(from The Collected Stories)

Okay, you know I don’t go for meta much. But this bit of sedate and thoughtful satire gives hope to all self-important artists everywhere. Almost all of them. Almost hope. Mostly because there’s this character, her dad, who’s full of life and stubborn and, despite the apparent success of his author-daughter, decisive about the kind of fiction he likes. He’s a kind of voice of reason. It also helps that the narrator’s similarly stubborn and decisive. And not particularly self-important.
“I would like you to write a simple story just once more,” he says, “the kind de Maupassant wrote, or Chekhov, the kind you used to write. Just recognizable people and then write down what happened to them next.”
I say, “Yes, why not? That’s possible.” I want to please him, though I don’t remember writing that way. I would like to try to tell such a story, if he means the kind that begins: “There was a woman…” followed by plot, the absolute line between two points which I’ve always despised. Not for literary reasons, but because it takes all hope away. Everyone, real or invented, deserves the open destiny of life.
Beautiful.
Somebody named Andie Miller recommended this story to me, and sent me a link to read it here. Excellent suggestion. From what I gather Andie, lives in Johannesburg, South Africa, which might be furthest location from which I’ve received correspondence. Well, maybe. How far is China from Philadelphia?