Inspiration From Across the Literary Landscape
Five acclaimed writers traverse the literary landscape, gleaning lessons from diverse genres of writing and bringing them back to bear on any work.
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Article Archive
Articles from Poet & Writers Magazine include material from the print edition plus exclusive online-only material.
Conjure the Strange: Lessons From Horror
The award-winning writer studies how the most powerful horror stories are grounded in “deeply human dilemma,” and how daring the ghoulish can bring us closer to our characters.
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Embrace the “And Then”: Lessons From Fairy Tales
Fairy tales are built on their own enchanting associative logic. A maestro of magical realism explores what writers can unlock when they let readers leap between a story’s plot points—and where such a trail of breadcrumbs can lead.
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Cultivate Suspense: Lessons From Thrillers
The author of Winter Counts offers a masterclass in building suspense, whether your character is planning a heist or planting a garden.
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New Ways of Seeing: Our Twenty-First Annual Look at Debut Poets
Ten debut poets, including Gbenga Adesina and Kalehua Kim, share the inspiration, advice, and writers block remedies that have sustained their literary practices.
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Brave New Metaphors: Lessons From Science Fiction
The celebrated writer shows how science fiction’s “novums”—the futuristic or fantastical developments a writer invents in their work—can delve into philosophical questions, explore contemporary issues, and help us see worlds that are not yet real.
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Ten Writers on Writing Advice: 2025
Ten authors answer the tenth question in our Ten Questions series: What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever received?
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Toward the Sensuous Form: Origins and Possible Trajectories of the Essay
The author of Voice of the Fish: A Lyric Essay (Graywolf Press, 2022) reflects on the ancient origins of the essay form.
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Ten Questions for Djaimilia Pereira de Almeida and Alison Entrekin
This week’s installment of Ten Questions features Djaimilia Pereira de Almeida and Alison Entrekin, the author and the translator of Three Stories of Forgetting.
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Ten Questions for Raquel Gutiérrez
“You have to learn to write when you don’t feel like it.” —Raquel Gutiérrez, author of Southwest Reconstruction
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The Long and Rolling Line
The author of Ocean of Clouds (Knopf, 2025) considers the lineage of his own loping lines and encourages poets to try them.
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Ten Questions for Juhea Kim
“Art is following your soul’s demand.” —Juhea Kim, author of A Love Story From the End of the World
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Plotting Form Ahead of Time
The author of Ocean of Clouds (Knopf, 2025) considers the benefits of planning elements of a poem before its composition.
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Ten Questions for Devon Walker-Figueroa
“It can take days, months, years for me to know when notes pass into the arena of poem or story.” —Devon Walker Figueroa, author of Lazarus Species
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Catching the “Chune”
The author of Ocean of Clouds (Knopf, 2025) reflects on the practice of poetry as one of both composition and listening.
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Ten Questions for Eshani Surya
“I’ve learned to be most interested in enjoying the process of making something emotionally true and honest.” —Ashani Surya, author of Ravishing
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Ten Questions for Sarah Hall
“I think the creative process is unboundaried.” —Sarah Hall, author of Helm
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Queering Language
The author of Bright Fear (Faber & Faber, 2023) and Flèche (Faber & Faber, 2019) explores what it means to write a self that “is in a perpetual state of becoming.”
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Ten Questions for Brandon Hobson
“How can we reach a higher truth in storytelling and art?” —Brandon Hobson, author of The Devil Is a Southpaw
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Writing Queerly
The author of Bright Fear (Faber & Faber, 2023) and Flèche (Faber & Faber, 2019) considers what it means to estrange a familiar motif in one’s writing.
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Ten Questions for Emily Wilson
“At a certain point, you just have to make that shift into the difficulty head-on. You have to hit it.” —Emily Wilson, author of Burnt Mountain
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Reading Queerly
The author of Bright Fear (Faber & Faber, 2023) and Flèche(Faber & Faber, 2019) reflects on how queer traces in literature can open doorways of possibility.
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Five Terrific Literary Magazines for Strange and Unusual Work
The editor of Diagram highlights five literary magazines with unexpected ambitions, including a celebration of sentence-long narratives and a journal dedicated to revenge.
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Five Fantastic Presses for Chapbooks
Writers looking to place their prose and poetry chapbooks will find committed advocates and caring editors at indie publishers including Cooper Dillon Books and Black Lawrence Press.
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