Charlotte Lit’s Blog

Welcome to Charlotte Lit’s literary arts blog. What you’ll find here: reviews, interviews, craft essays, previews of literary arts events, and anything else that catches our attention.

Jaime Pollard-Smith

Piece by Piece

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by Jaime Pollard-Smith “Because in real life, unlike in history books, stories come to us not in their entirety but in bits and pieces, broken segments and partial echoes, a full sentence here, a fragment there, a clue hidden in between. In life, unlike in books, we have to weave our stories out of threads […]

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Sarah Archer

Networking for the Introverted Writer

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by Sarah Archer Some of my earliest memories are from preschool, where there was an old cast iron tub, with rubber ducks painted on the sides, sitting in the middle of the room. The tub was filled with stuffed animals—and books. While the other kids ran around me and played, I just wanted to sit […]

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Amy Paturel

Essay Shakedown: Personal Versus Reported

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by Amy Paturel In almost every personal essay class, I get the question: “What is a reported essay?” And it’s a great question, particularly since publications like The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Atlantic are increasingly shying away from personal essays in favor of reported essays. So what’s the difference between the two? […]

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Charlotte Lit Admin

The Healing Potential of Writing

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by Elizabeth Hanly Once upon a time, a student told me his story. He told it in the voice of a child, since he was still quite young when the story occurred. The student had been kidnapped in Guatemala. His captors complained about his tears. “My mother complained of my tears too,” the student wrote. […]

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