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We had a lively and important conversation with author, publisher and literary curator Peg Alford Pursell, about the publishing landscape and how writers can successfully interact with it. Peg, who runs the popular reading series Why There Are Words, is launching an independent press with the same name. Starting with craft, we discussed forming a collection of stories as and after individual stories are produced, finding echoes, juxtapositions and correspondences between stories, and seeing new correspondences “that I had not imagined.” We talked about the way that the objects in the story carry emotional weight, tone, and do a lot of characterization. We also dug into what readers bring to a book, the fine line between mystery or intuition and intention in shaping your story, and the way that embracing the possibility the impossibility of objectivity allows her to release the work out into the world. She also probed the troubled area of letting go of your work–when and how to release it to the world, with a detailed look at the process of revision. Then we get her to switch hats and talk about the same issues from the point of view of the editor as she prepares to watch her own imprint and in her long history of curating the acclaimed reading series Why There are Words. Peg pointed out that profit and loss sheets are driving corporate publishing, and Angie drew parallels to the Hollywood studio system and its shortcomings. We talk very concretely about the amount of work it takes to get a manuscript ready to go out into the world, and how to know when you’re merely saturated, and when you’re actually done. Given the current playing field, should new authors shift their strategies for getting published? We got advice as well on starting a reading series, the pleasures and pitfalls, about publicists, publicity and self-promotion for authors (what you need to know), and then, circling back to writing, we touched on the art of compression and sensing the ending, since Peg writes some very short flash fiction. WTAW Press will be opening for book-length prose submissions June 15, 2016. “I want those voices that need to be heard. Please let people know that.” — Peg Alford Pursell
Links:
Ariel: The Restored Edition, a Facsimile of Plath’s Manuscript, Reinstating Her Original Selection and Arrangement
Margaret the First
Margaret the First published by Catapult Press
Why There Are Words reading series
Graywolf editor interview on Literary Hub
The Rumpus essay Elizabeth cited
https://www.facebook.com/wtawpress/?fref=ts
Peg Alford Pursell
Peg Alford Pursell is a writer, editor, teacher, literary community builder, and all-around good egg. She’s the author of the forthcoming SHOW HER A FLOWER, A BIRD, A SHADOW (ELJ Editions, March 2017).
Her stories have been published in or are forthcoming from VOLT, Soundings Review, RHINO, Permafrost, Eleven Eleven, Tupelo Quarterly, The Los Angeles Review, The Quotable, Joyland, Staccato Fiction, Emprise Review, Annalemma, The Fabulist, Sugar Mule, Blotterature, Her Royal Majesty, Pure Francis, and others.
Two of her stories were performed at Stories on Stage in Sacramento. Her 90-word, one-sentence story “Fragmentation” is the title story of Fragmentation and Other Stories (Burrow Press, 2011). Her 990-word story “Project,” published inAnnalemma Magazine, was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She evidently has an affinity for stories with word counts that are multiples of nine.
She lives in Northern California and curates the literary series Why There Are Words, held monthly in Sausalito. She is the founding editor of WTAW Press, an independent publisher of literary books. Peg also founded North Bay Writers Workshops. She works as a freelance editor and writing coach.
She earned her MFA in Creative Writing from the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers.
Story Makers is a podcast that features in-depth conversations with accomplished writers, filmmakers and industry experts about story craft, technique, habit and survival–everything you need to know to stay inspired, connect to your creativity, find others’ wonderful stories and your own success.
The hosts:
Elizabeth Stark is a published, agented novelist and distributed filmmaker who teaches and mentors writers at BookWritingWorld.com.
Angie Powers is a distributed filmmaker and published short story writer with an MFA in creative writing and a certificate in screenwriting from UCLA who teaches story structure at BookWritingWorld.com.
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