Leora Skolkin-Smith, Author

Excerpt of The Fragile Mistress in Guernica Magazine
The Fragile Mistress
A novel excerpt by Leora Skolkin-Smith,
August 2010
An unpublished excerpt from the novel, now in pre-production as a film.

On Herta Muller's "The Passport"
In The Quarterly Conversation, a look at the recent Nobel Laureate, Herta Muller.

Hystera, Chapter One
Parts of HYSTERA,my new novel, were first published by Persea Books.

An excerpt in currently in The Hamilton Stone Review Fall Issue.


HYSTERA tells the story of a young woman who finds herself involuntarily admitted to a mental hospital on New York City's Upper East Side, in the 1970s after a family tragedy. The story is layered with Lillian's own notebook characters as she invents people from the Middle Ages through the 19th century straight up to her present time, experiencing mysterious "mental conditions" that parallel her own. Lillian joins her invented cast of characters and that of the real people she meets on the ward as she journeys to health and stability. She finds herself, too, part of a continuum of rebellion and enigmas throughout history.

On Clarice Lispector
A short essay on Clarice Lispector's novella

"The Hour of the Star"

Published in The Quarterly Conversation, Fall, 2009

WANDERING STAR
Essay about Jean Marie Gustave's Clezio's THE WANDERING STAR

J.M. Le Clezio at PEN World Voices Festival in NYC
Brief report of US appearance of Nobel Prize Winner J.M Clezio

Ann Quin's PASSAGES
This essay considers Ann Quin's novella 'PASSAGES"

Grace Paley: A Woman of Her Words"
"GRACE PALEY,A WOMAN OF HER WORDS, By Leora Skolkin-Smith
Special to The Washington Post
Saturday, August 25, 2007; Page C01
Thanks to the staff at THE WASHINGTON POST, and editor Marcia Davies. Special thanks to Levi Asher at Litkicks.

"Dog Days of Summer: SUMMER READING"
Blog of the National Book Critic's Circle
A brief appreciation of the writer, Efriede Jelinek, and her latest novel GREED

"Jamestown"

A critical review of Matthew Sharpe's recent novel, "Jamestown", published by Softskull Press

Essay
An essay on how mental illness written about today differs from the poetry of one the finest women poets writing during the Nazi Period.

An Interview with Mark Thwaite

Guest Authors: Leora Skolkin-Smith
http://www.beatrice.com/archives/001653.html

Israeli Sculptor Menache Kadishman
"One day before the recent suicide bombing in southern Tel Aviv, some kilometers from where the explosions took place, I wandered into an exhibition by Menache Kadishman at the Tel Aviv museum..."

Efriede Jelinek's "The Piano Teacher"
A brief essay on the work of Nobel Laureate Efriede Jelinek, focusing on her "The Piano Teacher"

"Violette Leduc"
Readysteadybook.com