Zeno's Bar & Grill

Right now, I am loving this one quote from Michael Chabon that I recently ran across. I haven't been able to get it out of my mind, probably because he's got such a great turn of phrase. He wrote it in reference to short stories (as part of an introduction to a collection he edited a couple of years ago.)

Basically, he was decrying the modern short story, which he described as the "contemporary, quotidian, plotless, moment-of-truth revelatory story...sparkling with epiphanic dew."

His comments sparked lots of debate at the time, with some writers defending their right to sparkly epiphanies to the death, but it seems to me to be right on target, and applicable to novels as well.

It's true, isn't it: the epiphany is often the easy way out. Not that epiphanies aren't good, but they ought to be part of some greater scheme of things.

--Mel