My Fiction Articles
Simona’s Story: An excerpt from”Superpowers.”
Problems choosing a superpower. “…Consider Simona. He lived on the coast of Mexico around the time of the Spanish invasion. He was a fisherman. He asked for the power to feel the waves and know everything that was going on anywhere in the ocean. He could spot schools...
The Height of Success…For Someone Else, I think.
Every once in a while, I google myself, in order to prove I still exist. I have come to believe that true success is a long list of google entries—as opposed to my previous standards of success, which revolved about money and, possibly, academic credentials. By this...
There’ll Be No Castration Tonight.
An excerpt from “The Wicked Son,” a picaresque novel about skepticism and truth, etc. Dr. Aster, who is a psychiatrist on Earth and a wanderer with magical powers in the land of Wendle, has volunteered his services to help a congregation of union members, anarchists,...
An Improved Literary Rejection Letter
An Improved Rejection Letter (Can be customized) As most authors, and aspiring authors, know, it is standard procedure to send your manuscript to a publishing house (or agent) with a self-addressed, stamped envelope so that the manuscript– which they expect to reject–...
An Appreciation of Romantic Love
A personal defence. I have been writing about love on this blog. I am interested in how love develops and then recedes, or transforms into something else. There are the real phenomena of love at first sight, unrequited love, love in the very young and the very old,...
Dangerous Sexual Practices
This anecdote appears in “Come One, Come All.” I wrote it as fiction, but the story is real. I read about it in The New York Times. The speaker is the gynecologist who works at the Woman’s Health Center. “Dr. Redden, I think you’ll be interested in this case. This is...
The National Baby Test
There was a time when I served as a psychiatric consultant to a television program called “The Baby Game,” in which crawling babies competed with each other to be the first to reach their mothers who were jumping up and down at the other end of a rug. They also...
A True Story–But Very Strange
The advantages of fiction (I have followed my usual practice in this post of disguising the patient) There was a time a number of years ago when I had the occasion to treat just the sort of patient therapists like to work with, that is, she was intelligent, attractive...
Irony: a Short Tale of Torture–and Its Consequences.
Irony The Central Club of New York City came into existence in the late 19th century as a refuge for like-minded individuals intent on distinguishing themselves from people of lesser quality and financial worth, and to compensate them for having themselves been...
A Short Story about Being Very Young–and Very Old
Storytelling He was a tall, gangly man with an electric style of walking: sudden, large, bouncing steps, an occasional shuffle and a tendency to lurch from side to side. He used the wooden stick he carried to steady himself occasionally, but, more often, to point out...
Why Boasting is Unpleasant
Why boasting is unpleasant I had a memorable experience a number of years ago. I ran into an acquaintance of mine who was standing on a street corner waiting for a red light to change. I had not seen him since I had graduated college ten years before. “Hey, Walter,” I...