The Art of Subtext: Beyond Plot

This short collection of essays focused on subtext will be a welcome addition to any writer's library. Baxter is a witty and insightful essayist and each work focusing on a different aspect of subtext uses a wide variety of examples from literature. Baxter brings in examples from theatre as well to demonstrate the way in which infections and staging can provide literary depth to a work and has given me a lot to think about in terms of the way in which description can further influence my own stories.

A book about writing and literature that is itself literature. Baxter's books always have more insight and intelligence than the previous fifty books you have read combined. The Art of the Subtext is no exception. It deserves equal billing with the Art of Fiction and any other book on how to write great fiction. Baxter talks about books we have all read, yet is able to pinpoint why we have read them.

I got a lot out of this. It's a craft book for writers, specifically fiction, although I don't see why you couldn't use a lot of what he talks about in essay writing as well. It's not so much a how-to as a reminder of how to keep a certain dynamic, how to move plot along with all that lives below it -- very smart and useful, at least to me. Now I'm interested to see the rest of the series.

In The Art of Subtext, Minneapolis novelist Charles Baxter goes beyond many previous books on the writing of fiction. Baxter believes that fictional techniques work when they are rooted in basic cultural assumptions; therefore, his technical advice comes from a provocative meditation on who we are today. He asks why, for instance, writers no longer introduce characters with lengthy verbal portraits of their faces. To summarize Baxter crudely, it is because in a world of makeovers and simulations, we no longer trust appearances. The techniques by which an author creates subtext are important precisely because in our culture truth itself has gone underground.

Using common literary examples (short stories mostly), Baxter explores how subtext works in contemporary prose, why it's important, how it's changed historically in literature, and categorizes various methods and approaches to the art of subtext.

Good thoughts, but nothing mind-blowing.

What Baxter is doing in this book is helping to make deeper sense of stories, what makes them tick. Highly recommended.
http://12frogs.com/reading/reviews/2009/07/the-art-of-subtext-beyond-plot/