How can literature help us extend our empathic imaginations? How can writing and reading expand our curiosity and compassion for people in situations distant from our own?
Jim Shepard is the author of seven previous novels, most recently The Book of Aron (winner of the 2016 PEN New England Award, the Sophie Brody medal for achievement in Jewish literature, the Ribalow Prize for Jewish literature, the Clark Fiction Prize, and a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award) and five story collections, including Like You’d Understand, Anyway, which was a finalist for the National Book Award and won The Story Prize. His short fiction has appeared in, among other magazines, The New Yorker, Harper’s Magazine, McSweeney’s, The Paris Review, The Atlantic, Esquire, Tin House, Granta, Zoetrope, Electric Literature, and Vice, and has often been selected for The Best American Short Stories and The PEN/O. Henry Prize Stories. He lives in Williamstown, Massachusetts, with his wife, three children, and three beagles, and he teaches film and creative writing at Williams College. His story “The World to Come” was adapted into a feature film starring Casey Affleck, Vanessa Kirby, and Katherine Waterston.
"In terms of what I'm writing, I'm always trying to make myself a more interesting human being. And so that means I'm coming across these human dilemmas where I'm like what would it have been like to be in that position? And that snags my emotional imagination.
I do think that literature is all about extending the empathetic imagination. And so I'm always looking to educate myself in emotional terms, too. Because I'm very interested in the way we respond in those situations where it feels like we both have responsibility, and we don't have responsibility."
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