http://themanwhocouldntblog.blogspot.com
Matthew Simmons is the author of a novella (A JELLO HORSE, Publishing Genius Press, 2009) and a chapbook (THE MOON TONIGHT FEELS MY REVENGE, Keyhole Press, 2010). He is a bookseller living in Seattle with his cat Emmett.
Do you think a blog without comments loses its readership a) quickly or b) slowly?
Stacey Levine on Ryan Boudinot: “This one whom some were following was calm and restrained. His work shows so much work. Thousands of bees in his brain. His work makes its own ceiling, then bursts the ceiling again and again. Those calm, compact manners and the close shave. But you sense at any moment the gentlemanly restraint could fall away. At the spelling bee he was the most polite of them all. He is not in love with the normal. But I think he dislikes the abnormal, because, after all, the normal and its trajectory is so much more complicated and interesting.”
Massive Novel Alert: Today marks the official release of Ryan Boudinot’s massive (in all senses of the word[seriously—it's going to create a gravity well]) new novel Blueprints of the Afterlife(Grove 2012). I got a chance to read this early on. I like Ryan’s work. I like Ryan. Ryan’s a solid citizen of literature in Seattle. And everywhere. I figured I would like the book.
I didn’t figure it would be as expansive, as imaginative, as powerful, and as quaking as it it.
Seriously. It’s awesome. Take a look. Here’s a sample chapter.
Over the next few days, I’ll be posting some Boudinot appreciations and a round-up. (And if anyone reading has something they’d like to add, feel free to get in touch with me @ giantblinditems @ gmail dot com.) Today, though, we begin with a long interview with the author.
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You’ve written flash stories, short stories, a short novel, and a really long novel. Do you have a length at which you feel most comfortable?
You’re really wanting me to start this interview with a penis joke, aren’t you?
Heh. For the record, I think that no matter what is said in this email chain, we should use it in the interview. So, that line. And this caveat. We should just use everything said in here.
So, yes. READ MORE >
The Crow Arts Manor—a new-ish writing endeavor in Portland that hosts readings and sets up workshops with Massive folks like Kevin Sampsell, Emily Kendal Frey, Zachary Schomburg, Lidia Yuknavitch, and Monica Drake as instructors—is gathering a library. Here’s a note I got from the director, Sid Miller:
Crow Arts Manor, located in a Northeast Portland, is a 501c3 non-profits writing center, that provides low costclasses and workshop. Over the last 9 months we’ve been hard at work assembling a literary library. Through donations we’ve been able to obtain a large amount of current literary journals, magazines, books of poetry, short fiction and criticism. But it’s been difficult to obtain the classics, from writers going back to Whitman reaching to the end of last century. So now we’re asking the public for help. We’re looking for folks willing to donate a title or more from their own personal library. Our library will be open to the public and will be a tool for local writers, as well as local schools and non-profit organizations. It will be a place to read, write, and engage with other writers. We will never charge a fee for use of the library. If you are willing to donate, we are happy to send you a present, a past copy of Burnside Review (our partner). Please e-mail me if you are interested in helping.
sid@crowmanor.org
Help ‘em out?
I was listening to an interview with Jonathan Gold and was thinking, “Off the top of my head, I can’t think of anyone who hates Jonathan Gold and his writing.” (I could be wrong. There are probably chefs in LA who hate Jonathan Gold and his writing.) I was wondering, then, if Jonathan Gold sort of untouchable. Or if anyone is untouchable. I thought I’d ask you. Readers: Writing-wise, is anyone untouchable?
A lot of people—or, in truth, absolutely no people—have been asking me what my Top 50 Black Metal Albums of 2011 are.
So, here they are. I love all 50 equally, and do not have them numbered. If you can think of any that deserve honorable mention, anything I have forgotten, leave the name in the comments section and I will maybe tell you why I didn’t include them, or apologize because I should’ve included them.
Verg by Necrolocust
Vreg by Locustcorpse
Turgal by Trugla
Groluck by Stunefier READ MORE >
[Matchup #32 in Tournament of Bookshit]
‘Lyric Essays’
Before he got married, my friend Michael couldn’t really be bothered to spend a lot of time cooking for himself. Or, well, he wasn’t really motivated to invest a lot of his precious time in the act of preparing food in a kitchen for his consumption. (I’m sure Michael would appreciate me telling you that once he began his long-term, now state/church sanctioned relationship, this changed.) Also, Michael didn’t really have a lot of money. So, not having the finances to go out to eat every night, and not having the inclination to spend a lot of time cooking—because he was instead inclined to read and learn banjo—Michael ate a lot of Banquet Turkey Pot Pies. READ MORE >
“The Mona Lisa Curse,” by Robert Hughes. Part one of six.
UPDATE: “Apart from drugs, Art is the biggest unregulated market in the world.”
“My rap name’s Director’s Commentary”: A Mixed Ape by Giant friends NewVillager here. (Songs ranted over by some sort of maybe crazy person. First person to guess the ranter gets a couple of random galleys from my desk.)
File this under “Making Shapely Fiction”: A Tea Party protest attracted Birthers and Libertarians and Constitutional “Originalists” and Anti-Abortion Activists and Christian Homeschooler Dominionists and Second Amendment Loyalists and Anti-Immigrationists and Anti-Socialists and Race-Baiters and Mainstream Republican Activists and people who want the government to keep its hands off their Medicare AND people who think they are Taxed Enough Already. If their message seemed “cohesive,” (see also this, this, or any of these) maybe that was because they had a corporate-funded lobby and an entire news network dedicated to shaping the message into a cohesive one for them.
A month or so ago, I was asked to write a response to the work of John Cage. And then, 21 other authors and I stood in a big circle around a crowd and read our responses. I thought I’d share mine with you.
3 OBSERVATIONS ON SILENCE (FEATURING HARPO MARX)
1
Imagine a long line of people, and a very important person—possibly with his wife, possibly with his security, possibly he is a she. The very important person is walking down the long line of people shaking hand after hand. Three quarters of the way down this line of people, the very important person comes upon a man in an overcoat and top hat. When the very important person sticks out his or her hand, the man in the overcoat and top hat does not in return stick out his own hand, but instead lifts his leg and deposits it in the hand of the very important person. READ MORE >
To further the conversation, here are two things about “community” and bookstores that have influenced my thinking on the subject.
First, above, is video of a talk by the amazing Matthew Stadler. In it, he discusses the future of the brick and mortar bookstore. It’s the source of the title for this post.
The second is a short essay from my local alt-weekly, The Stranger. In it, Books Editor Paul Constant takes all the talk of community building and asks someone to go ahead and put up (or rent out) an actual building:
So here’s what we need: a fairly large bar, nothing fancy, not too expensive. Open almost all the time. Maybe a typewriter here or there for ambience. Ratty books on shelves. Some sort of an area that can easily become a stage. Chairs. Tables. No TV, no Wi-Fi. No nattering blogs or flickering videos to distract from the words you’re writing, speaking, or reading. A jukebox stuffed with Edith Frost, the Magnetic Fields, and the Pogues. That’s about it for the hardware.
Both are on the right track, I think.
First a note about my perspective. I’m a bookseller. I’ve been a bookseller for almost 12 years. I’ve worked as a floor clerk, in an author events department, in Kids Books, claimed publisher coöp, cashiered, and now spend most of my time behind the scenes writing ads and newsletters and signs.
I know the customers referred to on that sign. I’ve dealt with them, too. I know retail work can be very difficult, and that in the face of a lack of empathy from customers who have never themselves worked retail one can lose one’s own empathy. I also know the folks who come in, ask you to help them look for a book they only have a little bit of information about (a partial title, a remembered book review from a two-month old magazine), follow you to the shelf, pull out their phones, and reward your diligence by scanning the bar code and placing an order through Amazon. Right there. With you watching. READ MORE >
Today is the day that you can buy the debut album by NewVillager. It might help to know a little more about NewVillager. So, sure, here’s an interview with NewVillager.
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Identify yourself as completely as possible, please.
NewVillager
Nouvovilajwa
Refshatar
NuweVillager
قروي جديد
Նորգյուղացի
Yenkəndli
НовыяVillager
Новаселянин
NovaVillager! READ MORE >
Some fine writing by the one and only J.A. Tyler now lives on my little online book concern, Happy Cobra Books. You should go read it.
And then, READ MORE >
Updated. (Sorry.)
Had he not committed suicide in 1970—and not died of old age in the last few years—he’d be 75 today. If you don’t own Spirits Rejoice, there is a hole in your record collection.
Paper Towel, June 3, 2011, Jeffrey Simmons
I have a small file cabinet under my desk that has in it scraps of paper with notes—on notebook paper, printer paper, index cards, Post-It notes, and even (yeesh) napkins. Early drafts of stories—from a time when I wrote everything long hand first, and then typed them up—are in there. Little bits of research that I printed out, glanced at, and then decided to ignore. Pictures I took out of magazines.
There’s another pile on my bookshelf that’s twice the size of my mid-sized cat.
Why am I keeping it all? I thought about throwing it away, recently, READ MORE >
