“I’m so, so tired of reading about how writing should be demystified, how it doesn’t work the way Cortazar describes at all, how you toil at it slowly like you’re scrubbing a toilet, how the important parts are rewriting everything (preferably with the help of a gaggle of fellow workshop women) and killing your darlings and not getting personally attached to your work, how “good rejection letters” are a cause for celebration, and how you should take a class at Mediabistro or teach one at Barnes and Noble.”

At Bookslut, Elizabeth Bachner, true to form, has a long, thoughtful and lyrical essay about Michael Greenberg’s new book, the work of Julio Cortazar and how we’ve compromised the magic of writing to our own detriment.