Matthew Simmons
Matthew Simmons lives in Seattle.
Plug
Follow this link to see that poster, but big and readable.
I’d say it was shameless, but I do in fact feel some shame. Frankly, it feels pretty good.
On (Fake) Steve Buscemi’s Twitter Feed
Sure, Twitter is kind of dull in the hands of most. (See my Twitter feed for an example.) I accept that.
Additionally, lots of ‘celebrities’ (single quote trademarked by Tao Lin, used without permission) have adopted Twitter so as to keep their fans updated on the dull minutiae of their ordinary lives.
READ MORE >
Influences 5: Sasha Fletcher
Here is the fifth response to my influences post. The respondent is Sasha Fletcher.
Prompts:
1) Pick one of the pieces you chose and describe the thing about it that seems particularly innovative about it.
2) Tell me what changed about your writing because of that innovation.
Answers after the jump: READ MORE >
Shane Jones and Dear Leader have a conversation
Kevin Sampsell (seen above dancing) made our friend Shane and our Dear Leader talk about small press issues and being an “internet writer.” The conversation appears on the blog of the mighty, mighty Powell’s Books.
It’s a mighty fine conversation. Here’s an abridged highlight:
Blake: People call you and me “Internet writers” in certain forums, though I don’t necessarily ride that term at all, and think mainly it comes from people not understanding the Internet as a tool. Have there been things you’ve done that you thought effective? Have there been things you would like to do but haven’t, or are not sure how?
Shane: …The “Internet writer” thing is just a label. I don’t consider myself, or you for that matter, an Internet writer.The “Internet writer” thing is just a label. I don’t consider myself, or you for that matter, an Internet writer. I think it’s because we both have blogs and publish online that some people call us this. But we also have printed stuff in journals and printed books, so I don’t really get it. I do know that starting a blog was probably one of the most important steps I made in my writing “career.” I became involved in a community of talented writers and it let me expose my own writing to a community of readers. And that’s very important…
Blake: Yeah, saying “Internet writer” is about as arbitrary and misplaced as saying “typewriter writer.” People so desperately want to name things.
elimae reading in New York, update
Here’s the latest on the elimae reading in New York. The one hosted by Shya Scanlon. Here’s the lineup.
Lincoln Michel, Rozalia Jovanovic, Kimberly King Parsons, James Yeh, Justin Taylor, Nicolle Elizabeth, Tao Lin*, Nick Antosca, Todd Zuniga, Dennis DiClaudio, John Madera, Timmy Waldron, Forrest Roth, Terese Svoboda, Barry Graham, Dawn Raffel, Sasha Graybosch, Eric Nusbaum and more.
It will be at the KGB Bar, May 26, 7pm – 9pm. Everyone will read for 3 minutes.
UPDATE:
James Yeh got left out, and has been added. Sorry, James. Here’s an extra James Yeh link.
Also, would anyone in New York like to appear as me? Volunteer in the comment section.
* Sorry. No link here. This person apparently has no web presence. Maybe he should start a blog or something.
Gulag Archipelago 2
“In prison, they saved. They saved cigarette ends to make full cigarettes from the tobacco. They saved bits of turnip to eat at night when they were hungry. They saved shoelace ends to tie together to make new shoelaces. They saved the stumps of rotten teeth that fell out of their mouths.
“It was 2010 and they were in prison.”
Interlude
Let’s take a moment away from literature for this sentence from The Guardian:
Astronomers searching for the building blocks of life in a giant dust cloud at the heart of the Milky Way have concluded that it tastes vaguely of raspberries.
And without even trying, the universe has defeated almost all poetry.
(Turned on to this link by Charles Mudede at The Stranger.)
Influences 4: Shya Scanlon
Here is the fourth response to my influences post. The respondent is my friend Shya Scanlon. Read “The Fish” on Spork.
Prompts:
1) Pick one of the pieces you chose and describe the thing about it that seems particularly innovative about it.
2) Tell me what changed about your writing because of that innovation.
Answers after the jump: READ MORE >
Risk sentimentality.
A nice piece of advice that started with Colum McCann, given to Marlon James, and then repeated in an interview conducted by Maud Newton.
The relationship is at least as gripping as what happens between Mr. Rochester and Jane Eyre but fundamentally doomed. Was it difficult to write?
Oh my god it was the hardest thing I’ve ever written in my life. I remember calling friends shouting, “I just wrote a love scene! All they do is kiss!” to which they would respond, “. . . and are they then dismembered?” and I’d go, “No, after that they dance!” It was hard. I resisted it for as long as I could because I didn’t believe in it at first, and even when I did, I couldn’t figure out how to write it. Not until Irish novelist Colum McCann gave me permission by giving me the best writing advice I’ve ever gotten from a writer: Risk Sentimentality.
There’s a belief that sex is the hardest thing for a literary novelist but I disagree: love is. We’re so scared of descending into mush that I think we end up with a just-as-bad opposite, love stories devoid of any emotional quality. But love can work in so many ways without having to resort to that word. Someone once scared me by saying that love isn’t saying “I love you” but calling to say “did you eat?” (And then proceeded to ask me this for the next 6 months). My point being that, in this novel at least, relationships come not through words, but gestures like the overseer wanting to cuddle.
The rest of the interview is here.