Essays One, Lydia Davis
Essays One, Lydia Davis
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Essays One

Author: Lydia Davis

Narrator: Janet Metzger

Unabridged: 14 hr 13 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 07/07/2020


Synopsis

A selection of essays on writing and reading by the master short-fiction writer Lydia Davis

Lydia Davis is a writer whose originality, influence, and wit are beyond compare. Jonathan Franzen has called her "a magician of self-consciousness," while Rick Moody hails her as "the best prose stylist in America." And for Claire Messud, "Davis's signal gift is to make us feel alive."

Best known for her masterful short stories and translations, Davis's gifts extend equally to her nonfiction. In Essays One, Davis has, for the first time, gathered a selection of essays, commentaries, and lectures composed over the past five decades.

In this first of two volumes, her subjects range from her earliest influences to her favorite short stories, from John Ashbery's translation of Rimbaud to Alan Cote's painting, and from the Shepherd's Psalm to early tourist photographs. On display is the development and range of one of the sharpest, most capacious minds writing today.

About Lydia Davis

Lydia Davis is the author of The End of the Story: A Novel and several story collections, including Varieties of Disturbance, a finalist for the 2007 National Book Award. She is also the acclaimed translator of Swann's Way and Madame Bovary, both of which were awarded the French American Foundation Translation Prize. The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis, published in 2009, was described by James Wood in the New Yorker as a "grand cumulative achievement." She is the winner of the 2013 Man Booker International Prize.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Jeff

A true treasure trove. Terrific essays on under-read visionaries like Blanchot, Mallarme, Joubert, Butor, and Leiris, plus some of the best practical writing advice I've ever encountered.......more

Goodreads review by Tosh

A remarkable collection of essays by the brilliant prose writer Lydia Davis. I recommend this book to those who write. The first piece in the book "The Practice of Writing" is essential advice in choosing one's words correctly and economically. Also pieces on translations, essay writing, history, an......more