Unsayable

At the age of three, Michael Cunningham began obsessively collecting the names of things: oak, Chevrolet, finch, tulip, Tupperware. Each word rendered the world ever so slightly more understandable, more describable, kicking off a lifelong love affair with language - one that would, eventually, maybe inevitably, lead him to become a writer. In 'Unsayable', Cunningham's memories spill forth, and with them, reflections on the craft of writing. He is fifteen, in a swimming pool at night, gazing at the first boy he ever fell in love with, who is lost in contemplative silence. He is a new college graduate, setting off for nowhere in a Dodge Dart, hoping to pull meaning (and a novel) from the expanse of America. He is on Cape Cod, regaling an elderly couple with invented tales of sexual escapades. He is in an art gallery, unwittingly having the first in a lifetime of conversations with the man he would marry.

Genres

Biography

Language

English

Publisher

4th Estate

ISBN

9780008836382