Mary Allen
The Rumpus
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Past articles by Mary:
Books as Art
We love books for many reasons. Take a quick break from marveling at the interweb and appreciate the physical book as an object, and as a piece of art. → Read More
Not Quite Human
For the second time that day, then, I waited in the dark for something not quite human—and all too human—to begin. If you haven’t seen Charlie Kaufman’s new film Anomalisa, we highly recommend that... → Read More
Writ in Water
John Keats died on February 23rd, 1821. The Paris Review muses on the death obsessed poet’s life, and what he cryptically requested be written on his tombstone: Here lies one whose name was writ in... → Read More
Teaching a Robot to Love
Last year physicist Stephen Hawking suggested that advanced artificial intelligence, or AI, could lead to the end of humanity. How are scientists working on this issue? Teaching robots empathy with... → Read More
The Invisible Lower Class
Raymond Carver and other “Kmart realists” championed the working class in high-brow literary fiction. But has the realism of the 99% gone out of style? Electric Literature explores. → Read More
How to Write Something
Keep a close eye on your Twitter account. Important things may be said there that you will be expected to weigh in on, and if you don’t, everyone will wonder if you fell asleep in the bathroom stal... → Read More
Authors and the Automated
The Believer Logger contributes more insights into the never-ending conversation on the role of technology in our writing. Does it mean demise? Or can authors persist on in the face of an ever more... → Read More
The Autobiographical Novel
Why is it not a memoir, people will ask. I tell more truth in fiction, you might say. Alexander Chee gives step-by-step instructions on how to write an autobiographical novel, and it’s beautiful. → Read More
National Amnesia
Race is an important and central issue in the United States, but what about abroad? It appears that both the United States and the United Kingdom are witnessing one of those moments when we confron... → Read More
Metaphor in Retrograde
Is your big break finally coming? Will you get that novel finished? Are you about to be struck over the head with a mallet of inspiration? All of these questions answered and more, in your February... → Read More
Do You Remember That Thing?
Where do our words go when we lose them? Jenny Diski embarks on an exploration into vanishing vocabulary: So I had a thought about writing a book for the elderly, the old. Those who have lost their... → Read More
That’s Racist
As much as we cherish the books from our childhood, there is no denying that some of the stories are just a little (or a lot) racist. But how do we reconcile this truth? They were the feckless pri... → Read More
Wonderfully Witchy
A totally fantastic new comic of literary witches over at Electric Literature. Let your day get a bit magical. → Read More
Like Thoreau, But Not
Writers for generation have sought out the solitude of the wilderness to get their work done. But sometimes it’s not as romantic as we hope. → Read More
Down Dog
I will tell you this: taking life is a heady thing. Blasphemous and seductive. Only childbirth can compare, but it can’t unmake you in the same way. Life slipping from you is not a choice you make,... → Read More
Right on Time
The debate has typically been framed around whether it is ever appropriate for a writer to reference Seinfeld, Bright Eyes, or Facebook. What makes more sense is to talk about whether or not doing ... → Read More
Immortalizing History
Literature continually reminds us that we are not alone and (to paraphrase Kundera) that things are not always as simple as they seem. With so many stories, histories, characters and figures popula... → Read More
But Is It Dangerous?
Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf has recently become legal to publish and sell in Germany for the first time since World War II. What place does this volume hold in our collective world history? And shoul... → Read More
Can Creativity Be Taught?
Is creativity something we are born with? Can it only be nurtured, or can it be taught? Scientist discuss this age-old question for PRI. → Read More
Shocking the American Short Story
Three more anthologies published last year suggest that while the story remains one of our most flexible popular literary forms, and the quickest to absorb signals from the culture, if we’r... → Read More