Life of drafts
I hate lame drafts, trust me I know. Whenever I have a lame draft, I pull weird shit to try to spice it up. One time I removed all the dialog quotes and put em dashes in front. One other time I turned all the dialog into italics. One other time I deleted all the letters “n” and added this thing about how the writer of the story was missing the N-key (Stephen King did that). One other time I changed a female character’s name to sound more European. One time I removed all paragraph breaks and turned the entire story into one paragraph. One time I said the story was translated into English from Wingdings. When I get really desperate, I broaden the margins to make the story look longer. Sometimes I’ll make the first five words small caps like they do in fancy journals. One time I changed my name to “Toni Morrison” then had to find and replace “choad” into “tar blossom.” I never include a SASE because I never get accepted, so my logic beats theirs. I often shit-talk in my head about people with STDs, BMWs, SASEs, and MFAs, telling myself acronyms are for assholes. We all know the 20 under 40 list, but exactly who is under the influence of a 40 oz.? (Beer with me, people.) The only thing more lame than a “your mom” retort is calling nepotism, or “your dad.” The only thing writing has to do with life is that everything is a draft. Some people want fans, others just open the window to let the free air inside.
Raw dog
"Ceci n'est pas une hotdog"
[via Fail Blog] Magritte’s semantic play may have borrowed from the Tower of Babel, or the prophetic man just knew. Every time a pulled-over crack head pleads to the officer “this is not a pipe,” art wins. I knew a guy who deep fried sushi after it went bad, until it became good again. I guess that’s moral relativity.
HTMLGIANT custom made receipt for submitting to Tin House
Would be fun if y’all printed this out and submitted…
Jimmy Chen—
Still from "Versions," by Oliver Laric, 2010
Versions is a brilliant video essay [via Booooooom!]
13
Girls gone Wilde
Oscar Wilde's tomb, Père Lachaise Cemetery, Paris
“A kiss may ruin a human life.” — Oscar Wilde
Not sure if his mourners caught the quote, the irony I guess, and how above the tomb is a relief sculpture of some modernist flying angel whose male genitalia has since been vandalized, i.e. castrated, its whereabouts unknown. (Gender bending aside, someone’s gonna make a killing on eBay.) Like forever gumdrops on the pavement, these stone kisses are the graffiti of mouths, signifying that warm wet landing spot we all aim towards with eyes closed, as if seeing past the person.
Ass good as it gets
I commend Faces of Meth for showing us what happens to people on methamphetamine, but here is an example of someone who simply needs either a comb or a hair cut, and I suppose a shave. I’m sure meth has a lot to do with his overall disorganization in life, but really, he looks fine. Seems like he even put on a few healthy pounds.
Jimmy Chen—
According to Harper’s Index, in 1988 there were 2,343 exclamation points in The Bonfire of the Vanities; in 1990 that number had remained. Harper’s seems keen on addressing this, no doubt due to their rhetorical statistics. I can’t imagine how an author wouldn’t be self-conscious of the, say, thousandth exclamation point!…though Céline’s endless ellipses is just as tiresome…which makes me wonder is syntax style or mere muscle memory over the keyboard? If a mark is given the honor of sentience, shouldn’t that honor be met with profoundly grave and troublesome responsibility? Self-assured writing, put simply, is douchey, like Henry Miller with a gigantic contraceptive sponge.
The light from outside
The kaleidoscopic light promises us things, that we will be better engaged at some point. Our time is oft useless, but inside the shimmering fragments we find hospice and tentative repose. Yes, that was somewhat manipulative; I was obviously trying to tie biblical stained glass and iPhone apps together, their rows of minutiae narratives. Ever walk into a dark bar and see someone looking down at their dumbphone with a halo of light on their face? The text that never comes is not a writer’s plight, but we who wait at bars. “Be there in 5,” they all say. To the rows of people in cathedrals, praying, praying — they have their share of waiting too. I say no to these broken rainbows, no to these cruel seductive colors. A fly can only see a million shards of the same scene; its world is broken and short lived. I want to have a heart whole enough to stare at a wall for hours, on which a fly rests as some annoying period for a never written sentence.
The rise of pants
Circa 1800 Goya painted “La Maja Desnuda”; three years later, in 1803, perhaps feeling a little guilty, he does another, this time with clothes on her. This was before feminism, so let’s just say ol’ Goya was a little pensive about the Inquisition. (The paintings were owned by Spanish prime minister Manuel de Godoy, who preferred to go by “Manual” while gazing at the former painting.) Maja’s fate is ours as well — to start off naked, then end up clothed as some apology. Don’t blame eve, but Ross dress for less.
Jimmy Chen—
Hereby reappropriating this website as a work of art. Not for sale, but safe for work.
It’s a wonder what museum labels can do. Please call me “Do Shan’t,” not Duchamp. Or just please call me, which is what my therapist said today — the first mark of a codependent relationship. So, so needy.