<p>So…I think we’ve said enough about our talented young alumna, but people obviously have a lot to say about writing and writers. Who has influenced you as a writer (not necessarily professionally)?</p>
<p>I grew up reading all of the old, original New Yorker writers–my grandfather was a fanatic reader of that magazine, and had compilations by all of them. James Thurber, Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley, that whole crew (I also discovered Herblock and Pogo through Grandpa’s personal library). You might recall that E.B. White–a student of Wm. Strunk’s at Cornell–was also part of that particular stable of writers. I think he was the most pedestrian of the bunch, but he did a great service to the world with his children’s books and his updates to his mentor’s “Elements of Style.” </p>
<p>I think James Thurber was not only the funniest of the group, but also perhaps the most skillful wordsmith the United States has ever produced. When E.B. White wrote: “Write with nouns and verbs, not with adjectives and adverbs. The adjective hasn’t been built that can pull a weak or inaccurate noun out of a tight place” he was referring to Thurber’s extraordinary talent, IMO. </p>
<p>I also think that Harold Ross–the under-educated founder of The New Yorker–had extraordinary editing skills that helped make many of these talented writers accessible to regular readers. Apparently, he used to like to argue about punctuation at great length, prompting one of the group to call his reign at the magazine “the era of the Comma Man.”</p>
<p>As a prose writer: EB White, Mencken, Didion (Slouching Towards Bethlehem), Annie Dillard (Pilgrim at Tinkers Creek – amazing sentences), John McPhee.</p>
<p>John McPhee may be the best essayist ever. A writer who can take something you may never have heard of, something very esoteric, and make it hopelessly fascinating. “The Pine Barrens,” “Oranges,” and “On Suspect Terrain” come immediately to mind. He is a genius.</p>
<p>On Thurber…I’ve taught writing courses in the past, and one exercise I liked was to have the class write an essay-length biography of a pet. I then had them read two Thurber essays: “The Dog That Bit People,” and “Snapshot of a Dog.” Both are brilliant pieces of writing, but quite different. The first–about a family dog named “Muggsy”–is typical Thurber–wonderfully descriptive, impossible to read without laughing–right up to, and including, Muggsy’s demise. The second–about “Rex”-- has wonderful humor as well, but is clearly a true eulogy from start-to-finish; it’s impossible to read without crying. The juxtaposing of these short essays always made a big impression.</p>
<p>Michael Chabon, Paul Monette, Anna Quindlen, Flannery O’Connor, Andre Dubus III, Michael Cunningham, and Joan Didion, whose latest book broke my heart.</p>
<p>I don’t give a hoot what anyone says about the lack of literary merit in genre fiction, that man is a genius with the written word.</p>
<p>Also, Margret Rey, the wonderful lady who brought the world Curious George. It was the first work of fiction I’ve ever read, and it still holds a place next my heart to this day.</p>
<p>Stephen King is a very good writer I haven’t read his newest book about writing but it is supposed to be very good
I prefer his short stories though- some very good ones
in the same league with Ray Bradbury or John Collier perhaps
Oh that reminds me, a different sort of short stories Isak Dinesen
Winters Tales & Gothic Tales- boy are they :)</p>
<p>There are a lot of writers I enjoy who can turn a phrase and spin a yarn, but when I think of my favorites, I always think of what Harold Bloom said about James Merrill: “his work provides one of the authentic enlargements of life.” Life always seems larger when I read Nabokov, Melville, Merrill, Faulkner, McCarthy, Woolf, Dickinson.</p>
<p>Alice Munro (current binge), Garcia Marquez, Reynolds Price, Richard Ford, Annie Proulx, Toni Morrison, all spellbinding voices resonant of place and wonderful to get old with, may they stay well and keep writing, I fret as they are getting on a bit. For humanity and fluidity of language, the still untapped talent of Michael Chabon. For flair and originality, Haruki Murakami. For prose of elegance Ishiguru. Favorite lost voices of our last century: missing Isaac Singer, still reading Penn Warren, and the Delta’s melancholy thinking doctor Walker Percy, can’t believe Raymond Carver has been gone for so long.</p>
<p>I love Richard Ford, but is he really resonant of place? I thought the irrelevance of place in contemporary America was one of the themes of The Sportswriter; I seem to remember Frank Bascombe reflecting on this idea at one point in the novel–or maybe it was Ford himself in an interview? Can’t remember–it’s been awhile. But at least Ford is still writing; I think his latest novel–his third Frank Bascombe book–is due out some time this year.</p>
<p>well I think Frank’s tour of the New Jersey real estate market was pretty dead-on and also his work set in the western US like Rock Springs and Wildfire. Anyone who can call Eudora Welty a friend has a sense of place but he is restless! His wife was a the city planner for New Orleans for many years. Last year, my son was very enamored with Bowdoin College, which is an excellent place in my view, but I was really looking forward to seeing the Fords on campus…they had a two year contract to teach there. oh yeah…it was never me that was going to be attending and in his writing class…I was only going to be making payments. Regardless, they have left Bowdoin I have been told, but we can look forward to getting on with life with another installment from wry Frank. But Richard Ford really won my heart with his short essay published shortly after 9/11 in the Sunday supplement of the NYTs. It’s simplicity broke my heart…he wrote about being present as a young teen when his father suddenly died but how much better that was than what our Twin Towers families were left to endure…deprived of being in any way beside those they loved most when they left this world. well the essay was much better than my reference to it.</p>
<p>I share a birthday with Stephen King but would rather share his bank account. </p>
<p>My tastes aren’t nearly as literary as many cited here, though I think I’m on the literary edge of the divide in the commercial/literary spectrum.<br>
I’m currently re-reading a series of Robertson Davies novels for the umpteenth time…love WHAT’S BRED IN THE BONE, in particular. I once read three of this trilogies in an appraisal class over several weeks.</p>
<p>I’d give my left arm to write like Mary Renault in her series of Greek-based historicals. Oddly similar in a different vein are the works of John LeCarre, imo.</p>
<p>The wordplay and immense knowledge of history, religion, and culture of SF writer Avram Davidson I find marvelous. The short work of SF writer Roger Zelazny and film-maker & sexual neurotic Woodie Allen both appeal to me for vastly different reasons.</p>
<p>Going a little more downscale, there are works by Larry McMurtry that are good enough that I re-read to see how he pulled something off. I like James Clavell when he is neither lazy nor overly indulged by his editors…many forget that he wrote the screenplay for “The Great Escape.”</p>
<p>There are writers that I appreciate as being outstanding writers, like Flannery O’Connor, but do not necessarily enjoy. </p>
<p>I’ll probably think of more when I wake up in the morn.</p>
<p>Just read a raw but commanding SF first novel by newcomer Brit Susanna Clarke. Called “Harry Potter for grownups by some” does it a disservice. It’s downright Dickensian in some ways, with a very rich text and reaching deep into English mythology and poetry; even at an epic 846-page length it felt as if the ending were hurried. It’s raw and uneven but has a lot to like.</p>
Another fervent New Yorker fan here, driver, most especially of the classic stuff. It’s still my favorite magazine, but I find some of the subject matter today, for example the article about the tribulations of being a male porn star, jarring (ditto for the language).</p>
<p>I HIGHLY recommend the 8-CD compilation, “The Complete New Yorker.” It’s my favorite Christmas gift ever - I think it set dh back about seventy bucks. It’s awkward to read long articles on my monitor, expensive to print them out, and maybe the index could be better, but I don’t care. It gives you every issue in its entirety from 1925 on, and it’s nirvana.</p>
<p>It might be interesting to steer this back to the original question: Which writers have influenced you and (adding another part to the question) in what ways. This has become a discussion of which writers we like and recommendations, but sometimes there are real influences that help determine careers or politics or attitudes or feelings. That would be a more interesting discussion.</p>
<p>I think Coetze is the best writer I have ever read, excepting maybe Dickens. But he’s not an influence, as I cannot figure out how he wrote Disgrace, what made it so astonishing. The best writers don’t influence me, they just amaze me.</p>
<p>I agree with alum–great point about great writers. In terms of influence, I think I’ve been influenced more by writers I don’t like, especially the sort of middlebrow literati whose writing reeks of self-satisfaction and mannered lyricism. Whenever I read Annie Dillard, for example, I can just see her basking in the pleasure of having come up with such a clever metaphor or yet another poetic turn of phrase. That kind of writing always reminds me not to strive for lyricism or elegance, just to let it happen by having something to say and saying it well.</p>