Articles by Kevin Hartnett
May 17, 2013
Judging Luhrmann’s Gatsby: Five English Scholars Weigh In 14
You might think that the people who know Fitzgerald’s novel best would have the most disapproving view of the movie. To test that hypothesis, we asked five English professors who specialize in American literature to take in an early showing and share their thoughts. And to our surprise, they liked it.
January 18, 2013
Letters in the Wind: A Writer’s Evolution 7
I realized that my writing at age 28 was a lot like my golf game as a teenager: a single gust of wind and it went to Hell.
August 2, 2012
Dickens’s Best Novel? Six Experts Share Their Opinions 22
What was Charles Dickens’s best novel? It depends whom you ask of course. Searching for clarity, I decided to pose the question to a handful of leading Victorianists. I sent out emails to select scholars asking them if they’d be interested in choosing a novel and making their case. Just about everyone I reached out to was game.
July 13, 2012
A Night at The Moth: The Worst Thing that Ever Happened to Me 8
Why it is that people gravitate to the most tragic or dramatic moments of their lives when given a chance to tell a story? There are, I think, two reasons.
April 23, 2012
Tolstoy or Dostoevsky? 8 Experts on Who’s Greater 51
All mediocre novelists are alike; every great novelist is great in his own way.
April 11, 2012
High Wire Act: Why I Started Writing By Hand 34
I had several reasons for wanting to write by hand. Writing on the computer feels like going to war with myself. In fact, just thinking about a blank Word document makes me sweat.