RE: FC2, 98.6, small press longevity, obscenity, “experimental” vs. “innovative,” etc.
Blake Butler—
From the 1st edition of the original, 1771 three volume set of the Encyclopaedia Britannica: “SENTENCE, in grammar, a period or set of words, comprehending some perfect sense or sentiment of the mind.” Thus, by prior definition, many sentences are never sentences at all…
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Blake Butler—
(1) Dalkey Archive reupped their website into a stare-machine. (2) They are also offering a special sale of 100 books for $500. Give the gift of a whole library, to yourself, or to your mom. (3) They have also announced a few new forthcoming releases, including new by Jean-Phillipe Toussaint, Patrik Ourednik, John Hawkes, Joshua Cohen, and more. Bamm.
Michael Kimball Guest Lecture #3: The Rough Parts
Here’s a quote from Rachel Carson: “The discipline of the writer is to learn to be still and listen to what his subject has to tell him.” I always read “still” as “sit still,” which makes me think of this quote from Harry Crews (via Opium): “Sometimes you need to affix your ass to the chair.” That is, sometimes, sitting down and doing the work can be the most difficult part of being a writer. Sometimes, it’s the other parts of life that get in the way. Other times, it is the fiction itself, how we think about the fiction at different points in the process.
So how does the writer get through the rough parts, the blank parts, the parts that we know suck? Virginia Woolf says it is determination: “It is worth mentioning, for future reference, that the creative power which bubbles so pleasantly in beginning a new book quiets down after a time, and one goes on more steadily. Doubts creep in. Then one becomes resigned. Determination not to give in, and the sense of an impending shape keep one at it more than anything.”
Blake Butler—
Winners for the Artifice Magazine contest (belated in announcement on my part, as I’ve been across the map) are:
Daniel Powell for “1 fiction in the form of a Wikipedia article that’s been e-vandalized”
Mark for “1 Game Genie”
mjm for “0 honeybees framed as the plight of the working man”
To collect their winnings, folks need to email Artifice their addresses at editors@artificemag.com.
Meanwhile, I received issue 1 and gotdamm is it beautiful. Do a look.
Monday Morning Webahol
Image chosen by word association game with one of the main subjects of this post. Any guesses?
There’s a new poetry blog in town. Contributors to The The Poetry include the Maggy Poetry editorial A-team, plus about eight more fine people, plus^2 some sort of daily-rotating tag-team editorial arrangement. And a key word cloud-sphere that rotates bewitchingly. What else do you want from life? GO THERE.
Several pieces of news from Sentence: (1) The winner of the Sentence Book Award is (for a book-length manuscript of prose poems or a book-length manuscript consisting substantially of prose poems) is Sinead O’Connor and Her Coat of a Thousand Bluebirds by Maureen Seaton and Neil de la Flor. (2) 25 Sightings of the Ivory Billed Woodpecker by Re’lynn Hansen has been selected as the winning manuscript of The Firewheel Chapbook Award. (3) Sentence #7 is now available. (4) Also available now, An Introduction to the Prose Poem. Congrats all you winners!
Some people know about my doppelganger, the Other (or, since he’s older, perhaps the Original) Justin Taylor, who is a Baptist preacher out of Wheaton, Illinois and the co-author of a book called Sex and the Supremacy of Christ. ANYway, JTO left a comment on his friend David Murray’s post at The Gospel Coalition Blog the other day, which naturally triggered my Google alert, and though I don’t always keep this close track of JTO’s doings, the title of the blogpost caught my eye: “101 Writing Tips.” Turns out that Mr. Murray actually meant “Writing Tips 101;” he’s actually offering his Top 5 writing/preaching tips, which themselves are actually only intended to summarize some video about “preaching blunders” that he linked to. Here’s one now-
3. Don’t overuse nouns
Use verbs much more. Not, “It is our suggestion…” but, “We suggest.”
Heartily recommended to all you young preachers out there. Also: JTO’s blog, Between Two Worlds, is here.
Salute to Salu
Caustic Cover Critic interviews Michael Salu. Salu just did the Vintage Classics’ Italo Calvino and Raymond Carver reissues. His blog here.
“It is like a paler Earth, he says.”
Really astoundingly good new story from our friend Matthew Simmons at The Nervous Breakdown: “We Never Ever Went to the Moon.” It’s got plot and heart and floating. In a self-interview, Matthew says that the story’s from an as-yet-unpublished collection called Happy Rock, all about people who believe in things even while other people are watching them. Somebody needs to make that collection appear, if you ask me.
Alexis Orgera—
I’m loving Andrew Marvell’s To His Coy Mistress. What a seduction technique: Your coyness might be cute if we weren’t going to die some day, but we’re mortal so let’s fuck. Ha. Read the poem out loud and pay attention to enjambment. It’s really lovely.
"The grave's a fine and private place, But none, I think, do there embrace."
Noah Cicero Form Letter
Valentine’s Day is coming again, so i’m going to write a love letter. Anyone can use this love letter for their lover.
Dear Lover,
There are a lot of butterflies on the planet. But none in the winter. You are my winter butterfly.
I want to lick the inside of your belly button. I want to lick the lint out of it and then kiss you. Then you have the lint in your mouth. We are naked and you laugh.
[If you are a straight man or lesbian] I want to grab your pussy. I want to cup your naked pussy in my hand. Your pussy is like a leaf with dew on it on a July Morning. That means I like when your pussy is wet. I like your pussy more when it is wet than when it is dry.
[If you a woman or a gay man] I want to hold your soft penis in my hand. Then I want to caress it until it becomes hard and then I’ll call it a cock. I want you to do things with your cock that will make me moan and make strange sounds.
I want to eat candy with you and check our facebooks sitting close.
We need each other like poor people need food and politicians need votes.
We need each other like cell phones need signals and books need readers.
Right now I’m yearning for your genitals to be near by, for your laugh, for your arms, and your legs to wrap around me and pull me deeper.
I can never get deep enough into you.
I want you have my babies. I want our babies to look like us.
We will raise our children to be nervous and strange and to love music like we do.
I keep seeing your belly in my mind, your belly flat, I rest my head on your belly, your belly is soft and we watch a movie. A movie staring Will Ferrell. Everything is right with the world. We have good credit and our grades are good.
I want to fuck until both of our genitals are chafed and sore.
There are a lot of butterflies on the planet. But none in the winter. You are my winter butterfly.
Sincerely,
Your Lover
(Originally posted here.)
Noah Cicero has several books published on several small presses, The Human War, The Condemned, Treatise, Burning Babies and in a short while The Insurgent will be released. Noah Cicero is currently spending his days snowblowing his driveway. Noah Cicero stands in the snow, in the freezing cold weather, looking around, he likes at night in the winter, when it is quiet. There are no birds, sometimes the wind brushes over the snow, making that sweet sound that politely touches the soul of the kindest and even the meanest of souls. If you ever meet Noah Cicero you should first fist bump him, then give him a hug, he likes fist bumps and hugs. Noah Cicero voted for Barack Obama because he smokes.