Craft of Writing

“Tenderness is spontaneous and disinterested; it goes far beyond empathetic fellow feeling. Instead it is the conscious, though perhaps slightly melancholy, common sharing of fate. Tenderness is deep emotional concern about another being, its fragility, its unique nature, and its lack of immunity to suffering and the effects of time. Tenderness

“Kawabata taught me that it’s detail, not plot, that makes something worth reading—that great works of literature aren’t sequences of events but assemblages of unforgettable details. That’s what readers find moving—the storyline is merely interesting."

Interview with Yu Hua in Paris Review

"Tenderness is the art of personifying, of sharing feelings, and thus endlessly discovering similarities. Creating stories means constantly bringing things to life, giving an existence to all the tiny pieces of the world that are represented by human experiences, the situations people have endured and their memories. Tenderness personalizes