Tillie Olsen & Grace Paley: "as if they were God and it was clay"

Posted today on PEN America’s blog, a brief appreciation of Tillie Olsen and Grace Paley written by Amy Bloom. Here's an excerpt:

And as much as Ray Carver and Norman Mailer shaped American fiction and were known for it, Tillie Olsen and Grace Paley shaped the American short story, as if they were God and it was clay, and however much or little known they were for much of their writing lives, the short story itself is now different than it was, because of them, and we know better how we should live and write, because of them.

Read, she said.