Viv Groskop

The art of the short story: what we can learn from the Russians

In a dazzling creative writing masterclass George Saunders examines stories by Chekhov, Gogol, Tolstoy and Turgenev and explains what makes them so great

Illustration for Gogol’s ‘The Nose’ by Léon Bakst, 1904. Credit: Alamy 
issue 23 January 2021

This is such a superb idea that it’s a wonder a book like this has not cropped up before. Here we have a critically acclaimed, best-selling novelist, who also happens to be a highly sought-after creative writing teacher, setting out the curriculum of his over-subscribed ‘How to Write’ class in a way that is accessible to anyone… and the book reproduces the texts under discussion.

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