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Joshua Cohen + The Cupboard = Must Have

Bridge & Tunnel (& Tunnel & Bridge)
by Joshua Cohen
66 pages. Tape-bound
$5.00 (Just released — order here!!!)

A man performs the role of the Sun in a bit of modern choregraphy, and a young ballerina ruins a dinner party with one violent sneeze. A painter paints paintings of walls and hires a painter to paint onto a wall. Some lifestories get rejected. Some stalkers get stalked. Here, for you: twelve stories, to be read as they were written—on the bridge, in the tunnel, in the bus, on the train.

Here’s an excerpt:

from Bridge & Tunnel (& Tunnel & Bridge)
“WHEN WE STOPPED SAYING WE WERE GOING TO MOVE OUT OF THE CITY”

When we stopped saying we were going to move out of the city, we had:

nothing to talk about at parties, nothing to talk about on the train, nothing to talk about to my aunt, nothing to talk about to her parents, nothing to talk about over pizza, nothing to talk about over good but insufferable sushi, nothing to talk about on the corner of Canal Street & Centre, nothing to talk about at jury duty, nothing to talk about in the bathroom at the theater before a movie began. When the bun place closed. The midnight movie theater in Midtown. When there was nothing to do in Midtown. No point to go. When the deli that pastramitized its own meats shut down, too. I really liked that bun place. When we stopped saying we were going to move out of the city, we became more bearable (we had to be). But, speaking just for me, more depressed.

Presses / 12 Comments
February 23rd, 2010 / 11:39 pm

Justin Taylor

Worlds Collide!!!! aka “Justin Taylor is Cool”

You know what I love? Waking up to a Google alert that has a story in it called “Justin Taylor is Cool.” Who wouldn’t love that? So imagine my surprise when I clicked through and wound up at something called the Reformation21 blog. It’s a post about me and my doppelganger, Justin Taylor of Crossway Books, a preacher from Wheaton, Ill about whom I’ve blogged many times, and whose awareness of my existence I’ve frequently been given to speculate about. Well it seems all but certain that he knows about me now, and furthermore, this post by Stephen Nichols seems to make clear once and for all that he is not my doppelganger, but rather that I am his. Since it’s a short post it is reproduced in full, but you might as well see Ref21 for yourself.

So here I am thumbing through my latest copy of Paste catching up on the latest Indie and post funk metal ska offerings and there it is:

“Justin Taylor’s first short story collection” . . . “artfully captur[ing] the view of the 2000s.” Everything Here Is the Best Thing Ever–great title, despite being riddled with theological problems.

Apparently our Justin, “Editorial Director at Crossway and follower of Christ” by day, is a Brooklyn-living professor of writing at Rutgers on the side.

I knew someday being Justin’s friend would raise my HQ (hip quotient for those not in the know).

Stephen, if you’re reading this- thanks for the shout! And yes, EHITBTE presents something of a theological problem–hardly beside the point, btw. You might think about it as an intentional release of the self-destructive powers of the exponential and the recursive onto Leibniz’s notion that “all is for the best in the best of all possible wolds.” Not that that solves anything- but solving problems is your homeboy’s line of work. Mine is causing them. Seems like we’ll work together splendidly. And Justin, if you’re out there, pleased to meet your acquaintance! I’m really sorry I keep putting out books that have titles that sound like they could be your books- The Apocalypse Reader, and the (forthcoming novel, provisionally entitled) The Gospel of Anarchy. We have things in common! I love GK Chesterton! And Kierkegaard! And I just got my copy of The Axioms of Religion by Hobbes and Mullins in the mail today and am very excited to read it. Let me know if you ever want to chat about the history of American Baptist thought and sectarianism.

Blake Butler

Barry Hicks, Bill Hannah

P.S. If this actually ever happens, I’m getting out a gun, Hannah-style.

P.P.S. Here’s Barry editing himself.

Random / 16 Comments
February 23rd, 2010 / 5:33 pm

Blake Butler

Connectivity in Lynch: Michal Ajvaz’s The Other City

[This post originally appeared on my personal blog last year. In light of a new audience, and a new book from Ajvaz forthcoming on Dalkey in a few months, The Golden Age, I’ve reupped it here. Thanks! BB]

The signs of connective tissue in the films of David Lynch are in places very clear. Beyond Lynch’s own mentioning of the mesh of words, most vocally between Mulhollland Drive and INLAND EMPIRE, but also, I would insist, between all the films, in many ways the blank or horrendous spaces that make the films seem the most ‘underneath the viewer’s skin’ are the creation of the space itself, a portal both from film to film, as well as, I must demand, into human.

The rips in spaces in Lynch are all throughout, and in many ways, the definitive space of Lynch: the totem-being behind Winky’s, Club Silencio, the Black Lodge, the pink house on the sound stage and the ‘other version’ of Hollywood & Vine in INLAND EMPIRE, the Rabbits, Ben’s house in Blue Velvet, the exploding shed in Lost Highway, perhaps the entire terrain of Eraserhead, etc., etc. You could list these rooms forever.

You could also list, in your own life, the spaces of your mind that are contained in memory or in associative practice: sleep rooms, childhood slurrings, ruined pictures, unrecorded thoughts, most any second mostly. That you could also not truly make this list is important too, as here is an example, in Lynch’s hands, perhaps, of what occurs in evidence of the reckoning:

[Watch the whole scene here]

Kevin Sampsell Week (2): Smorgasboard

For day 2 of Kevin Sampsell week, I’d like to collect some various KS/A Common Pornography pornographalia from around the web and elsewhere. Below you’ll find some video, some review snippets, another excerpt from the memoir, and everything else to keep your Sampsell buzz afloat. If this turns out to be not enough, you can always peruse Kevin’s website, a free-flowing form of fun and e-orgasm. Hit it!

Kevin reads from ACP at the In The Flesh Reading Series 2-18-10

***** 5 Star review for ACP from Time Out New York: “…Sampsell shares loneliness with such intensity that his book almost defeats it—both his and yours.”

– A Sampsell short story (not in the memoir) from 52 Stories, “Jailbreak.”

Pillow Talk Episode 1: Kevin interviews our own Mike Young (produced & edited by Bryan Coffelt)

– A review of ACP on Blogcritics: “… The structure of A Common Pornography is narrative genius.”

…. and, lastly, for today, pg. 75 of A Common Pornography:

Vibrator

Dad gave me a vibrator once. Sort of oval-shaped. He gave it to me so I could wrap it and give it to Mom as a birthday present. Later, they kept it in a drawer by the bed. Then, shortly after, they slept in separate beds.

Author Spotlight / 22 Comments
February 23rd, 2010 / 1:43 pm

Justin Taylor—

NYC Area Alert Quad-shot:

First off, rival readings on Friday the 26th: Celebrate the fifth anniversary of Earshot!, the venerable series hosted by Nicole Steinberg. The reading will feature my buddy Jeff Johnson, Kate Greenstreet, Jennifer Firestone, Megan Williams, and Margarita Delcheva. It’s in Williamsburg, BK. Directions here. That same night, over at Housing Works Bookstore Cafe, Joanna Smith Rakoff will mark the paperback release of her novel, A Fortunate Age (NYT Editors’ pick; IndieNext pick; B&N First Look Club; SFChronicle best-seller–wow, not bad, right?) with a little help from the M Shanghai String Band and something called the Story Pirates. Also, JSR will be reading with yours truly at Oblong Books in Rhinebeck, NY on March 11. Yes, that one banner thing says the 13th, but don’t believe it. All the other stuff says the 11th, which is a Thursday. But in between the 26th and the 11th is March 4th, which is the day of the 2nd annual Canteen magazine gala fundraiser, which is offering some seriously schmancy good-times. Tickets are on a sliding scale, beginning at $75 and going as high as $1000+. These guys are emphatically not screwing around. Just for showing up you get cocktails and hors d’oeuvres from a Michelin-starred chef, recognition on the Canteen donor page, a copy of the magazine, and your literary fortune told by Porochista Khakpour and, um, me. Higher-level donors can get–among other things–a cocktails class with a mixologist from Per Se, a private tour of “a major museum collection” led by Arnold Lehman, the director of The Brooklyn Museum and also, the host of the event (it’s being held at his house). So if you’re up for feeling like part of High Society (don’t click that- nsfw), you can buy a ticket here (click this- it’s totally sfw).

Comments Off

Blake Butler—

The 2nd edition of our Live Giants live online reading series, originally scheduled for tomorrow with the inestimable Dorothea Lasky, has unfortunately needed to be pushed back due to some personal constraints. Instead, Dottie will be reading here, live on the site, next Wednesday 3/3 at 9 PM. Please update your personal reminder devices accordingly. Those who have seen Dottie read know that this is not to be missed. In the meantime, you can use this leeway space to, if you happened to have not, acquaint yourself with Dottie’s AWE, truly one of the most fun and heartraw books of poems I’ve read in a long time, or to get excited for her soon forthcoming second book, also from Wave Books, the excellently titled Black Life. I’ve already begun digging in, and let me tell you: hold onto your head. See you next Wednesday!

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Justin Taylor

It is Tuesday and We Love Ourselves and, Hey, Why Shouldn’t We?

I was just mucking around in the GIANT stats and noticed something wild- on 2/21 lightning hit our transmitter and HTMLGiant had a huge 18,501 unique visitors. That means that yesterday was in striking-distance of the site’s all-time high, which was December 4, 2009 when every single person in the world (or, rather, 20,249 people in the world) decided they wanted in on the DFW Grammar Challenge (part 2, part 3). So what was it that brought the teeming hordes back over our way? Was it Jeremy Schmall’s poems? Was it Amy again? Was it my post of Harold Bloom reciting a Stevens poem? Actually, it was Jimmy Chen’s “illustrated account of Tom Wolfe’s wardrobe on the Charlie Rose show.” The post went up on the 16th, but the 21st was the day that Andrew Sullivan linked it from his blog, describing it to his readers as “brilliant.” So kudos & salutes to Jimmy, and Andrew, if you’re reading this–thanks! I’m a regular reader of yours already, and it’s very gratifying to know you’ve got an eye on us. Cheers, all!

Behind the Scenes / Comments Off
February 23rd, 2010 / 12:04 pm

Sean Lovelace

6 Things of Scin

1. Sonora Review jump-jacked their flash fiction contest deadline. It is now May 1 (Bach’s death-day). Joe Wenderoth is the final judge. It pays a cool G (or 4000 draft PBRs in little plastic cups at Egan’s, Tuscaloosa, Alabama.)

It’s dirty, it’s dark, it’s loud, and it’s VERY smoky.

2. Or: A student on Tuesday asked “Why write if you are not going to publish?” Fair enough, BUT. Have you ever played chess on a back porch? Ever swam in a river, with no intention of crossing? The discussion blossomed. Writing as enjoyable play? Period.

3. Ever lipped something 100% not yours but kick ass at a reading and told no one? Ever. It is VERY fun. Try it. (Stories welcome)

4. Lit and gaming going to keep stadium lamping/furry cheeking one another. You can feel it, prickly on your skin. If Cage is right, both about the stakes and the merits of his creation, then gaming could be about to embark on an extraordinary transition, and in 20 years’ time, the people who make these games could be as fêted and culturally imposing as Ken Loach, Zadie Smith or Simon Rattle.

5. Used to be authors could sell their “letters” and maybe retire (or at-least cash in for those final years). It was a rite of passage for the big dogs. Like a reverse-benefactor. UT is the bumbledom/fangs (they believe) of all this. But. With email, IM, vid chat, what record will exist? What letters? What drafts? DELETE. Lost pinky drive. DELETE. Maybe it’s all for the better? DELETE.

6. Here is your Meat Joy because we all like that sort of thing. Meat and Joy.

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6AK9TI3-LU

Web Hype / 26 Comments
February 22nd, 2010 / 6:59 pm

Alec Niedenthal

Ten Years of The Lioness

Hey, so this year is the tenth anniversary of The Lioness, a seminal album by countryish indie-rockers Songs: Ohia, whose frontman is the estimable Jason Molina (who also fronts Magnolia Electric Co.). Molina’s best, I think, are elliptical, sinister love songs, with which he stuffed The Lioness from front to back. His songs are heavily symbolic, studded with violent images, etc.–just listen to the songs I’m posting below (but don’t watch the videos–they’re just still images of the band), won’t you?

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DXsFkRBsAF8