Tiah Beautement's Blog, page 80

On the every day

Wars and elections are both too big and too small to matter in the long run. The daily work - that goes on, it adds up. - Barbara Kingsolver

On Whoever Fears the Sea

Justin Fox, Whoever Fears the Sea - Hannah had returned with the darkness. If only he could shift the ballast, change tack. Why did the touch of a woman means so much more when at sea, he wondered. - - Paul thought about how each journey, each documentary he made, was a thing external to himself, a drama in which he participated. . . But now he could rework the script. That's what travel is all about, he thought. a constant rewriting. - - A ship must not be blind, you understand. - - Like thieves in the night -...

On destruction

The urge to destroy is also a creative urge. - Pablo Picasso

On Carol Shields Collected Stories, Part I

Carol Shields Collected Stories is composed of Shields' last work, 'Segue' and her three short story anthologies: Various Miracles, The Orange Fish and Dressing Up for the Carnival. The following quotes are from 'Segue' and Various Miracles. Carol Shields, Collected Stories Part I - But if you picture the sonnet, instead, as a little sound, a ping in the great wide silent world, you make visible a sudden fluidity to the form, a splash of noise, but a carefully measured splash that's saved from preciosity by the fact that it comes from within the body's own borders... - - I...

On two stories

Earlier in the week itch published my story "Uncle Jack": Three pairs of eyes blinked. They took in the wild reddish curls. "Big hair," their mother had said. They took in the long fingers, decorated with numerous rings and ending in long red nails. "Impractical," their mother had said. They took in her earrings, so large that little Ida could have used them as doll’s hula-hoops. "Can tell she doesn’t have children," their mother had said. They took in the shoes, with heels so high and pointy they could have doubled as knitting needles. "Asking for bunions," their mother had...

On Doctor Sleep

Stephen King, Doctor Sleep - He reached into the brown paper sack, loosened the cap on the glass container of intoxicating liquid, and smelled the brown smell. That smell could talk, although it only had one thing to say: Hello, old friend. - - We're all dying. The world's just a hospice with fresh air. - - The mind was a blackboard. Booze was the eraser. - - At times like this he regretted none of the pain and sorrow and anger and horror, because they had brought him here to this room while the wind whooped outside. - -...

On writers

Writers who don't write are fucked. We descend slowly into a pit of despair from which the only escape is another novel or short story or even a blog post. But the longer you leave it, the further you sink. The further you sink, the harder it becomes to sort through the mess in your head and pair character with plot, fill their mouths with dialogue and scatter dead flies on their windowsills. At some point the voice becomes two, then three, then four. All that stuff you're constantly uploading swirls around like a tornado, battering against the inside of...

On the beat

- A story needs rhythm. Read it aloud to yourself. If it doesn't spin a bit of magic, it's missing something. - - Esther Freud

On Efemia Chela

Efemia Chela is the third place winner of the Short Story Day Africa 2013 competition. Out of our three winners, she was the least google-able. This may have something to do with the fact she was only twenty-one when she wrote 'Chicken'. (Yes, we're biting back our jealousy of such talent at her age.) So with our interest piqued, we sent Tiah Beautement off to go find more about this promising writer. TB: Hi Efemia. Thank you for coming by my blog. I've followed you on twitter for a few months now, but confess to not knowing much about you....

On writing with children

- If you fear that taking care of your children and household will damage your writing, think of JG Ballard. - - Helen Dunmore