Every writer is a bit of a ham.  I love to read my own work – to groups of any size, on occasions when selling books is encouraged and on occasions when it is not allowed, I love to read in auditoriums, hotel lobbies, living rooms, and bars. 

To encourage other hams I’ve run several reading series in which both emerging and established writers have read from their works.  Introducing these writers – which involves reading their current and past work, and thinking about their talents and their places in literature – is, in that tired but honest phrase, a Great Pleasure.  A more melancholy pleasure is talking in public about writers who have died.

As part of this continuing engagement with my colleagues, and as an opportunity to read books I might otherwise overlook, I do book reviews.

Finally, I like to discuss the craft of writing from a podium or as part of a panel.  The subjects I’ve talked about and would be glad to talk about again include: resemblances between short fiction and short non-fiction; Writing as an Amateur Sport; the Superiority of the typewriter over the computer; Taking the Time to be Brief.  I think the rules of grammar and syntax – following them, choosing among them, flouting them – are essential to good writing, and that writers should understand and employ rhetorical devices; but nobody has yet asked me to talk on this topic.

Edith Pearlman is available for readings, introductions, eulogies, book reviews, lectures, and panels.