Five books of fiction for poets to read who want to be fiction writers (and a bonus memoir)chosen with enough word play to engage the poetic habit, and just enough plot. My theory is that poets sidle up to prose most easily if it exhibits some of the flash of poetry. Examples abound of the standard 19th century character-and-plot focus. If poets want to advance the cause of prose by revamping the sentence by plundering their craft, it's possible as long as they get a handle on narrative drive. I wrote a hundred stories before that previous sentence made much sense – Surprise! was my best.
Sixty Stories especially Donald Barthelme. The king of metafiction breaks it down. Especially easy to see narrative effects in “The Glass Mountain” with its numbered sentences and seemingly simple sentences.
The Assault by Reinaldo Arenas. Gay-Cuban-man-turned monster tries to kill his mother. Short chapters that suggest fiction writing isn't impossible, and organized as a quest, a form that is hard to screw up.
Autobiography of Red by Anne Carson. Perhaps better than her poetry, this short book is a primer in co-opting fictional structures for poetic ends.
Minor Angels by Antoine Volodine. Read any chapter in any order. Mongolian grandmothers of the future try to kill a grandson for political reasons. The points-of-view go way distort-o. Sci-fi at its most literary.
The Passport by Herta Muller. She received a Nobel for the way she torqued sentences. Don't bother me with Updike.
Self Portrait in Green by Marie N'Diaye. Ok, so it's memoir, but it reads like very strange fiction, and proves a prose writer can steal from poets without sounding effete.
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