Award Date

1-1-2004

Degree Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Fine Arts (MFA)

Department

English

First Committee Member

Douglas Unger

Number of Pages

122

Abstract

The seeds of Roaring Orchards were planted during a spring drive to Williams College. In one of the outdoor malls spread along the roads that lead east from the northbound curl of the Taconic Parkway, there is on Sundays a small farmers' market. I stopped to get a carton of blueberries from the produce tent, and wandered to a table stacked with used books for sale. Most were illustrated biographies of baseball players and how-to books, but there were also a few dusty yellow paperbacks. I bought The Palm at the End of the Mind, Nostromo, and The Portable Chekov. It wasn't until I got back to my car that, flipping through the pages of Chekov, I found teeth marks on the margins of the pages. I enjoyed for a moment imagining that these weren't the work of a child but the result of a more visceral frustration with Chekov's understated depiction of grief. That those teeth marks betokened an exasperation, a silent scream that inscribed what Chekov so often left unsaid. Roaring Orchards grew out of an attempt to articulate that impulse.

Keywords

Novel; Orchards; Original writing; Roaring

Controlled Subject

American literature

File Format

pdf

File Size

3471.36 KB

Degree Grantor

University of Nevada, Las Vegas

Language

English

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