As Edgard Varése once said, “I refuse to submit to sounds that have already been heard.”
Sommer Browning’s facebook feed reminded me of this 21st century Dadaist called SMOKERSOFCIGARSPIPES, who has over 5,000 videos including this one:
Ireland’s Bird Life: A World of Beauty
Ireland’s Bird Life: A World of Beauty
Edited by Matt Murphy and Susan Murphy
Text by Richard Lansdown
Images by Richard Mills
Sherkin Island Marine Station Publications, 1994
160 pages / Abe Books
There is a twitcher out on the seafront.
The seafront must be a few miles long altogether – stretching from the oil refinery past the power-station all the way to the saltwater lake, and then the woods. Some days the twitcher will be outside our house where the waders dabble in the mud for lugworm and shellfish. Other days he’ll be down by the saltwater lake where the wigeons and shovelers compete for stale breadcrumbs.
My boyfriend thinks there are a couple of different twitchers, but I know there’s just the one.
He is a little kingfisher of a man with long beak and speckled brow, and when he perches on the folding-stool with his face fastened into a pair of binoculars, his elbows jut out at each side like a stubby wingspan. Although it’s hard to tell through all his cold weather clothes-wear, I guess he is about seventy.
I am certainly interested in nature but it’s other people that interest me the most.
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February 6th, 2012 / 12:00 pm
February 6th, 2012 / 12:00 pm
“The Hottest Litmag” as determined by everyone who has ever read HTMLGIANT
—or at least those who responded a while back when I asked folks to name “the hottest litmag in the room.” As of that moment. And now, after the jump, I’ve compiled the responses.
By far the clear number one was …
Impossible Mike—
“Poetry is nothing but a certain astonishment before the world and the means for this astonishment.”
Andre du Bouchet, 1954
2
DARK MATTER #1
Dark Matter is a magazine I made up last night. It’s composed of poems from other publications on the internet and some songs. Some of the poems are newer and some are older. They come from publications that I enjoy reading. The songs are songs I like and can be listened to with the poems, or by themselves.
the superbowl uses roman numerals to identify each game
2. OK, you don’t want to read any fucking super “Can creative writing be taught?” posts on here so don’t, just skip this link and start pounding avocado into paste (for the guac dip later), but this one has some interesting points and some decent links. So.
Creative writing is about doing the work of writing, and the experimental innovator benefits from time, support, and guidance.
11. Super exchange between John D’Agata and a fact checker, Jim.
Really, Jim, respectfully, you’re worrying about very stupid shit.
7. Jim Ruland over at Hobart is REALLY cheering for the Giants tonight.
2. What’s your AWP book fair budget? I like to take a big bundle of cash and leave my card behind. I bring the card, and it’s butter my biscuits crazy.
3. How to handicap this Superbowl? Brady plays it cool but you can see in his eyes the wake up daily, the “WTF? I own $8,000 flower pots and can do things with my hair. This kicks ass!” Eli looks like he cuts Brady’s yard, and not well. He walks through life in a daze. Brady gets nightly cunninglingus advice from his Brazilian goddess wife (who could buy him out X 20). “Clockwise, fucker!” “Sorry,” he mumbles again as he rubs the back of his neck and walks out back and throws a football through his walnut fence (lands in neighbor’s spleen-shaped pool). Eli likes Applebees but thinks the Wonton Tacos Chicken are “Too dern spicy.” Brady sometimes eats sushi fried, OK? Eli once wrote a complaint letter to Wal-mart (about some frozen waffles that split in half upon toaster entry) but didn’t send the letter because, in his heart, he loves Wal-mart. Brady did attend the opera in Italy last summer, but he also took two Lorcet and a V&T before settling in his seat. Eli is scared of horses (their heads are way too big!). Brady likes to smell the tips of his own fingers. Who knows?
{LMC}: An Interview with Megan Garr, Editor of Versal
Versal 9 was the January selection for Literary Magazine Club (details of our next selection, Monday). Did you read the issue? What did you think? My favorite story was Carmen Petaccio’s “Tornado,” where the writer personified a tornado and created a really imaginative story. I also admired Stace Budzko’s “To Be Glad And Young,” particularly the ending. Versal editor Megan M. Garr and I had a great conversation via e-mail about Versal, the proliferation of magazines, being based in Europe, arrogance, editorial humility, and more.
Versal—where does the name come from?
Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, where he shortens the word “universal” to keep with the meter. It’s from a random comment by the nurse in act 2. Somewhere along the line the word “versal” also came to take on the meaning “single”. I liked that conflation, ten years ago when I was first figuring out how to live in a foreign country.
A “versal” is also that ornamental capital letter at the beginning of old texts – a fact that suits us, I think, with our attention to design.
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Cynical Monsters
In Defense of Monsters
by BJ Hollars
Origami Zoo Press
52 pages / $8 Buy from Origami Zoo Press
Most people have little room for magic or legend in their lives. Folks spend most of their formative years cultivating a certain amount of cynicism towards legend and work incessantly towards creating a sense of control over themselves and the world at large. To be human is to conquer – whether physically or mentally.
We keep doing our work, spend inordinate amounts of time “surfing” the web (surfing itself invoking an image of an uncontrollable wave, that of information, tamed by man) and we watch television where we have 24-hour news coverage and programs that reflect our tastes. (Although it can be argued the practice of watching television is, in its own way, an acceptance of a mythology in itself. The very idea of personal choice in the current media system is false. A great infographic from designers Frugal Dad suggests, at the very least, we should reconsider what we’re watching as personal choice.)
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February 3rd, 2012 / 12:00 pm
February 3rd, 2012 / 12:00 pm