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A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life Hardcover - 2021
by Saunders, George
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- Hardcover
- first
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Details
- Title A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life
- Author Saunders, George
- Binding Hardcover
- Edition First Edition
- Condition New
- Pages 432
- Volumes 1
- Language ENG
- Publisher Random House
- Date 2021-01-12
- Bookseller's Inventory # 2406240004
- ISBN 9781984856029 / 1984856022
- Weight 1.52 lbs (0.69 kg)
- Dimensions 11.8 x 8.6 x 3.7 in (29.97 x 21.84 x 9.40 cm)
- Library of Congress subjects Tolstoy, Leo, Chekhov, Anton Pavlovich
- Library of Congress Catalog Number 2020031045
- Dewey Decimal Code 891.708
About Twice Sold Tales Massachusetts, United States
Specializing in: 20th Century Literature, Intellectual History, Literary Theory, Philosophy, Poetry, Social Sciences
Biblio member since 2006
Specialize in Modern American First Edition Fiction and Non-Fiction - General Collectible Books
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Summary
For the last twenty years, George Saunders has been teaching a class on the Russian short story to his MFA students at Syracuse University. In A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, he shares a version of that class with us, offering some of what he and his students have discovered together over the years. Paired with iconic short stories by Chekhov, Turgenev, Tolstoy, and Gogol, the seven essays in this book are intended for anyone interested in how fiction works and why it’s more relevant than ever in these turbulent times.
In his introduction, Saunders writes, “We’re going to enter seven fastidiously constructed scale models of the world, made for a specific purpose that our time maybe doesn’t fully endorse but that these writers accepted implicitly as the aim of art—namely, to ask the big questions, questions like, How are we supposed to be living down here? What were we put here to accomplish? What should we value? What is truth, anyway, and how might we recognize it?” He approaches the stories technically yet accessibly, and through them explains how narrative functions; why we stay immersed in a story and why we resist it; and the bedrock virtues a writer must foster. The process of writing, Saunders reminds us, is a technical craft, but also a way of training oneself to see the world with new openness and curiosity.