Article on Gordon Lish, Raymond Carver and Barry Hannah

 

carver hannah lish critiquecarver hannah lish critique

Cover of New Issue of CRITIQUE

Article on Lish, Carver, Hannah in new CRITIQUE

New issue of Critique: Studies in Contempoary Fiction 52.4 contains my 10,000 word article, “Saying More Without Trying to Say More: On Gordon Lish Re-Shaping the Body of Raymond Carver and Saving Barry Hannah,” which is also, in a slightly expanded version, the second chapter in my overdue study on Lish contracted with Routledge. Did initial research in 2008 at Indiana University; submitted paper in 2009 while in Los Angeles and quickly accepted; published 2011 while I am in New York.

RIP Barry Hannah

Was floored and bummed when I heard of the passing of Barry Hannah.

First read him back in 1988-89, in the depths of my Lish Phase, and grabbing every Vintage Contemporaries paperback I could — Airships, and then Ray and Boomerang.

I re-read Hannah often — whether it is Hannah or Gordon Lish in those sentences, some mighty powerful stuff. I am wondering if I should do a full critical book — there are only two out.

HTML Giant has a post on Hannah, and I mentioned my essay and Gordon Lish book where I discovered, when looking at the Hannah manuscripts in Lish’s archives,  that Lish had saved the career of a writer bedeviled with booze and drugs and life, and several assholes claimed it self pormo.

To paraphrase William Carlos Williams: “There are a lot of assholes [bastards] out there.”

The pettiness of the small world of writers, would be writers, and publishers never ceases to make me shake my head and shrug.

Lish/Carver/Hannah Essay

My 13,000 word essay on Gordon Lish editing both Raymond Carver and Barry Hannah has been accepted for publication in Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction.

I now have three or four pieces in inventory there, since summer 2007, and none have been published yet….such is the nature of academic publishing.  Good thing I’m not up for tenure or looking for a teaching gig!