Clark Blaise (1940-), Canadian and American, is the author of 20 books of fiction and nonfiction. A longtime advocate for the literary arts in North America, Blaise has taught writing and literature at Emory, Skidmore, Columbia, NYU, Sir George Williams, UC-Berkeley, SUNY-Stony Brook, and the David Thompson University Centre. In 1968, he founded the postgraduate Creative Writing Program at Concordia University; he after went on to serve as the Director of the International Writing Program at Iowa (1990-1998), and as President of the Society for the Study of the Short Story (2002-present). Internationally recognized for his contributions to the field, Blaise has received an Arts and Letters Award for Literature from the American Academy (2003), and in 2010 was made an Officer of the Order of Canada. Blaise now divides his time between New York and San Francisco, where he lives with his wife, American novelist Bharati Mukherjee.

Praise for Clark Blaise Award Recipient from the Academy of Arts & Letters Officer of the Order of Canada "The elegant stories in The Meagre Tarmac constitute a warning of sorts ... the old tables are turning."--Margaret Atwood, The New York Review of Books "Blaise is probably the greatest living Canadian writer most Canadians have never heard of." --Quill & Quire "On the leading edge of world literature." --John Barber, Globe and Mail "The Meagre Tarmac is a naked instance of appropriation of voice--a literary felony justified in this case by the results." --Philip Marchand, National Post "Not to be forgotten ... is Clark Blaise's collection The Meagre Tarmac, wherein a writer's writer excelled himself and got more attention than he has received in a long time, though still not as much as he deserves."--Ian McGillis, Gazette "You know it's going to be a stellar year for fiction when Clark Blaise publishes something. The Meagre Tarmac ... demonstrates yet again that Blaise is one of the continent's master authors."--Uptown "What holds the collection together is Blaise's mastery of the short story, his ability to give us a whole personality and the sensuous particularity of lived experiences in a handful of pages." --Steven Hayward, Globe and Mail "Blaise meticulously conveys a sense of connection and isolation in the lives of Indian immigrants who are detached from their former lives and country, 'untethered to any earth,' and yet are shape and guided by that absence ... Such connection is beautifully contrasted by the way the opening stories fracture a single family's narrative into multiple perspectives, illustrating the divide that separates people from one another and rendering it more tangible than any geographical border. In the end, The Meagre Tarmac is like a slow exclamation caught halfway between a sigh and laughter, between hope and despair, connection and dissonance."--Canadian Literature

• Contents The Sociology of Love 7 In Her Prime 21 The Dimple Kapadia of Camino Real 34 Dear Abhi 44 Brewing Tea in the Dark The Quality of Life 71 A Connie da Cunha Book 88 Waiting for Romesh 103 Potsy and Pansy 114 Isfahan 135 Man and Boy 150

Clark Blaise (1940-), Canadian and American, is the author of 20 books of fiction and nonfiction. A longtime advocate for the literary arts in North America, Blaise has taught writing and literature at Emory, Skidmore, Columbia, NYU, Sir George Williams, UC-Berkeley, SUNY-Stony Brook, and the David Thompson University Centre. In 1968, he founded the postgraduate Creative Writing Program at Concordia University; he after went on to serve as the Director of the International Writing Program at Iowa (1990-1998), and as President of the Society for the Study of the Short Story (2002-present). Internationally recognized for his contributions to the field, Blaise has received an Arts and Letters Award for Literature from the American Academy (2003), and in 2010 was made an Officer of the Order of Canada. Blaise now divides his time between New York and San Francisco, where he lives with his wife, American novelist Bharati Mukherjee.

Praise for Clark Blaise Award Recipient from the Academy of Arts & Letters Officer of the Order of Canada "The elegant stories in The Meagre Tarmac constitute a warning of sorts ... the old tables are turning."--Margaret Atwood, The New York Review of Books "Blaise is probably the greatest living Canadian writer most Canadians have never heard of." --Quill & Quire "On the leading edge of world literature." --John Barber, Globe and Mail "The Meagre Tarmac is a naked instance of appropriation of voice--a literary felony justified in this case by the results." --Philip Marchand, National Post "Not to be forgotten ... is Clark Blaise's collection The Meagre Tarmac, wherein a writer's writer excelled himself and got more attention than he has received in a long time, though still not as much as he deserves."--Ian McGillis, Gazette "You know it's going to be a stellar year for fiction when Clark Blaise publishes something. The Meagre Tarmac ... demonstrates yet again that Blaise is one of the continent's master authors."--Uptown "What holds the collection together is Blaise's mastery of the short story, his ability to give us a whole personality and the sensuous particularity of lived experiences in a handful of pages." --Steven Hayward, Globe and Mail "Blaise meticulously conveys a sense of connection and isolation in the lives of Indian immigrants who are detached from their former lives and country, 'untethered to any earth,' and yet are shape and guided by that absence ... Such connection is beautifully contrasted by the way the opening stories fracture a single family's narrative into multiple perspectives, illustrating the divide that separates people from one another and rendering it more tangible than any geographical border. In the end, The Meagre Tarmac is like a slow exclamation caught halfway between a sigh and laughter, between hope and despair, connection and dissonance."--Canadian Literature

• Contents The Sociology of Love 7 In Her Prime 21 The Dimple Kapadia of Camino Real 34 Dear Abhi 44 Brewing Tea in the Dark The Quality of Life 71 A Connie da Cunha Book 88 Waiting for Romesh 103 Potsy and Pansy 114 Isfahan 135 Man and Boy 150