Uncover the Hidden Truths of Creativity and Suffering in Alex Boyd’s Latest Essay Collection
If my cursory Google search is any indication, there does not seem to be a real critical tradition for ars scribendi in the way there is for ars poetica. Prose writers have worked without a term to encompass their writing about writing. Perhaps you will indulge me ars scribendi, because, to my mind, Boyd’s book is the art and life of writing, and understanding it that way changes what you expect from it.
Take This for the Pain has elements of essayistic forms we’re familiar with but requires a different lens. The craft essay comes close in some cases but implies instruction. Personal essay is too broad. Book and culture reviews, which comprise a significant portion of Boyd’s pieces, are what they say they are — reviews — but the term lacks the accumulated weight of a complete artistic sensibility being examined over time and across the full scope of the book.
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