It’s the first semester of freshman year at Carnegie Mellon. I’m enrolled in Calculus for Science Majors. After the midterm, I skipped a couple of the weekly recitations. Then, when I finally did show up, I looked for my test in a pile of graded assignments. On one midterm, in the space marked, “Name _______”, …
Tag Archives: Vollmann
The writer we deserve
Originally published March 2, 2016, Seattle Review of Books. It’s early in the year, time for taking on ambitious, resolution-worthy reading projects, and what better project than The Dying Grass, the latest novel from William T. Vollmann? Vollmann, our young nation’s own Tolstoy. Russia can keep Count Lev Nikolaevich and his high society, literary friends, …