Telling Stories: An Anthology For Writers

Drawn from Joyce Carol Oates's reading list at Princeton University, the pieces collected in Telling Stories provide beginning writers with models and inspiration for their own writing. Oates gathers here a diverse anthology of over one hundred works, including "miniature" narratives, dramatic monologues, poems that tell stories, memoir and diary excerpts, and a generous sampling of classic and contemporary short stories. Throughout, Oates has chosen exemplary writings - by relative newcomers and established authors alike - to delight readers as well as to stimulate students' own creative work. A general introduction and an afterword on the writing workshop offer students encouragement, advice, and exercises for writing. A text for creative writers, an anthology for fiction courses, Telling Stories provides a master's portrait of the art and craft of storytelling.

This exciting anthology by one of America's finest storytellers provides over ninety works of narrative art. With the reading list for her writing seminar at Princeton University as a model, Joyce Carol Oates chose pieces that will inspire beginning and experienced writers alike. Here are classics and relative unknowns, short vignettes and long genre fiction, tragic tales and humorous character sketches -- models for just about any writer. Section introductions and an Afterword on the writing workshop provide a glimpse of Oates's own understanding of the storyteller's craft.