I'm not sure I can articulate any principles behind the decisions about what to cut and what to keep.
Garth GreenwellThe academy is an incredibly sheltered world, and I do think it's important for writers to get out from under that shelter, at least for a while, to see what the world looks like from outside it.
Garth GreenwellI think one reason I'm drawn to expansive syntax is that arias are so often exercises in extending language as a means of intensifying feeling.
Garth GreenwellWhenever I go to New York I try to soak up as much live music as I can, including as many nights at the opera as I can manage.
Garth GreenwellI'm still primarily interested in observing as closely as possible the shifting weather between people. I think the master of this sort of thing, and a writer who has meant a great deal to me, is Henry James: there's a magical way that he has of turning the slightest gesture into a whole world of drama and feeling.
Garth Greenwell