A teaching day, and I still have to write one student's feedback letter. So, brief for now: Lydia Davis' story "Lost Things" which students always care about. I have it on the syllabus for the last workshop in December when we're going to talk about short short fiction, including work by Kim Chinquee, Deb Olen Unferth, and Diane Williams.
LOST THINGS
Lydia Davis
They are lost, but also not lost but somewhere in the world. Most of them are small, though two are larger, one a coat and one a dog. Of the small things, one is a valuable ring, one a valuable button. They are lost from me and where I am, but they are also not gone. They are somewhere else, and they are there in someone else, it may be. But if not there to someone else, the ring is, still, not lost to itself, but there, only not where I am, and the button, too, there, still, only not where I am.
4 comments:
Hey Paul,
If you haven't already, check out Miranda July's story "The Moves" in her book No One Belongs Here More Than You. Kind of amazing.
Thanks, Aaron. I bought that book when it came out and haven't gone back to it, so it's nice to get a reminder. I hope your semester is going well. (Where are you teaching, by the way?)
Hi Paul,
I'm at a tiny liberal arts college in West Virginia...A huge change from NYC, but it's okay in its own way...
Ah, I think I remember hearing about this. That's not where James Hall taught, is it?
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