October 2010

{LMC}: An Illustration of one line from Sean Kilpatrick’s “The All Encompassed Drowned”

Ed: You can read a PDF of this story, here, so you can better participate. Buy NY Tyrant. If you would like to have the full PDF of NY Tyrant 8 so you can participate in this month’s LMC discussions, get in touch with me. But still, when you buy a literary magazine, an angel gets its wings.

Literary Magazine Club / 5 Comments
October 27th, 2010 / 2:00 pm

Tortoise and the Hair

Malcolm Gladwell

Getting really tired of Malcolm Gladwell’s “genius” hair, that intentional stylization, or at least neglect, of the intellectually consumed. His 1999 appearance on Charlie Rose is proof that he understands what normal hair is (no comment on the tie). In 2008, on the same show, he looks either high on meth or himself. Gladwell has made a career of being a provocative thinker, and while I do find him pleasantly curious at times, his constantly enthralled persona is exhausting. One more cappuccino on the per-diem en route to The New Yorker offices and he’s gonna have an epiphany about foam. (What the tale don’t tell you is that a fast rabbit is running away from itself.) True, everyone is a poster child of their own cause; I’m just weary of the cause.

Author Spotlight & Mean / 22 Comments
October 27th, 2010 / 1:26 pm

What’s More Annoying: Special HTMLG Self-Reflexive Edition

What’s more annoying:

How Amy McDaniel never misses an opportunity to remind us that she studied with David Foster Wallace, which somehow endowed her with a magical (foolproof) grammar wand?

OR

How I never miss an opportunity to come across as a rotten pretentious elitist who loves the sound of his own voice yet can’t seem to talk about anything of interest or importance other than worn out concepts like experimental writing?

OR

How often HTMLG discusses Tao Lin?

OR

The fact that Chelsea Martin is still on the roster, even though she hasn’t posted since the great Wiggergate fiasco?

OR

How Justin Taylor, the inventor of the “craven self-promotion” label, which (btw) appears to have been discontinued, can somehow always find a way of self-promoting in every post?

OR

How Jimmy Chen seems both extremely smart and utterly incapable of playing any role other than class clown?

OR

The way Roxane Gay champions good ole fashion storytelling, the way regular folks do?

OR

How Ken Baumann is so smart and handsome and successful?

OR

???

Massive People & Mean / 44 Comments
October 27th, 2010 / 1:23 pm

Winston made for the stairs. It was no use trying the lift. Even at the best of times it was seldom working, and at present the electric current was cut off during daylight hours. It was part of the economy drive in preparation for Hate Week.

Two Obituaries: Glimmer Train and Tin House

Glimmer Train (1990 – October 2010) Respected literary magazine Glimmer Train died of exhaustion yesterday evening, having finally succumbed to the strain of ‘going full steam ahead’ to ‘present stories in a handsome physical publication that people would keep.’ The literary community will fondly keep alive the memory of Glimmer Train by storing the colorfully illustrated issues in English Department libraries across the country. Glimmer Train is survived by its two founding editors, sisters Susan and Linda, and by approximately 22,250 contest finalists, many of whom will console themselves by listing the meaningless accolade in their submission cover letters. Funeral services will be held on Saturday, October 30th, 2010 at 2:30 PM, 1211 Glisan Street, Suite 207, Portland, OR 97209. Glimmer Train will be buried next to its siblings, Iron Horse Literary Review and Night Train, may they all rest in peace.

Tin House (May 1999 – October 2010) Bi-coastal purveyor of literary culture, Tin House passed away on Monday after a long battle with alcoholism. Tin House will be remembered for its tin-sided Portland office, now an iconic landmark to many literary acolytes; its popular writer’s conference, at which authors could add their voice to the desperate din; and its less popular ‘New Voices’ magazine feature, occasional evidence of the staff’s tin ear. Memorial services (Theme TBA) to be held Sunday on the hallowed grounds of Reed College, Steve Almond officiating. In lieu of flowers, please send receipts of your latest purchases from a bookstore. If you cannot provide a receipt, please send a written explanation in 100 words or less.

Mean / 12 Comments
October 27th, 2010 / 11:58 am

Do you think it’s wrong to call Joshua Furst Joshua Farts?

Shit I Don’t Like About Writers & Writing

– Hearing the words “writer,” “reading,” “poem,” “poet,” “the author of,” etc. more frequently than should any human regardless of his or her particular fondness, hobby, or paid work
– Ego, and reflection of ego onto others’ actions because the nature of ego is often that one can only see one’s self in another self
– The absence of self identity that seems to come along with so many of the more flagrant perpetrators of said ego, giving them even more excessive ability to flaunt said ego without losing any sleep
– Twitter and facebook feeds of writers who think about these “tools of social media” as personal sales pitches aimed at you, the “friend,” often unrelenting in their use of the terms of the 1st list item and w/o any form of layering of else that might lead you to believe they are an actual person
– “Tortured” updates on same social networks over how “crazy” today or tomorrow is going to be while editing or writing
– People who retweet Kanye West
– Kickstarter and other similar fundraising systems, which somehow have quickly become the means for acquisition of literary food stamps, even if a lot of people I like have used it to do some cool shit
– The simultaneous bent of many personalities or commentmakers to go on about how evil, ugly, mean, nasty, etc. in general negative or shitty a certain outlet is, matched with an equal to less bent of also complaining that things are “too positive” or “you forgot to include me” when said person or entity has made little to no effort to “get involved” on their own end
– How almost no writer ever has done a good job writing about what it is like to be obese
– How many writers are atheists and yet are proud of themselves as creators
– How the writers who are christian usually suck at writing
– How there are so many books now I can’t think
– How I’ve been reading so many of those books that I seriously am finally starting to get carpal tunnel from holding them up while on the stationary bike and from all this silly typing
– How I don’t quite have enough books now to build a new house out of them so I can sell the place I live in now and get out of this loft complex and live somewhere quieter
– When people don’t mention that their ‘is the author of’ refers to a chapbook, or call chapbooks books, or say chapbook out loud near me at all really
– When chapbooks cost $10 even though they might cost $2 to make most of the time
– People who “won’t read” chapbooks even tho some of them do some amazing shit a full book couldn’t really ever do
– Web magazines who have so little design skill that it actually hurts me more to not look at them than to look at them because I know the damage they are doing to all aura and yet people still submit to them and bitch about their slow response times
– Print magazines that look like they were designed in 1991 by someone who had bad taste even then
– Anyone who bitches about response times ever, usually signifying that they’ve never worked a day on the side of the editing table or even volunteering or trying to pay for the books that sit on the tables often unselling and just trying to break even and hardly reading anyway
– How proud people are of celebrities who talk about a book, like it’s some winged beast descending to kiss their face
– How at least a handful of people will hold this against me at least in a comment and think I think my shit doesn’t stink because I said any of this or that I hold myself to some other standard or that I think I’m special when really I’m just hanging out like anybody else I just sometimes will run my mouth and I like to think I have a lot of faith even when I bitch and this is all a big try
– People who pimp their social state of having or not having on either end, trying to justify lack thereof or surplus because someone has this or that or doesn’t have this or that or went here or there or didn’t or wanted to and didn’t and etc., as if anyone needs to or doesn’t need to experience anything or not anything to write a word down on paper and have it be something, as if those with money can’t think, as if those without money can’t think, as if everyone’s out to kill you because you are male female black white red candy sugar sandwich
– Gmail chat status updates that change every few hours
– Gmail chat’s winking box that goes back and forth until you click it and look at who said what even if you are on invisible and were trying to ignore the thing entirely but don’t have the balls to just log the fuck out
– People who don’t mind saying flagrant things about what other people say or do but won’t do anything flagrant on their own or outside the realm of people who will back them up
– People who think that because you made something that must mean you have to have it or you worship it or yourself for having had it or that you are out for glory in every move
– People who only ‘Like’ or comment on things when it involves something about them
– People with no sense of humor and/or who can’t laugh at themselves
– People who never get crunk READ MORE >

Mean / 206 Comments
October 27th, 2010 / 10:20 am

Everywhere is fucked.

Random / 5 Comments
October 27th, 2010 / 12:47 am

6 beer rules for writers i have known or been (with subtext)

1. if someone buys you a beer at a bar, buy them a beer soon-or-later (you slaw-cheeks fuck)

2. when you drop/dwell by my house and bring a 12 pack and then you have 1/or maybe 2 beer remainder in the 12 pack don’t take the 1/or maybe 2 beer remainder with you, leave it as a thank you (you lint-shuffler fuck)

3. why are you yipping about your own book while drunk/loose-lipped at a bar? (you cloud-hound fuck)

4. you didn’t tip the bartender?! whoa. we all noticed (you smart phone blue-haze fuck)

5. you may have visited my town, i might have even asked and glowed and paid you to visit, but that does not make me your babysitter (you donut-slusher/late night bailout caller fuck)

6. that is all, maybe (tonight)

Mean & Random / 6 Comments
October 26th, 2010 / 10:28 pm

Typical htmlgiant comment being composed

Mean / 19 Comments
October 26th, 2010 / 7:20 pm