Photo by Sincerely Media on Unsplash
By Miles De Rosa, Staff Writer
American novelist and short-story writer Christine Schutt visited Susquehanna via Zoom on March 24 to read from her latest collection, “Pure Hollywood” and field questions from students. She is the latest writer to visit campus as a part of the Writers Institute’s Seavey Reading series.
Schutt delivered an impassioned reading of “Duchess of Albany,” a short story about an alcoholic, widowed writer and her relationship with her two daughters, her aging dog Pinky and the town’s veterinarian. Some consider it to be one of the best short works of her career.
Before and after the reading, Schutt fielded questions from students and faculty alike about her craft, advice on writing, and the ever-evolving subject matter of work. Schutt took great time to consider each question and it was clear that she was fully engaged for the duration of the event.
Schutt’s calling card is her unique use of language. A review of “Pure Hollywood” published in Publisher’s Weekly stated simply that, “Nobody writes like Schutt.” Her prose is sweeping, all encompassing and nonlinear–often dealing with taboo or difficult topics such as grief, incest and parent’s fractured relationships with their children.
“Pure Hollywood” has received widespread acclaim since its publication in 2018. Many critics have hailed it as her best book yet, the latest success in her already triumphant career. The collection deals greatly with privileged characters who often fail to recognize their own opulence.
Though Schutt’s prose is still as boundary-pushing as ever, though the language in this book is slightly more approachable than much of her earlier work. “You Drive,” a story from her debut 1996 collection “Nightwork,” was criticized in a 2015 New York Times op-ed titled, “Do We Mistake Inaccessibility For Brilliance,” for being too difficult to understand. “Pure Hollywood” has drawn no such criticisms as Schutt manages to balance her boundary-pushing sentence structures and temporal leaps with very clear, distinct prose.
During the Q&A portion, Schutt mentioned that earlier in her career she was much more indulgent in her use of language, saying it made sense to her and that she wasn’t as concerned with the reader. She said that has changed as her career has gone on, and she is now more conscious of how her work will be read.
Since graduating from Columbia University’s master’s of fine arts program, Schutt has become modern literature’s most acclaimed stylist. She has won two O’Henry Awards, given each year to a small handful of exceptional short-stories, and a Pushcart Prize, which honors the best literary work published in small presses each year. In 2008, she was the recipient of the Guggenheim Fellowship. Schutt was also a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2009 for her novel “All Souls” as well as a finalist for the National Book Award in 2004 for her first novel “Florida.”
With all of the success that Schutt has achieved, it’s no surprise that she’s continuing her work with a new collection titled, “Little Violences on the Farm.”
