“Why do writers find the train such a fruitful work environment?” This is the question Jessica Gross sets out to answer in a recent piece published by The Paris Review, in which she describes her experience on a train to Chicago.

The journey is bounded… I know when it will end… My main job is to be transported; any reading or writing is extracurricular. The looming pressure of expectation dissolves. And the movement of a train conjures the ultimate sense of protection—being a baby, rocked in a bassinet.