Today I was rummaging through Powell’s interviews, and I ran across one with Jhumpa Lahiri, in which she stated her “literary mentors”: “Among short story writers, certainly Chekhov, and Joyce’s stories in Dubliners. Flannery O’Connor, Hemingway — those are all in the ‘twentieth-century but no longer living’ camp. Then there are still-living authors, like William Trevor and Alice Munro and Mavis Gallant, for stories.” Some of my favorites, too.
I think I listened to Lahiri read one of William Trevor’s short stories on the New Yorker podcast, but I could be imagining that. At any rate, I looked up his writing, and now have a book on hold at the library. What would you recommend to a person fairly unacquainted with Trevor? Stories or a novel? Any particular one?
Reading from other writers’ shelves is one fantastic way to find new reading material and inspiration, or at least for me it is. I also searched Mavis Gallant and put one of her books on hold. The mention of Flannery O’Connor reminded me of her giant Complete Stories on my nightstand that I’ve neglected for several months.
It’s good to remember good writing.
