Janice Lee

http://janicel.com

Janice Lee is the author of KEROTAKIS (Dog Horn Press, 2010), Daughter (Jaded Ibis, 2011), Damnation (Penny-Ante Editions, 2013), Reconsolidation (Penny-Ante Editions, 2015), and most recently, The Sky Isn’t Blue (Civil Coping Mechanisms, 2016), a collection of essays. She is Editor of the #RECURRENT Series, Assistant Editor at Fanzine, Executive Editor of Entropy, Editor at SUBLEVEL, and CEO/Founder of POTG Design. She currently lives in Los Angeles and teaches at CalArts.

HTMLGIANT Features

Brian Evenson’s SUMMER READS

Brian Evenson on his summer reading…

***

First of all, if this is the third summer that you’ve convinced yourself that this summer that this summer you’re really going to read Infinite Jest instead of just pretending to read it, it’s time to burn the book. The first summer it really could have happened. Last summer, even, it could have happened, but by this time the jest is on you. You’re better off reading:

siglio-bough-down-green-1Bough Down by Karen Green (Siglio Press)

Her moving, powerful and haunting book about her husband Wallace’s suicide and its aftermath.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

cover.troublers.hiresTroublers by Rob Walsh (Caketrain)

This is one of the strongest, funniest, and oddest story collections I’ve read lately, the kind of book to give you faith in the form again. Well worth the attention.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Ballad of Ballard and Sandrine by Peter StraubThe Ballad of Ballard and Sandrine by Peter Straub (Subterranean Press)

This is a sharp and strange little novella. If you can’t find the Subterranean Press edition, it’s $2.99 for Kindle or in Issue 56 of Conjunctions.

 

 

 

 

 

 

READ MORE >

2 Comments
June 10th, 2013 / 11:05 am

Reviews

Mourning into Joy: Boxing the Compass by Sandy Florian

florian-coverBoxing the Compass
by Sandy Florian
Noemi Press, 2013
114 pages / $15  Buy from Noemi Press or Amazon

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If Sandy Florian’s novella Boxing the Compass is the answer, then the question might be: is the era of climate change spawning a specific literature? Some exploration of this question will lead us into the astonishing work of mourning Boxing the Compass is.

Ironically, the phrase Homo sapiens is Latin for “wise man.” Like all species, the existence of Homo sapiens has always been finite. No divine favor, cognitive privilege, or technical fix has ever exempted Homo sapiens from eventual extinction. None ever will. Climate change just promises to turn this “eventual” extinction into an uncomfortably close event. In 2010, the renowned Australian microbiologist Frank Fenner hypothesized Homo sapiens will go extinct within a century. Entertain Fenner’s hypothesis, and then try to write a book for the ages: for at most two or three generations more.

Whatever else climate change is, it is an event in language. The extinction of myriad species of fish should make writers differently aware of the biotic referents of tropes such as “to spawn a literature.” Extinctions bring about irreversible absences. The prospect of the extinction of Homo sapiens draws language into a hurricane swirling words up and away, or down and out, from anthropic referents. What happens to words as their referents irreversibly disappear? In becoming bereft of their referents, words may kindle mourning. Within language, climate change is metamorphosing frighteningly many words into words of mourning.

Imagine a novella catching intimations of the oceans in their terrible fragility as sustainers of life by narrating a daughter in mourning for her mother. Imagine that, through the daughter’s grief, this novella allows the mourning climate change solicits in language to find articulation. With these imaginings, we arrive at Sandy Florian’s uncanny work of mourning, Boxing the Compass.

READ MORE >

3 Comments
June 10th, 2013 / 11:00 am

Reviews

From Old Notebooks by Evan Lavender-Smith

7880525From Old Notebooks
by Evan Lavender-Smith
Dzanc Books, December 2012
182 pages / $15  Buy from Dzanc Books

 

 

 

 

 

 

Martin Heidegger posited the idea that all criticism is existential and there is no impartial analysis outside of the experience of the reader. A reviewer of Evan Lavender-Smith’s From Old Notebooks asks: “Should the reader of F.O.N. expect the meaning or truth of the book to lie with its author? Does the truth/meaning of the book lie outside the book?” Furthermore: “There may be some question as to F.O.N.’s status as fiction, poetry, philosophy, nonfiction, etc. but hopefully there will be no question about its status as a book.” Both comments are from Evan Lavender-Smith critiquing his own book within the pages of From Old Notebooks, even revealing: “Why am I so averse to the idea of classifying F.O.N. as poetry? – Because poetry doesn’t sell.” That’s the way From Old Notebooks rolls, defying genre and classification, even defying the traditional boundaries of author and reader. On the exterior, it reads like a notebook filled with philosophical musings, hermeneutics, the germs of story ideas, dialectical exposition, hagiographies on dubious beliefs, aphorisms made ironic by their sincerity, and letters to death. But the flow of the notebooks is deceptively simple, appearing like a random collection of ideas when it’s in fact a journey through the Penrose stairs of Smith’s mind.

I came across From Old Notebooks several years ago when it was first published by BlazeVOX. F.O.N. was one of the first postmodern/experimental works I’d read. Since then, I’ve read a lot more experimental works, some of my recent favorites including Robert Kloss’s The Alligators of Abraham; One by Blake Butler, Vanessa Place, and Chris Higgs; and Janice Lee’s Daughter. With F.O.N. recently reissued by Dzanc Books, I was excited about diving back in. It’s hard to analyze experimental works because the experience the reader has is so subjective and without making assumptions about the author’s intent, a huge part of the critique, for me, comes down to how the work resonates on a personal level. Explorations of infinity and thought stripped away from form involve literary techniques that are invented along the path of creation, and as a result, often defy formulaic definition. That is what makes these works so bold and compelling. Part of the allure of From Old Notebooks, then, is its accessibility.

The subject matter and the themes vary, encompassing everything from film quirks to quandaries on death, musings on poetry, and pornographic abstinence. The notes incorporate personal whimsies, fears, and even worries about family. Rather than obfuscate, we have a movement toward revelation. But the investigation branches into even more questions and there’s a playfulness in the tone that engenders the feeling of a contemporized Socratic enquiry, only with oneself. As a few examples:

“God endowed the universe with an infinite number of signs, but only one fact.”

“Qualifying death as “unknowable” is, finally, an act of cowardice; death as “unknowable” preserves mystery, the possibility of mystery. The truth atheist knows death intimately; for him, there is nothing at all mysterious about death.”

“Perhaps they would be more palatable if independent films had more explosions in them.”

“Should I be concerned about exploiting my children by including them in F.O.N.?”

“Consciousness is my worst habit.”

READ MORE >

4 Comments
June 10th, 2013 / 11:00 am

Boss Fight Books!

bossfightbooksGabe Durham is starting up an incredibly cool new press called Boss Fight Books that will revolve around creating great books about classic video games. The launch titles will be Earthbound, Galaga, Super Mario Bros. 2, ZZT, and Jagged Alliance 2 with a great lineup of authors from a variety of backgrounds. These include Ken Baumann,  Michael Kimball, Anna Anthropy, Jon Irwin, and Darius Kazemi. I recorded a two minute video short with short clips for each of the games to commemorate and celebrate the news, as well as a reminder of how cool each of the titles were. I got goosebumps just recording/playing Earthbound again! As their Kickstarter surpassed initial expectations, it’s happening for sure, though you can still get in on the action and help them reach their stretch goals by clicking the link below. The first of the books is coming out near the end of the year and there’s a lot more of the details on the link. The book covers look beautiful and you can check out what the press will be about directly from Gabe Durham and Ken Baumann on the Kickstarter page. And of course, make sure to check out the books when they release, as well as the games themselves!

More info on the Kickstarter Page.

Some info directly from the site:

The Series:
Each of the books will take a critical, creative, historical, and personal look at a single classic video game.Some books will be about the history of the game’s creation, some will focus on particular elements like level design, story, and music, some will investigate the subculture that has formed around a game, some will bring in outside art, science, and media, some will have a strong autobiographical element. Many books will be a combination of all these things.

The Format:
All the books will be available in paperback and ebook (all formats), and sold both directly from our site and from other major online bookstores. Each book will be numbered, collectible, and will look great on your shelf together.

READ MORE >
Random / 6 Comments
June 7th, 2013 / 12:14 pm

HTMLGIANT Features

Will Alexander’s SUMMER READS

Will-Alexander0

Poet Will Alexander’s summer reads:

***

361167Black Mirror: The Selected Poems of Roger Gilbert-Lecomte, by Roger Gilbert-Lecomte, Trans. David Rattray (Station Hill Press, 1991)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5192GCNPpIL._SY300_Rasa, by Rene Daumal (Norton, 1982)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

READ MORE >

2 Comments
June 7th, 2013 / 11:05 am

Reviews

The Exiles

Exiles_HalfcoverThe Exiles
by Matthew Kirkpatrick
Ricochet Editions, March 2013
49 pages / $10  Buy from Ricochet Editions

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Matthew Kirkpatrick’s chapbook, The Exiles, we find ourselves instantly swept into something strange. A young boy’s mother asks him in a car ride home how sixth grade was. This means that he must have just finished sixth grade. He answers that he can’t remember. Lately he’s been feeling confused over the things around him, that happen to him, what he sees and the things he dream: “Things he remembered seemed unreal, and the things he forgot, like what had happened to him only hours before, disappeared from his memory as dreams upon waking.” At the same time, the neighbor girl routinely runs up and down and backwards on her front porch. We don’t know why yet, and so this makes us wonder if she is running backwards in reality, or if this is another confusion in the young boy’s vision. These two have something in common besides their oddities, and that is that they watch each other. In fact, each person we are introduced to in this world seems to watch someone else for one reason or another. The young boy James mainly watches in hopes of resolving his confusion over who really is real – his Dad at the dinner table, or Dad in the basement. The neighbor girl watches in reaction to those who watch her. Neither James, nor the neighbor girl seem to be aware that they are exiles under the watchful eye of their exiled world, but Dad in the basement is barely cognizant: “At times, he thinks that he exiled himself, and other times he thinks he was exiled; surely, he has done something.”

We begin with the young boy James, initially unnamed, his sister and mother going in the car through the rain. We end with the same boy (or is he really the same?), whose name we now know as James, with Sister and Mom (and possibly Dad?) going again in the car in the rain, only now the rain is warm because it is almost summer, whereas the opening scene is absent of season. We don’t know what season it is, but we do know that this trip in the car that opens the text is not the first of its kind: “There they go again in the car through the rain home.”

READ MORE >

3 Comments
June 7th, 2013 / 11:00 am

HTMLGIANT Features

Sueyeun Juliette Lee’s SUMMER READS

SJL author

Today Sueyeun Juliette Lee shares some of her summer reads:

***

WCE_Cover-9-200x265We Come Elemental by Tamiko Beyer (Alice James Books, 2013)

I’m very excited about this text. A queer ecopoetical exploration of landscape and being, of bodies and transformations all set in relation. I’m very interested in these ideas, in how we collaborate with our environments…how our bodies are practices set loose among a landscape that is constantly being iterated with us.

I think Tamiko is a FREAKING GREAT poet and someone I’ve had my eyes on for a while. She actually once submitted a short manuscript for Corollary, and it got snatched up elsewhere!! That’s what happens when I move at glacial speed. Sigh. But I’m super excited her work is getting more attention. She’s a major player!!!

 

 

 

416RLhQcjhL._SY300_ 9780826493620_p0_v1_s260x420Impressions of Africa by Raymond Roussel and Death and the Labryinth by Michel Foucault

An old friend of mine used to LOVE Roussel. I resisted reading him for a long time, and I’ve dipped in and out, but I’m ready to make a little study. I’m stymied by the fact that I don’t read/speak French, and I think to really appreciate all of Roussel’s language games, you have to have a nuanced understanding of French syntax and vocabulary. That said, I think the dissonance in reading Roussel in English will still be of interest, and having Foucault’s study of Roussel’s writing strategies can help illuminate some of the conceptual parameters and frameworks Roussel was working in.

I’m not someone who uses much language “play,” per se in my work, but it’s something I’m of course very interested in. What writer isn’t?!?! Some of my friends and former classmates write this way–I’m thinking of Lawrence Giffin and Steve Zultanski. And they do it so elegantly–with wit, irreverence, but also devastation there, too. A quick plug–Zultanski’s Agony (BookThug) and Giffin’s Christian Name (Ugly Duckling) are AWESOME and so devastating in their own ways. I was surprised by the depth of feeling these works actually evoked in me.

 

READ MORE >

1 Comment
June 6th, 2013 / 11:00 am

HTMLGIANT Features

Joe Milazzo’s SUMMER READS

Summer reading picks from Joe Milazzo:

***

ABookBeginningWhatA Book Beginning What and Ending Away by Clark Coolidge (Fence Books, 2013)

Partly out of excitement to have this work restored to print; Coolidge is neither understood nor celebrated enough as a prosodist, or, if you prefer, prose thinker, à la Stein (I know this mostly from his writings on jazz / improvised music); the book itself just long and packed / impacted enough to occupy a season.

Randomly selected excerpt: “Door only to be taken in. Mingles into the corner as it comes. Enough, and green, and by and large, were familiar.”

 

 

 

 

 

lawless_mydeadMy Dead by Amy Lawless (Octopus, 2013)

Have you seen the table of contents? The volume opens with 8 individual poems, all entitled “One Way to Write a Sonnet Is To Number the Lines.” This appeals to me, and aligns with my own formal / lyrical interests.

Randomly selected excerpt: “Night is ugly as all the other shit / I just mentioned”

 

 

 

15647100688120LAm I A Redundant Human Being? by Mela Hartwig (Dalkey Archive, 2010)

I picked this up at the open of the year courtesy Dalkey’s annual sale, but have not yet been able to see if the book itself satisfies the expectations (high-ish… is this Madame Bovary without the self-delusion, an early negation of the novel [an imitation of Arthur Schnitzler tangenting itself into anticipations of Tao Lin], or a Modernist self-help manual?) I have for it based on the title.

Randomly selected excerpt: “Of course, his obvious attraction flattered me. But, then again, maybe it didn’t.”

 

 

 

 

READ MORE >

Comments Off on Joe Milazzo’s SUMMER READS
June 5th, 2013 / 11:00 am

HTMLGIANT Features

Debra Di Blasi’s SUMMER READS

Debra Di Blasi

Debra Di Blasi’s summer reading recommendations:

***

9780393073775_198The Bonobo and the Atheist: In Search of Humanism Among the Primates, by Frans De Waal (Norton, 2013)

The most recent book by hands-on primatologist de Waal once again successfully argues that the study of primatology is not how apes behave like humans, but how humans behave like apes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

9780465033294_p0_v1_s260x420Regenesis: How Synthetic Biology Will Reinvent Nature and Ourselves, by George Church and Ed Regis (Basic Books, 2012)

Predicts how current and future biological research will lead to transhumanism, genetic regeneration and mutation, and living products that reproduce and redesign themselves. The eugenics potential would make Adolf Hitler proud.

 

 

 

 

READ MORE >

1 Comment
June 4th, 2013 / 11:00 am

My Pet Serial Killer Video

Check out this My Pet Serial Killer (by Michael Seidlinger) Video Review by Angela Xu and Peter Tieryas Liu. Starring Hannah Lee. Read Peter Tieryas Liu review on HTMLGIANT here.

Author Spotlight & Random / Comments Off on My Pet Serial Killer Video
June 3rd, 2013 / 11:50 am