Sat, 03 Jan 2009 19:40:07 GMT The Bat Segundo Show: Allison Amend Allison Amend most recently appeared on The Bat Segundo Show #256. Allison Amend is the author of Things That Pass for Love. Condition of Mr. Segundo: Pondering the troubling things that pass for love. Author:Allison AmendSubjects Discussed: Dealings with the Atlantic Monthly, what constitutes a proper golf story, miniature golf, how Jewishness and faith relates to sustaining a narrative, speaking multiple languages, Pig Latin, the connotations of molested, small animals in short stories, whether an author should be concerned about manipulating the reader, grabbing the interviewer by the beard, discovering stories through subconscious intent, stories that need more gerbil, writing stories that run counter to an innate perspective, verisimilitude, magical realism, whether multifarious themes and motifs disguise the primary premise of a story, the narrative complexities of romantic intimacy, avoiding the chick lit label, Curtis Sittenfeld, the Glimmer Train essay, Amends two unpublished novels, dealing with potential editors who issue demands to include a love story, how much one should compromise for art, authenticity vs. marketability, frequent appearances of Zima within Amends stories, authors who include brand names in fiction, experimenting with lists and found documents, planning the endings of stories, selecting stories for the collection, and thematic unity. EXCERPT FROM SHOW:Correspondent: Golf figures prominently into a number of these stories. In How Much Greater the Miracle, you write, The soul and golf are interrelated. I try not to wax too philosophical, but the soul is like a golf ball. Now is this particular statement one of the reasons you frequently return to golf in your writing? Do you feel that golf gets a bad rap? Is this your way of essentially taking it, or absconding it, from the upper-class country club associations? Are you trying to counter the John Updike/Richard Ford/Kevin Costner kind of approach to golf? I think this is a very important question! Amend: Sure, sure. I think that your answer is much better than the one Im going to give you. Correspondent: No, Im sure your answer is going to be fantastic. Amend: Which is that back when I was in grad school, Michael Curtis, who edits the fiction for the Atlantic Monthly, requested some golf stories. He was editing the fiction section of Golf Digest. Correspondent: Oh wow. Amend: And he needed some golf stories. So I was like, I can write a golf story. And he said, Oh, its very good. I dont want it. But its a good story. And I said, Thank you. Ill write another one. So I wrote another golf story. Correspondent: Aha! Amend: He said, I dont want this either. But I like your writing. So I wrote one more just to see. But actually I do really like golf as a literary theme. Because, first of all, its something for your characters to do without really having to have them do a lot of business. So everyone knows how you play. I mean, everyone sort of knows the theory of golf. You hit a ball towards a hole. And so your characters can talk a lot and can think about things without its not like its basketball, where you have to describe the reaction all the time. So I really like golf that way. But also its this really absurd game. I played a lot when I was younger and dont play so much now. But if you told me that you cant see theres a hole about the size of your palm and you cant see it from here. But if you hit the ball three times, you will hit it in the hole. I would never have believed it. Correspondent: Now you say that you had had golf experience before when you had been asked to do these stories. Or did you have to go into golf again and do a refresher course so to speak? Or a refresher run? Amend: Well, I was at Iowa. We had a lot of free time. Correspondent: Okay. They have golf in Iowa. Amend: They do have golf in Iowa. And its actually pretty accessible. Theres a great municipal golf course. A nine hole golf course. And so I actually played a decent round of golf. But mostly I just asked my parents. They are very into golf. And so when I needed some golf details to make the story seem more authentic, I just asked them. I said, What do you do if the balls on the side of a hill? And my dads like, Well, you hit down on it obviously. Im like, Oh, of course. And Im taking notes as Im talking to them. So that was my golf experience. Correspondent: But this is an interesting notion of what a golf story is. Amend: Right. Correspondent: Because if one plays golf, its automatically a golf story? Or golf happens to be a motif? I mean, how golf-intensive does a golf story have to be? Amend: You know, I dont know. I dont think that the golf story is going to be the next hot genre. Although there is the golf novel that does pretty well apparently every year. But for me, its just a story where I have to ask my parents a lot of questions about golf to write it. So to me, thats a golf story. Correspondent: Im just wondering if theres any golf criteria for a golf story. Ive never been asked to write a golf story. And Ive never actually considered, until we just talked about this subject, about what a golf story entails. And so Im wondering. Maybe its like a Christmas story. Amend: It just has to be some Christmas. Correspondent: Yeah, I dont know. Amend: Yeah, I think so. Im not sure that Im the best person to ask, since none of my stories were accepted for Golf Digest. Correspondent: But theyre in here! Theres like three golf stories in here. Amend: But theyre in there. In which case, golf is sort of a theme. Correspondent: Yeah! So you are a golf story person. Amend: Apparently, Im a golf story person. Correspondent: Among many other things. Well, okay. Amend: Well, I could be. Ive been called worse. BSS #256: Allison Amend (Download MP3) This text will be replaced
Tue, 30 Dec 2008 13:48:53 GMT Five Blue-Chip U.S. Golf Vacations - Street.Com The ultimate golf destination should have year-round courses, a signature course worthy of a pilgrimage and a wide variety of courses to suit scratch golfers and passionate beginners. And it should have something else to do or see, either after a …
This entry was posted
on Saturday, January 3rd, 2009 at 3:03 pm and is filed under Golf Tips.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
Both comments and pings are currently closed.
Correspondent: Golf figures prominently into a number of these stories. In How Much Greater the Miracle, you write, The soul and golf are interrelated. I try not to wax too philosophical, but the soul is like a golf ball. Now is this particular statement one of the reasons you frequently return to golf in your writing? Do you feel that golf gets a bad rap? Is this your way of essentially taking it, or absconding it, from the upper-class country club associations? Are you trying to counter the John Updike/Richard Ford/Kevin Costner kind of approach to golf? I think this is a very important question! Amend: Sure, sure. I think that your answer is much better than the one Im going to give you. Correspondent: No, Im sure your answer is going to be fantastic. Amend: Which is that back when I was in grad school, Michael Curtis, who edits the fiction for the Atlantic Monthly, requested some golf stories. He was editing the fiction section of Golf Digest. Correspondent: Oh wow. Amend: And he needed some golf stories. So I was like, I can write a golf story. And he said, Oh, its very good. I dont want it. But its a good story. And I said, Thank you. Ill write another one. So I wrote another golf story. Correspondent: Aha! Amend: He said, I dont want this either. But I like your writing. So I wrote one more just to see. But actually I do really like golf as a literary theme. Because, first of all, its something for your characters to do without really having to have them do a lot of business. So everyone knows how you play. I mean, everyone sort of knows the theory of golf. You hit a ball towards a hole. And so your characters can talk a lot and can think about things without its not like its basketball, where you have to describe the reaction all the time. So I really like golf that way. But also its this really absurd game. I played a lot when I was younger and dont play so much now. But if you told me that you cant see theres a hole about the size of your palm and you cant see it from here. But if you hit the ball three times, you will hit it in the hole. I would never have believed it. Correspondent: Now you say that you had had golf experience before when you had been asked to do these stories. Or did you have to go into golf again and do a refresher course so to speak? Or a refresher run? Amend: Well, I was at Iowa. We had a lot of free time. Correspondent: Okay. They have golf in Iowa. Amend: They do have golf in Iowa. And its actually pretty accessible. Theres a great municipal golf course. A nine hole golf course. And so I actually played a decent round of golf. But mostly I just asked my parents. They are very into golf. And so when I needed some golf details to make the story seem more authentic, I just asked them. I said, What do you do if the balls on the side of a hill? And my dads like, Well, you hit down on it obviously. Im like, Oh, of course. And Im taking notes as Im talking to them. So that was my golf experience. Correspondent: But this is an interesting notion of what a golf story is. Amend: Right. Correspondent: Because if one plays golf, its automatically a golf story? Or golf happens to be a motif? I mean, how golf-intensive does a golf story have to be? Amend: You know, I dont know. I dont think that the golf story is going to be the next hot genre. Although there is the golf novel that does pretty well apparently every year. But for me, its just a story where I have to ask my parents a lot of questions about golf to write it. So to me, thats a golf story. Correspondent: Im just wondering if theres any golf criteria for a golf story. Ive never been asked to write a golf story. And Ive never actually considered, until we just talked about this subject, about what a golf story entails. And so Im wondering. Maybe its like a Christmas story. Amend: It just has to be some Christmas. Correspondent: Yeah, I dont know. Amend: Yeah, I think so. Im not sure that Im the best person to ask, since none of my stories were accepted for Golf Digest. Correspondent: But theyre in here! Theres like three golf stories in here. Amend: But theyre in there. In which case, golf is sort of a theme. Correspondent: Yeah! So you are a golf story person. Amend: Apparently, Im a golf story person. Correspondent: Among many other things. Well, okay. Amend: Well, I could be. Ive been called worse. 