If a doctoral student will find practical guidance and encouragement here, for a seasoned ethnographic writer the relief comes in the realization that there is company in those seemingly lonely moments when one struggles to render into comprehensible prose the powerful presence in all fieldwork of the inchoate, the imponderable, and-what is sometimes the result of ethical concerns for the protection of one’s informants-the unsayable. As I read through the book, I was repeatedly struck by the sense of familiarity both with the dilemmas faced by Narayan’s chosen authors and with the exuberant outbursts with which they leaped across the constraints of a scholarly discipline to recapture the insights of fieldwork. (An early Tyler novel is called The Clock Winder, but I imagine the similarity in the titles is just incidental.) The story behind the title: Cheryl and friends. Narayan’s excitement at meeting Chekhov across the literature-ethnography divide and the rich array of beautiful ethnographic writing together forcefully remind us that ethnographic writing is never simply a descriptive exercise. This article analyzes two short stories by the renowned Russian author Anton Chekhov, both of which give the reader a practicing lawyer attempting to reconcile the demands of the office with. “Narayan’s short book can easily be read as a manual, and some (especially those with less experience to assure them that the doldrums do eventually pass) will find it useful for precisely that purpose. Anton chekhovs home and a visit to friends: The dichotomy between the personal and the professional, or the lawyer subjectified and objectified. Read More about Alive in the Writing Read Less about Alive in the Writing A new and lively exploration of ethnography, Alive in the Writing shows how the genre’s attentive, sustained connection with the lives of others can become a powerful tool for any writer. Weaving together selections from writing by and about him with examples from other talented ethnographers and memoirists, she offers practical exercises and advice on topics such as story, theory, place, person, voice, and self. Highlighting this balance of the empirical and the literary, Narayan calls on Chekhov to bring new energy to the writing of ethnography and creative nonfiction alike. By closely attending to the people who lived under the appalling conditions of the Russian penal colony on Sakhalin, Chekhov showed how empirical details combined with a literary flair can bring readers face to face with distant, different lives, enlarging a sense of human responsibility. In Alive in the Writing-an intriguing hybrid of writing guide, biography, and literary analysis-anthropologist and novelist Kirin Narayan introduces readers to some other sides of Chekhov: his pithy, witty observations on the writing process, his life as a writer through accounts by his friends, family, and lovers, and his venture into nonfiction through his book Sakhalin Island. Anton Chekhov is revered as a boldly innovative playwright and short story writer-but he wrote more than just plays and stories.
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