“I have come to approach beauty and neatness in art with skepticism. So far, the nascent literature of the coronavirus pandemic has reinforced my distrust. No one has had time to truly refine their ideas. In the shaky realm of literature, during a crisis in motion, mess and chaos are the forms that speak best to painful realities” (Writer and critic Lily Meyer). Agreed. While I prefer to record my thoughts after I’ve have some narrative distance, we also learn from experience captured in real time. However, those words have value only if they are not sugar-coated, but speak honestly about states of rawness and confusion. For more thoughts about writing, see REFLECTIONS.
