Wonderlands
Essays on the Life of Literature
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3.0 • 1 Rating
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- $9.99
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- $9.99
Publisher Description
Searching and erudite new essays on writing from the author of Burning Down the House.
Charles Baxter’s new collection of essays, Wonderlands, joins his other works of nonfiction, Burning Down the House and The Art of Subtext. In the mold of those books, Baxter shares years of wisdom and reflection on what makes fiction work, including essays that were first given as craft talks at the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference.
The essays here range from brilliant thinking on the nature of wonderlands in the fiction of Haruki Murakami and other fabulist writers, to how request moments function in a story. Baxter is equally at home tackling a thorny matter such as charisma (which intersects with political figures like the disastrous forty-fifth US president) as he is bringing new interest to subjects such as list-making in fiction.
Amid these craft essays, an interlude of two personal essays—the story of a horrifying car crash and an introspective “letter to a young poet”—add to the intimate nature of the book. The final essay reflects on a lifetime of writing, and closes with a memorable image of Baxter as a boy, waiting at the window for a parent who never arrives and filling that absence with stories. Wonderlands will stand alongside his prior work as an insightful and lasting work of criticism.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Novelist Baxter (The Sun Collective) combines memoir with writing tips in this eclectic collection. In "The Request Moment, or ‘There's Something I Want You to Do'," he makes a case that inserting a request into a story can save ones that "sit there" and do nothing, while "Inventories and Undoings" offers a reading of William Maxwell's So Long, See You Tomorrow and a reflection on his experience sorting through his dead brother's belongings. This autobiographical bent extends to "What Happens in Hell," about a terrifying car crash that happened after his limo driver fell asleep at the wheel. In the title essay, Baxter recounts a course he taught at the University of Minnesota on "seemingly haunted narratives," with Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon and Jean Rhys's Good Morning, Midnight as examples: "you know you've entered a Wonderland when someone says, ‘There's something bad and weird in the air,'" he writes. Baxter's voice is erudite, witty, and humble, and he brings his observations together with smart quips on the writing life: "I think writers should make their own mistakes.... Why should anyone try to avoid failure, mistakes, heartbreak, sorrow, drunkenness, sexual confusion, and apathy?" Budding novelists, take note.
