In Unsayable: A Life in Writing, Pulitzer Prize–winning author Michael Cunningham reflects on his life as a writer and on the craft of writing through intimate portraits and memories of his lifelong love of language. In vignettes with titles, such as “How to Write, How Not to Write,” “Is It Autobiographical?” and “Notes for a Story I Didn’t Write,” Cunningham offers his companionship on the journey of a writer’s life, from discovering the power of language to the mysteries of putting words down on paper. “Stories are, by definition, experiences about experiences,” he writes, “and we who write them know that any story, even the greatest of them, is an approximation of the unsayable—that which we all know but can’t express in language.” With insights on craft and storytelling, process, and exemplary passages from authors including Cormac McCarthy, Toni Morrison, and Marilynne Robinson, this book is full of inspiration.
