Answering Your Questions about Structure
In which I answer the questions you asked about structure...plus a new anthology of poems of illness.
Meghan O'Rourke's Substack
Essays about literature, the craft of writing, the body and illness, and other obsessions.
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Latest posts
Structure is Everything
On why structure is never mere decoration — and how when I found the shape of my new book, it almost wrote itself.
Writing Residencies and What They Give You
Notes from MacDowell, and a list of residencies I've heard good things about
On Building a Writing Life: Spring Office Hours, Part 2
Answering your questions about agents, query letters, book proposals, and writing.
How to Get Published in Magazines: Spring Office Hours Part 1
Answering your questions on pitching, cover letters, and knowing when your work is ready
How to Write Better Drafts
What Elizabeth Bishop’s drafts can teach us about letting go and just starting.
How to Make the Unsaid the Most Powerful Part of Your Writing
A second post on juxtaposition, white space, and the art of leaving things out
What Endings Really Do
A writer and editor's guide to shaping the last lines of your work — from Rilke to The Great Gatsby.
Endings (and the Writers Who Love Them)
Ask not what your ending is, but what it might do for your book.
The Art of Writing More than One Thing at Once
On children, writing, and the strange discipline of carrying more than one project in your head.