The Napkin Manuscripts: Selected Essays and an InterviewThe Napkin Manuscripts is a collection of twenty-two engaging prose pieces written over the past several decades by Michael McFee – poet, essayist, editor, and teacher. Taken together, they constitute a wide-ranging exploration of what working writers do, how they do it, and what it means. The book is divided into four parts: Section one is composed of personal essays, and is rooted in the landscape and culture of the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, where the author grew up and where he often returns for inspiration. Section two gathers essays about the literary life and writing, among them pieces on editing, on teaching, on memorizing poetry, on rejection slips, on typewriters, and on becoming and being a writer. Section three collects seven essays about individual Appalachian writers, among them Fred Chappell, Kathryn Stripling Byer, and Robert Morgan. Section four consists of a public interview conducted at the Michael McFee Literary Festival at Emory & Henry College a few years ago, and recapitulates many of the book’s topics in lively conversational form. The Napkin Manuscripts will appeal to anyone with a connection to Appalachia and the South; to readers interested in contemporary poetry and literature; and to teachers, writers, and students of poetry, essays, and creative non-fiction. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 31
Page 5
Sorry, this page's content is restricted.
Sorry, this page's content is restricted.
Page 8
Sorry, this page's content is restricted.
Sorry, this page's content is restricted.
Page 12
Sorry, this page's content is restricted.
Sorry, this page's content is restricted.
Page 20
Sorry, this page's content is restricted.
Sorry, this page's content is restricted.
Page 21
Sorry, this page's content is restricted.
Sorry, this page's content is restricted.
Contents
Back Home | 5 |
Unsent Letter to Robert Morgan | 17 |
Christmases with Flannery | 25 |
The Other Side of the Desk | 52 |
First Lessons | 62 |
The Slip | 74 |
Who Knows? | 81 |
Typewriter Writer | 91 |
The Epigrammatical Fred Chappell | 111 |
Robert Watsons Please | 124 |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
A. R. Ammons Ammons Ammons's Appalachian writer Asheville blue bouncing off cloud called cedar Chapel Hill Chappell's Confederate flag cover letters dark death desk Doris Betts editor epigrams especially essays eyes feel fiction Flannery Fred Chappell Frost Gerald Barrax girl hear heart human imagination J. V. Cunningham Kathryn Stripling Byer landscape language literary living look magazine memorable metaphor Michael McFee Midquest mountains Napkin Manuscripts nature never night North Carolina opening paper phrase Piedmont Plain Air pleasure poem poem's poet poet's poetic poetry professor published Quarterly Radio reader recite remember Reprinted by permission rhyme Richard Wilbur Ridge Robert Morgan scar seems slip song Southern speaker stanza Steve story sure teacher teaching there's things typewriter verbal verse voice walk words writing poems wrote Yucca Moth