A Swim in a Pond in the Rain: In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life

This final chapter is addressed to aspiring writers. While Saunders has assumed the role of guide and mentor in this book, he does not want to be too prescriptive or bossy. He believes that a mentor should encourage writers to be themselves, and he therefore welcomes some resistance to his advice: “The closest thing to a method I have to offer is this: go forth and do what you please” (485). He also believes that a writer’s challenges can be solved only by sitting down at the writing desk: “So, don’t worry, work, and have faith that answers will be found there" (486).

Saunders considers the worldbuilding aspect of fiction writing as he describes the view from his desk in Corralitos, California: “Out the door of my writing shed are some things. What things? Yes, exactly. It’s up to me to tell you, and in telling you, I will shortly be making them” (487-88). The words and phrases that he decides on will create a reality; there is a difference, for example, between writing “shaggy sad redwoods” and “some trees” (488). Moreover, a reader’s response to the chosen phrases, whether positive or negative, is a sign that reader and writer are in communion. 

Saunders returns to the question of fiction's importance. Reading fiction has altered his state of mind, since “[f]iction helps us remember that everything remains to be seen” (487). He exhorts writers to “speak to our time as freshly as these Russian stories spoke to theirs” (489). Putting this book together had made him appreciate both the stories and his own vocation more: “Writing this book turned out to be a chance to ask myself again, at length: ‘Do you still want to devote your life to fiction?’ And it turns out, I do” (489-90).