Ropes of Sand

Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now

2008-04-29T16:11:00.007-04:00

For some reason, when it finally occurred to me to post about these exciting new developments in contemporary fiction on our now-down-to-three-visitors-a-day blog, Starship's "Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now," came into the field. It's not an entirely appropriate soundtrack the news that Sana and Sugi are making large literary splashes, but something about the tone is right. Incidentally, you can download the ringtone of the song here. And here are links to our ladies' author pages: Sana & Sugi

In Which the U. of Iowa Tries To Put Theses on the Internets for Free

2008-03-13T13:27:00.003-04:00

Dear all,

Horrified that this has prompted my return to the blog, but guess what?

Iowa wants to put MFA theses on the Web.... for free.

Read more here. Also pasting an e-mail from the awesome Kembrew McLeod, who is spearheading efforts against.

-----

Wednesday, March 12

Hello, and Greetings From Iowa City:

Over the past twenty-four hours I have dealt various University of
Iowa administrators, and I now have a (somewhat) better understanding
of how UI is handling the controversy over the possible online
publishing of MFA theses. Regardless, I am still somewhat confused
about what exactly is going on, and I feel like I have taken a hit of
bureaucracy-flavored LSD.

From what I can tell, the UI Library doesn't seem to be at fault;
they have no plans to scan MFA theses now or in the future. I know
and trust our librarians, and the ones I have talked to -- including
Paul A. Soderdahl, Director, Library Information Technology -- fully
agree that it is a bad idea to put MFA theses online.

That's the good news -- no old theses are being scanned, and there
are no plans to do so. However, there is bad news, and it affects
current MFA students who want to graduate from UI this year.

The controversy stems from a piece of paperwork that students have to
sign in order to deposit their thesis, and therefore graduate. It's
called a "First Deposit" form (found here: http://www.grad.uiowa.edu/
pubs/forms/FirstDepositCheckli

st.pdf). It contains brand new language
that can be construed as a license that hands over student thesis
publishing rights to the University of Iowa -- unless an embargo form
is signed, and that embargo only lasts two years. I ran the First
Deposit form by a very good entertainment lawyer who confirmed this
reading. In short, it's a badly written, ill-conceived document.

The problem is that the Graduate College (which gives out degrees)
won't revise this contested language (which it wrote), and the
deadline to turn in the First Deposit form is approaching in two
weeks. Even after internal pressure from students, staff, and
faculty, the Graduate College has refused to revert to the old,
uncontroversial form.

I said before that this doesn't appear to have anything to do with
Google Print, but that's not entirely true. The language of this new
Graduate College form would allow for MFA theses deposited this year
to eventually be posted on Google Print, which is a reminder that we
need good university policies regarding copyright protections and
exceptions. I highly recommend UVA Prof. Siva Vaidhyanathan's blog,
The Googlization of Everything: http://
www.googlizationofeverything.com/, for more info about the broader
implications of the Google Print project.

This Friday, March 14, my colleague Loren Glass will meet with a Dean
at the Graduate College, Dale Wurster. Loren is representing the
concerns of UI's Nonfiction Writing Program -- which has led this
fight -- and he will try to convince Dean Wurster to go back to the
old form. Sadly, it's not an open meeting, and I won't even be
attending (Wurster scheduled me for an individual meeting next week,
instead).

UI librarian Paul Soderdahl and others have been urging the Graduate
College to revert to the old First Deposit form until we have time to
write a sane publishing policy regarding MFA theses. But there seems
to be some kind of breakdown between the Graduate College and the
Library, some kind of bizarre communication-scrambling wormhole that
spits out contradictory information.

Meanwhile, the clock is ticking on an April 5 deposit date, like a
really boring bureaucratic version of the TV show 24 -- all while
this year's crop of MFA graduates could suffer negative consequences.
Based on my own experience, I feel that UI's Graduate College has a
really poor record with copyright issues, including fair use, and I
am not hopeful that things will turn around. However, the external
pressure might help.

Best,

Kembrew McLeod

P.S. Please spread the word in emails and blogs, and you have my
permission to reprint this email.

Colette!

2007-12-10T14:02:00.000-05:00

In continuing my never-ending quest for world domination...

Tracy and I are proud to announce the birth of Colette. Full name is Colette Carman Jane Kistulentz, and she was born December 8 at 6:54 pm., and weighed in at 6 pounds, 14 ounces. Among the famous folk who were born on December 8, three stand out: Sammy Davis, jr., Ann Coulter, and Jim Morrison. Fill in your own jokes here.

Cultwriter

2007-12-06T12:21:00.001-05:00

Ever feel down? Maybe Jim Hynes will make you happy. He's started a nice new blog called Cultwriter, which I discovered after discovering his recipe for spaghetti sauce.

Lishing Carver

2007-10-17T12:51:00.000-04:00

I don't know what happened, but I decided to post on the blog today. And it's going to be about the possibility that Tess Gallagher, the widow of Raymond Carver, will publish Carver's stories as they stood prior to Gordon Lish's involvement. The would-be book would be called Beginnings and stand as the "true" book behind What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, which would then stand (according to Gallagher) as "a part of the history." Read about it in the NY Times.

Remember when Dey House had all of those grey and broken filing cabinets in the basement? You could slip down there and read any story that had every appeared in workshop. People said there were Carver stories down there that looked vastly different than anything they'd ever seen, but these people were also drunked up and perhaps feeling a bit "expansive" themselves.

Where Are They Now?

2007-08-22T17:16:00.001-04:00

So, my dear ropers, where are you? What are you doing? This back to school time of year has me nostalgic for noon beers with Mullins and Bognanni at George's, dollar Tuesdays at Martini's with Team Barrelhouse, Maker's Mark at the Foxhead, $1 PBR at Deadwood, eating that last nasty slice from Pizza on Dubuque, and then falling asleep during Julie Englander's question-and-answer portion of Live From Prairie Lights.

In the meantime, I'm finishing up my course work for my PhD here at Florida State. Taking my preliminary exams in March, hope to graduate in December 2008. I've got a few stories coming out, including one that is online now at http://narrativemagazine.com/sq (free registration is required to read the whole thing). Perhaps the most important thing is that Tracy and I are expecting our first child, a girl, in December.

So why don't we all pony up with the where and whens of our life. Or you could just email me (that hint is directed solely at Strickley).

Certain Somebodies

2007-07-12T15:37:00.000-04:00

A certain Stansel makes his fancy magazine debut in the summer issue of the Antioch Review. His story "All We Have" will break your heart if you have one.

I'd also like to announce at this time that a certain Stansel will be making his way to Houston in a month, where he will drink beer in ice-houses, wear boots made of reptile skin, and work towards a PhD in literary fancypantsiness.

A certain Solomon is the recipient of a Pushcart Prize for her story Lotto, which was workshopped a lot at Iowa. She'll be making her way to McDowell sometime in the nearish future.

A certain Krasikov will be publishing a story collection and a novel with Speigel & Grau in 2008, which is almost too long to wait for it.

Also, a certain Klein has published a story with the new online version of AGNI and it's pretty awesome to see it there. Visit eyeshot if you haven't lately too.

From what I've heard, a certain Le is tearing it up. But maybe I'll leave it to that other blog to bring us up to date with that.

And I've also noticed that a certain Liening is all over the damn place with his fine poetry.

A certain Strickley has failed to congratulate people accordingly and this is the first step in her journey toward redemption.

Oh Heaven

2007-06-07T08:55:00.000-04:00

At a film festival in Athens, Ohio, I saw a short competition film on graphic artist Jeffrey Brown, which prompted me to buy one of his books a couple of days later. At this point, certain pages in the book have become shorthand for certain feelings in our household and among our friends. My sister, for example, wanted to show her date a particular page in lieu of attempting to explain to him what she was thinking. She didn't. The point is that Brown's images have entered our little collection lexicon as though they were metaphors, which speaks to their density and potency. In short, he's a great poet.

Today I learned that The Poetry Foundation has paired Jeffrey Brown with Russell Edson in a match that strikes me as particularly astute. How often do good things like this happen? Here's what the foundation says about the project of letting graphic novelists loose in their archives:

As a way to help readers discover (or rediscover) our archive, poetryfoundation.org has invited some of today’s most vital graphic novelists to interpret a poem of their choice from the more than 4,500 poems in our archive, reaching from Beowulf to the present.

I'd like to post the image here, but I think it's too big, so I'll send you here to download your own copy of Jeffrey Brown's interpretation of Russel Edson's "Of Memory and Distance."

Time and Truckers

2007-05-21T14:33:00.000-04:00

So I was on my way back to Denver from a fishing trip near Casper, WY, yesterday. We stopped in at a gas station somewhere between Nowhere and Hell and Gone when the ghost of Frank Conroy made contact with me.

On the rotating wire rack next to the cash register, amidst 18 other audio books with titles such as "Archimedes 14: Rise of the Droids", "The Lonely Homesteaderwoman and the Lonely Cowboy" and "Desecration: Antichrist Takes the Throne (Left Behind Series #9)" I spied a copy of Frank Conroy's "Time and Tide: A Walk Through Nantucket". I rubbed my eyes and looked again. It was still there.

The only reasons I could come up with for Frank's presence there among the homemade beef jerky (delicious) and fluorescent orange hunting caps were of the supernatural/quantum variety (e.g. by observing that particular audio book I changed its behavior into Time and Tide, whereas if Mullins observed the same audio book it would have appeared as a biography of Jeff Lynn or "Letters to Penthouse XVI: Hot and Uncensored").

It was good to see the old man, thought I would share with you all.

Iowasick

2007-05-03T03:19:00.000-04:00

Dear all,

There is a big picture--a two-page spread--of the Hamburg Inn in the latest New Yorker. It is not labeled as such, but that is what it is. (It is actually a picture of Barack Obama campaigning there.)

Sugi

Hate to Be A Bearer of Bad But

2007-04-12T09:33:00.000-04:00

Kurt Vonnegut

November 11, 1922 – April 11, 2007

outrageous

2007-03-21T03:40:00.000-04:00

hey, y'all. i found this on youtube and couldn't stop watching it. for anyone who's not on spring break: i'm sorry for your life.

Breaking

2007-03-07T15:17:00.000-05:00

News of the substandard conditions awaiting wounded soldiers at VA hospitals and clinics seemed (to me) a little slow to break big. We've been reading for some time of the differences bewteen the injuries of this war and the ones for which the hospitals are equipped. The Washington Post started reporting on mouse droppings and black mold in February. And now the story is everywhere. I wonder if other stories will have similar tragectories. In particular, I wonder about this one, appearing now at Salon. Go there to read about what some of the 165,000 women who have served in Iraq have seen and experienced. Something bothers me about the way this story was written and I'm not sure exactly what yet, but it delivers the news.

Plagiartastic

2007-02-13T10:28:00.000-05:00

This month's issue of Harper's came and made me all smart for a few days. I fear the new smartness has worn off now, as I have already regurgitated what I've learned (in an increasingly inaccurate fashion) to 3+ people and that's the limit. From there, my fervor wanes and I can remember the look of the essays on the page and the feeling that there was something important happening in there. And then I'll go around with a spark of righteousness and indignation in my head until I realize I no longer recollect the source; I just know there was something to be upset about and I've got an issue somewhere in the apartment to back me up.

Before I forget the source, I extend to you the actual text. May you remember more than I do: Jonathan Lethem's "The Ecstasy of Influence" is a "Plagiarism," complete with a Usemonopoly.

Edward N. Luttwak's "Dead End" is also very worthwhile. I was utterly persuaded by it, which makes me a little afraid of reading it again.

And there's a Munro story in there too.

Good golly that was a good issue. I will send it to anyone who wants it. I'll even throw in a few extra surprises. We'll call it a mystery grab bag.

AWP Atlanta

2007-02-03T09:31:00.000-05:00

Hey all, just wondering who amongst us might be making the trek to Atlanta for AWP at the end of the month. Anyone? Bueller?

Prairie Lights cancels abortion book reading after threats

2007-02-01T14:34:00.000-05:00

Iowa City book store cancels abortion book reading after threats

So wrong.

I could use a swink

2007-01-30T15:16:00.000-05:00

The long-awaited third issue of Swink is out and available for public consumption. This volume includes such notable authors as Sarah Strickley, Brad Liening, and Daniel Alarcon. I think we can all be sure that it will be a fine issue indeed.

allergies

2007-01-24T16:40:00.000-05:00

Even though I sometimes get hay fever, I don't believe in allergies. I think a certain amount of respiratory inflammation is normal. Also, as a waiter, you are constantly dealing with neurotic people who claim to be allergic to the most ridiculous things and then asked for all kinds of substitutions as an accommodation for these phantom ailments. I’m allergic to parsley, so can I please have a steak as a garnish instead? Yes, yes, some people will die if they eat peanuts, but I think actual, for realsies allergies are probably somewhat rare, while neurosis and irrational feelings of persecution are epidemic.

I’ve also always had the same innate distrust of the concept of writer’s block. It has always seemed to me that when one makes time to write and actually sits down to do it, it just happens. For the past six months, however, my experience was markedly different. Whenever I sat down to work, I felt terribly restless and unable to concentrate. Even when I cleared a whole day just to write, it was impossible to sit in the chair for the whole time. I would write and rewrite the same sentences. I paced. I diddled with my iPod. I kept wanting to deny that it was writer’s block per se, but as it dragged on (and on and on), I felt my conceptual rejection waning. The feeling of writer’s block for me was something like sleeplessness, a sensation of being simultaneously agitated and exhausted.

I’m not sure if it’s over or not, but this weekend, I started to think that I could sit down again. Weird. I did nothing out of the ordinary, but out of nowhere, I felt a breaker switch flip in my head and had the sudden knowledge that I could sit down and work again, especially if I used a pen instead of a computer. Again, this realization came out of nowhere. The only deviation from my normal routine was that I haven’t been drinking for the last month (an early Lent sacrifice, I guess) and I’d just had a ménage á trois.

Does anyone have clear evidence–anecdotal, clinical, or otherwise–proving the existence of writer’s block? Or is it just a lot of hooey?

Have I Killed This Blog?... And, Zadie Smith on Novel-Writing

2007-01-17T12:24:00.000-05:00

Where did you go? Even SAS is silent.

Zadie Smith on Novel-Writing and the Dream of the Perfect Novel

Elizabeth McCracken in NYT Magazine

2006-12-31T13:00:00.000-05:00

The Bell of the Barbell
Elizabeth also wrote for this issue last year...

Happy New Year, all.

Hype Machine

2006-12-25T19:40:00.000-05:00

Those who love music... I wanted to share a recent discovery:

The Hype Machine!

This is GREAT. It is a music blog aggregator--that is, it collects embedded MP3s from music blogs. A great way to discover new music, etc. etc. MANY fun hours, good new music to write to. You can also run searches and it will aggregate music by your favorite group... hard-to-find live sessions, whatever the dude who shares your taste and blogs about it has found. (So far, my favorite stuff is on this German blog. I have no idea what he's saying, but really excellent taste.)

Happy holidays and general seasonal whatnot to all.

-Sugi

Blogger Update

2006-12-13T09:14:00.000-05:00

Oh, dear.

I noticed that most of our contributors are gone today.

That can't be good.

My guess is that it has something to do with the upgrade to blogger beta that has been happening over the past few days. In order to blog on blogger, I think you need to have a google account now. More on this when it becomes more clear.

Okay: From the Help Desk
Why is Blogger switching to Google Accounts?
Google Accounts are better protected against fraud, impersonation, and abuse. In addition, by switching your Blogger account to a Google Account, it will be easier to use other Google services like AdWords, Google Groups, Google Alerts, Froogle Shopping List, Personalized Search, your Personalized Homepage, Google Answers, and many future Google services.

Everyone, please come on over. We want you back. Can't do without you.

McEwan, Atonement, Plagiarism... What?

2006-12-07T21:40:00.000-05:00

Novelists Defend One of Their Own Against a Plagiarism Charge

interesting who rose to defend him!

Yiyun!

2006-12-06T14:48:00.000-05:00

Listen everybody: A Thousand Years of Good Prayers has won the Guardian first book Award!

Read a nice little bit about it here: Guardian

The People Who Graduated After We Graduated

2006-12-05T14:34:00.000-05:00

Now have a blog. Visit it here: Oughtsix
And it's now in our sidebar too.

Against the Day

2006-11-22T10:32:00.001-05:00

Is anyone reading the new Pynchon?

People all over the damn place, though not here, are arguing about whether to read it, whether women read Pynchon, and whether or not reviewing Pynchon is a useful endeavor. People are also trying to decide what Pynchon might look like today. (We are experiencing the Pynchon morph courtesy of popwatch.) Here's the amazon synopsis, apparently written by the Pynchon himself:

Spanning the period between the Chicago World's Fair of 1893 and the years just after World War I, this novel moves from the labor troubles in Colorado to turn-of-the-century New York, to London and Gottingen, Venice and Vienna, the Balkans, Central Asia, Siberia at the time of the mysterious Tunguska Event, Mexico during the Revolution, postwar Paris, silent-era Hollywood, and one or two places not strictly speaking on the map at all.

With a worldwide disaster looming just a few years ahead, it is a time of unrestrained corporate greed, false religiosity, moronic fecklessness, and evil intent in high places. No reference to the present day is intended or should be inferred.

The sizable cast of characters includes anarchists, balloonists, gamblers, corporate tycoons, drug enthusiasts, innocents and decadents, mathematicians, mad scientists, shamans, psychics, and stage magicians, spies, detectives, adventuresses, and hired guns. There are cameo appearances by Nikola Tesla, Bela Lugosi, and Groucho Marx.

As an era of certainty comes crashing down around their ears and an unpredictable future commences, these folks are mostly just trying to pursue their lives. Sometimes they manage to catch up; sometimes it's their lives that pursue them.

Meanwhile, the author is up to his usual business. Characters stop what they're doing to sing what are for the most part stupid songs. Strange sexual practices take place. Obscure languages are spoken, not always idiomatically. Contrary-to-the-fact occurrences occur. If it is not the world, it is what the world might be with a minor adjustment or two. According to some, this is one of the main purposes of fiction.

Let the reader decide, let the reader beware. Good luck.

--Thomas Pynchon

"Stranger than Fiction"

2006-11-13T07:34:00.000-05:00

Has Anyone seen this?
It looks like a really cute film about writing. Darn! Why didn't we think of it?

The Continuing YL Fanclub

2006-11-06T10:03:00.000-05:00

Notes for those who might have missed these exciting pieces of news;

A Thousand Years of Good Prayers is going to be a movie!

And...

Yiyun is a Whiting Award winner.

Yiyun... and Charles D'Ambrosio. Yup.

Asali Solomon from the class ahead of us is reading NYC soon, and in other places--from her new collection, Get Down. She's great--go if you can!

Happy voting.

Literary Partnerships

2006-11-06T09:36:00.000-05:00

The tongues have been wagging of late about famous and famously doomed literary partnerships. Probably because of the release of books like the new biography of Assia Wevill, who was Ted Hughes' mistress when Sylvia Plath died. The book reportedly portrays Hughes "as a bully who forced her to obey his list of household chores." Read a review in the
Guardian

A little disturbing is the suggestion that the victims of the doomed romances of tomorrow will be more easily accessed by their future biographers: "If one half of the partnership destroys his/her letters, then one half of the correspondence is lost for ever. But if one half of the partnerships destroys all his/her emails, it will not matter, as the other half can still possess the correspondence in its entirety."

More disturbing is the suggestion that the women who lose their lives and minds in "20th-century heterosexual relationships, charged by sexual passion," kind of had it coming: "But it is undeniable that their association with famous literary men has contributed to their stature. The interesting thing about all these women is that they knew it, even at the time." Read about it at the Independent

Mark the Calendar

2006-11-03T14:15:00.000-05:00

I don't know anything about this event, but I do know where my weekend is headed.

Visit Rule, Brittaniea for last year's drunk and to submit yours this year.

Incidentally: Unpacking boxes recently, I found a pretty smoked-on-boozed-on old notebook that made the rounds some night at the Foxhead. Inside there is an inventively blue flipbook designed by the brilliant umbilicalkid. Also, a diagram of the graffiti in the women's bathroom as of Winter 2005. And, a message to the future about PBR. Finally, a note: MEANING, SENSE, CLAIR.

Big congratulations to Sugi

2006-10-16T15:34:00.000-04:00

for a two-book deal with Random House, Random House. I can't wait to see the books out now.

Work, Democrat. Work.

2006-10-12T16:51:00.000-04:00

So it looks like I've taken a while to warm up to the whole blog thing, but I'm feeling toastier after 16 months, as I have something to shill for...

My friend and frat brother Thomas Bates has started an organization called Democrats Work. The general idea is to pair avowed Democrats with already-existing service organizations, so as to increase visibility of Democrats doing the things Democrats do anyway (as we are a good and charitable people), as well as to maintain the roots of the grass outside of the election cycle. It has some other objectives, which you can read all about at the website. Long story short, the first round of states they are targeting are Nevada, Colorado, Arkansas and Ohio. (SAS/Ian/Balou, I'm looking at you... more to come, let me know if you are interested in the slightest.)

While Mr. Bates was out here in sunny Denver (where I reside), I tagged along with him to a few Democratic events and discovered that a) if you want to be "into" politics you pretty much have to read political blogs, and b) man, I sure don't read blogs (except for this one, of course). All this talk of my discomfort with blogs is making me feel old. Also, my knees hurt from playing beach volleyball. Yes, Denver.

Literarily (this is a writer-type blog, right?), looks like Orhan Pamuk won the Nobel Prize. The Times points out that this continues a trend of choosing writers who are in opposition to their States, even though they purportedly award the thing based purely on literary merit. Called to mind Joyce Carol Oates' National Book Award acceptance speech, though on re-reading it I think that's more to do with a) faulty powers of association/recollection and b) limited pool of appropriate associations to draw on.

In closing, this is old news, but Bill Moyers did a pretty neato series - "On Faith and Reason" - for his PBS show. You can get it as a podcast, or watch the videos on the site (though I don't see anything when I just tried it). Generally speaking, he's pretty dope. So is the segment with David Grossman on his retelling of the Samson story. Word.

Bid

2006-10-11T11:03:00.000-04:00

Ever wonder what it would cost to have a book, book proposal, screenplay, novel chapters, or synopsis critiqued?

Find out when the bidding starts on ebay.

In an effort to raise money to help orphaned children in China, Julie Kenner has pulled together an interested assortment of literary effects (you'll recognize many of the names) for sale: "We have a range of great items to bid on, from signed books, to Hollywood memorabilia, to critiques of your book or screenplay by editors, agents, and managers. Something for everyone ... and just in time for your holiday shopping!" she says on her fundraising website.

Read all about it here:

Bid

By the way, I'm just going to keep soldiering along on the blog.

Okay?

See Dog, See Debate

2006-10-05T10:48:00.000-04:00

Wow. Where is everyone?

While Ian is away in the land of the flying corn, I've decided to send Balou to doggie day care. Forgive me please my sorry self -- all I do (still) is talk about my dog -- but I've just found this wonderful wonderful thing: I can watch my dog on my computer.
Some things I didn't expect:
1. How high my heart jumps every time he walks near the webcam.
2. How often I wonder if he can sense me watching him.
3. How many people I've already told about this.

See my dogs and the dogs of others here:

Pet Spot

Balou is in Upstairs Playroom One. I know it won't be the same for you because it won't be your dog, but the experience is rather like watching fish swim in a tank (only it's dogs in a room) and people do that (sometimes straight through meals) even though they don't know and love any of the fish in the tank.

In the interest of redeeming myself, here's some non-dog related junk:

As many of you may know, the political scene in Ohio is very hot at present. The stakes are high and the campaign dollars are big and dirty. Ken Blackwell and Ted Strickland (kind of) debated economics last night in Cincinnati. Read about it here:

Debate Spot

My favorite part of the evening: Blackwell claims he knows Roy Rogers and he knows that Strickland is not Roy Rogers. Strickland claims that he too knows Roy Rogers and that Blackwell is not Ronald Reagan.

Balou

2006-09-03T16:34:00.000-04:00

This is what Ian and I do now: we try to take pictures of our dog. He runs away. Poses inappropriately. Takes on a desperate air. As yet, we have not been able to best him. In this, the photo that will have to do, he hadn't had time to register the situation. He's an Italian Greyhound and very fast. Outruns all the big ones at the dog park. He's also into being completely concealed by blankets and covers. While I'm at work, Ian and Balou are eating Skyline and snuggling. We have only purchased one outfit for him thus far, but I am gunning for a nice set of snow shoes for winter.

What do all you people do now?

inbox

2006-08-28T18:48:00.000-04:00

good thing my old iowa email address works. i just got this today from the uiowa press:

George Saunders, this year's judge, said, “Kevin Moffett is a writer who has the very rare gift of true kindheartedness. Again and again in Permanent Visitors, he surprises and gratifies the reader with the intensity and patience of his gaze—his ability to find the complicated, the funny, the human, the dazzling, in the stuff of everyday life. The best stories in this book remind us of the real and only purpose of fiction: to recalibrate the heart.”

more info available at powells or kevin's website. someone should do an interview with him for us.

It's New York, Y'all

2006-08-25T20:31:00.000-04:00

Last week, we moved to Hell's Kitchen, New York City. It's a pretty big deal for this country girl. I'm still trying to find a job, writing my novel, and building endurance for five flights of stairs. Last Sunday things got wonderful right away when we hopped on a boat on the west side of the island and saw a concert by my favorite band, The Avett Brothers. I've heard these North Carolina guys called "bluegrass punk" and a few other genre-leaping classifications. You need to listen to them right away, and see them live if at all possible. They have the bass, banjo, guitar, screaming harmonies, sweet ballads, bluegrass ditties, and every combination thereof. You'll love them.

on the road

2006-08-25T16:27:00.000-04:00

one last hoorah before school starts (teaching english 101 at a local community college). figured i'd get one last trip in before summer '06 expires. i went with my gentleman friend from portland down to l.a. and back, stopping in san francisco, chico, and crater lake, oregon.

strange brush fire at night. in the middle, oregon does kind off look like iowa, but i never noticed before.

the water in the deepest lake in america is really this blue. someone explained the science to me, but i didn't get it.

all these gorgeous vistas make me think of religious postcards.

Mac Battery Recall

2006-08-24T22:47:00.000-04:00

Hey folks--

thought I'd send a heads-up about this (there was also a recent Dell recall!).

Mac issues recall of some batteries

This is awesomely inconvenient... sigh. On a happier note, Blogger now allows you to sign in with a Gmail account, and has a linking button for Mac users. S'about time.

Hope all are well.

F.X. O'Toole and Kevin Costner

2006-08-03T13:06:00.000-04:00

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1220503,00.html

Are book reviewers ever going to get tired of writing opening sentences like this one? No? Oh well. (Sorry it's not a live link...)

Field of Dreams is going to be screened in Dyersville, Iowa, on August 11th. Kevin Costner is going to be there and he's going to play a free concert with his band. Sometimes I wish I still lived in Iowa... and then I hear that Kevin Costner has a band.

How is everyone?

Regards,

The Cats

2006-08-02T14:07:00.000-04:00

Perhaps you have heard of the famous Hemingway cats. Famous because they are polydactyl. Famous because over fifty of them still roam Hemingway's Key West home, all of them descendants of the originals and all of them named after Hollywood stars and all of them buried creatively in the side yard when the time comes. Famous because Hemingway was famous.

The Hemingway cats are also maybe a little terrifying. They are not restricted to any one portion of the property (now a museum) which means that they are all over everything. And if you've ever walked into what you assumed was an empty room featuring a few booky relics to discover twenty or so animals languishing in the heat, you know what I mean. You notice one, and then you notice another, and then you see that you're surrounded. "This isn't how I thought it would be," you think. Of course, you did smell the cats before you entered. You had fair warning. And the tour guide has a lot to say about them. And you can buy tiny airplane-booze bottled Hemingway cat nip in the gift shop.

In any case, if you desire ardently to see the Hemingway cats in the Hemingway home, you'd better do it soon. The USDA is threatening to shut them down. Because you need a license to be an "exhibitor of cats," possibly one of the world's most terrifying professions.

friend of a friend

2006-07-17T22:05:00.000-04:00

evergreen state ropies, goats, or babies;

this friend of a friend is having a reading in seattle. it promises to be a lively and engaging evening. if you're in the area, you should check it out. here are the details:

Philip Fried reads from his new book of poetry, BIG MEN SPEAKING TO LITTLE MEN (Salmon Poetry, Ireland) on Monday, August 14, 7:30 PM, at Elliott Bay Book Company, 101 South Main St., Seattle, WA 98104.

For more on the book, take a look at salmonpoetry.com.

Fried is also the publisher of THE MANHATTAN REVIEW, which publishes poetry.

Store phone numbers: 206.624.6600 or 800.962.5311

In The Last Place

2006-07-17T16:10:00.000-04:00

I don't know how many conversations I've had recently about Alice Muno's stories. Many. Many, many, many. And even more often than I've had conversations about her stories, I've thought about them. About what they do and how they do it and how impossible it all often seems to realize. And all the while during this talking and thinking, (almost) everyone else was thinking and talking about this news:

Edmonton Journal

I feel like I pay attention, but I'm frequently one of the last to know. I don't know where I am looking. Out the window at the cats that hide under the cars in the street. Maybe all of you have had this conversation already. Okay. But I'm still wondering how the fact that this book will be Munro's last book struck you. I felt sad all day. Now I am looking again at cats. Have any of you read the new/last book yet? What is everyone doing these days?

You Know Him As Brad

2006-07-11T11:24:00.000-04:00

His poems are making their way into the world again. You can visit a few of them here: H_NGM_N B__KS And while you're there, you can buy the chapbook. It will help you have a happy day.

Soon, he'll be taking the Twin Cities by storm. Keep your eyes open for more forthcoming work.

Steve Grant is a Daddy

2006-06-26T13:21:00.000-04:00

Say hello to Mathilda Starring Grant, 7lbs 1 oz, born about a week ago.

Alicia and baby are doing fine and Steve is dancing on the ceiling.

Protest Singer

2006-06-22T15:13:00.000-04:00

I recently asked someone who has been a long-time Dixie Chicks fan if she had their new album because I wanted to hear it. She said, "You don't even like the Dixie Chicks. What, now that they're voicing political views that are similar to yours, now they're cool?" My response was basically, "Well...yeah." She didn't have it and I still haven't heard it.

Most music with political tendencies to it, I don't especially like. I appreciate the existence of it, but what I've heard is usually the old alt.country business, which I can only take in small doses. This is why it pisses me off that the bands I do like (yes, "indie rock" bands) seem to avoid political discussion, at least overtly. Perhaps this is a holdover from the 90's, when "college rock" became "indie rock," when it moved out of Mom's garage and lost the wonderful arrogance of youth. Have the bands now not realized that apathy is so 15 1/2 years ago?

Anyway, I was happy to be introduced recently to the music of Kimya Dawson, formerly of The Moldy Peaches. A self-described "anti-folk" singer, she is actually pretty damn pro-folk, in that she sings mostly acoustically about politics and love (romantic, familial, platonic), about giving her friends hugs and flowers, and giving Bush the finger. Her ultra positive, bordering-on-naive attitude can get a bit grating at times (she's kind of that girl in the dorm down the hall who has good weed but won't shut up about the time she met Ani), but this is tempered by acknowledgements of the dark side (her song "12-26" is a brutal fictional account of a tsunami victim) and by frequent references to poop, which is nice. Her website (www.kimyadawson.com/) has a few MP3's you can download. I recommend checking them out.

Is there anything you've heard that is worth a listen? Is there someone out there taking it to the Man with guitar in hand? Is that Dixie Chicks album any good?

sorry if this is too low brow...

2006-06-19T18:40:00.000-04:00

..but did anyone else see britney spears have a super freakout on network television? i thought i was watching an episode of intervention. millions of gay makeup techs across the globe screamed in unison. i think they're taking donations of proactive skin care solution, waterproof max factor mascara, and maternity bras at the red cross or something. it was almost as big a train wreck as sandra bernhard's catfight on the view.

in case that was too puerile for you, i'm also reading (slowly) john banville's the sea. I'll let you know how it was when i finish it, sometime next year, i think.

Do the Rubber Dummy

2006-06-09T13:58:00.000-04:00

I know that everyone everywhere in all the world has already seen this. But I can't over-emphasize its goodness. Do it now and do it all day long. Do it long and do it hard. Do it good.

Rubber Dummy

What Would Your Book Cover Look Like?

2006-05-26T13:31:00.000-04:00

Catching up online after a day of Internet detox. Found this, courtesy of Maud:

Great book covers..."pulped."

What would Gilead look like? Hee. (Jo, the pulp fiction covers made me think of your astonishing collection.)

-VVG

Yiyun's On The PBS

2006-05-24T16:32:00.000-04:00

Yeah Yiyun!

bollywood

2006-05-18T13:04:00.000-04:00

attention, procrastinators.

as if there wasn't enough crap keeping you from busting out that dramatic conclusion to chapter 69 of your work in pogress, i give you this. create your own subtitles. post one too, if you get a winner.

Iowa Moving South

2006-05-12T22:57:00.000-04:00

I just heard in the past week that our own Becky Lehmann, poetess first class, is moving to Tallahassee to join me in the PhD program. As is newer graduate Robert Monroe, who is trying out the graces of the Kistulentz guest suite next week, while getting his I spent too much time in Ireland pale self sunburned to all hell.

As my new drinking buddy Mark Winegardner says, you can come on down and get a PhD for writing the book that you were going to write anyway.

Which brings me to this question: where are you, geographically? Where are you career-wise? And as the opening salvo, I will start. I will finish course work towards the PhD in December. I've got a bunch of short-shorts and or prose poems out now, including the Dick York piece in a new journal called VOX and the M*A*S*H one in SOUTHEAST REVIEW. The novel putters forward. Should be done in 3-4 months.

So hereby and forthwith, I request that you do the following: update us all. Brag mercilessly.

2006-05-11T17:53:00.000-04:00

Okay, I've never posted here before but I've been hanging out in this office chair watching the world turn green. That's when a young man's mouse turns to the New York Times Website. I stumbled upon this. It's a list of the "Top Books of the Last 25 Years." Some of the old reviews are choice, especially Marilynne's review of Raymond Carver's short story collection, "Where I'm Calling From." In her own unique way, she retreives Carver from that damnable, spiritually-devoid, minmalism and finds, underneath all that drinking and cavorting, a sentimental realist. It was fun to read her voice again, the rhthyms just like being back in the classroom (or church - I could never differentiate). I don't know how to upload links, so I'll just cut and paste it:http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/21/books/fiction-25-years.html

The New Yorker Corrects A Short Story

2006-05-04T15:30:00.000-04:00

Did you guys see that the New Yorker ran a correction to Martin Amis' short story, "The Last Days of Muhammad Atta"? They noted that the story contained a reference to Newark Airport, and that that name hadn't been used until 2002.

I remember reading somewhere that the NYer used to fact-check all its stories... I wonder how this particular correction arose! It's been awhile since I've seen something like that. What did you all think?...

-VVG

como vao voces?

2006-05-03T18:28:00.000-04:00

just got back from a little over two weeks in brazil. my portuguese is terrible, but everyone i talked to agreed that the da vinci code is a stupid book and that v for vendetta is a kick ass movie. wearing nothing more than a skimpy one-piece and my beloved haviannas, i read prodigal summer by barbara kingsolver on the beach in rio. it was slightly more refined than a jackie collins book, but a little less fun too. i sped through it until i got to the sexy bits.

saw a wedding, went to a soccer game, ate pig ears on a farm, all while wearing nothing but said skimpy, one-piece. tudo joia.

Miss

2006-04-25T10:51:00.000-04:00

I wanted to be sure all of you saw this, though if you've visited Maud today, you probably already have. It made me very much miss Marilynne and her Marilynnisms. On the intellectual level of much of today's literature: "If a grocery store were stocked on the same principle, it would carry only Fruit Loops." Marilynne at the U of Louisville Incidentally, I hear that a number of former workshoppers are convening on IC this week. It might be a good time for those of you who were thinking about a visit to finally take one. And then take pictures and then post them on the blog with some pithy remarks and some boozy reminiscences and gossip and the like.

What is Alaska Like?

2006-04-23T16:09:00.000-04:00

That's the title of Anna's story in the new issue of

ONE STORY

In addition to being great, the story also happens to be HOT.
Here's more info: The magazine publishes, as its name suggests, one story each issue, so you can't find it in bookstores. But you can order a free sample or two on-line. This issue is #73...

Nice Job Anna!

Things Learned of Late

2006-04-21T10:35:00.000-04:00

1. In planting my own Porch Garden (known in some parts as a Container Garden) I have learned that tomato plants should be buried very deeply in the soil. The instructions on my Big Boy Tomatoes (not pictured) recommended that I bury 80% of the plant. That sounded ridiculous to me. I decided to bury about 50% of one plant and 20% of another and study their progress with much scrutiny. I have also planted Snap Dragons (pictured), Rosemary (pictured), Lavender (pictured), and Basil (already dead). Advice is welcomed.

2. One of the many conversations I don't enjoy having very much now is the one about the James Frey scandal. This week I heard about the Navajo writer Nasdijj, who published three books about Native American life, but is actually a white person named Timothy Barrus, fervent dog owner and former erotica-novelist. I am now wondering if this will take the literary foibles debate elsewhere. Or if this is old news that just took a long time to get to Ohio.

3. The good word is that many of you have published stories of late. You do not want me to post the news on the blog, because you are shy. I say now, publicly, Good Job!

4. I learned this week that because the Cincinnati Reds are under new management, they now have cheerleaders. Everyone keeps saying, "Cheerleaders in baseball?!? I don't know about that!" And then that's the end of the conversation.

Reds Cheerleaders Jumping In The Air

Storm06 013

2006-04-14T19:10:00.000-04:00

Storm06 013
Originally uploaded by skavanag_2006.

A lot of you guys will remember this place from Iowa Ave. Manester lived there, James Renfro upstairs. I jimmed open one of those windows above the front porch when James was locked out.

By all reports, folks are ok. I made a bunch of phone calls - the only word I heard was Luke Sykora's roof was torn off. I'm making inquires and also starting a "computer replacement" fund that I'm going to contact Connie about. Electronics don't typically fare well in a wind/water environment. I'll keep people posted.

Type "iowa city" into the tags field on Flickr and you'll get a massive download of some very compelling photography from the front.

Glad people are safe.

The Path

2006-04-14T17:52:00.000-04:00

Lee Klein sent me this brief description of the path the tornado took:

"The tornado headed up Burlington from the Dairy Queen on Riverside (which is wrecked) then across College Green over to Iowa Ave (tearing the roof from that sorority and screwing Shira the poet's place, too), then it took down all the trees in front of that creekside apartment on jefferson where Michelle Falkoff lives, then heading up Rochester and out of town . . .Two blocks from Thisbe's."

I read this morning that there were no major injuries, and hope this is still holding true.

Photos of Iowa City

2006-04-14T16:09:00.000-04:00

I'm having a hard time making this into a link, but please Check out Lee Klein's pictures on Eyeshot.net
at http://eyeshot.net

The outside of the Mill is kind of heartbreaking to see. I hope everyone we know in IC and their cars are alright.

How Terrifying

2006-04-14T09:15:00.000-04:00

How very many times I felt certain that that siren sounding in Iowa City meant something other than lunch for the factory workers, but was not sure. And now to see on the news one of the last places I visited before leaving town with its roof blown off. Are all of you in IC okay? Do you need anything? What can we do?

Nawlins Libraries Update

2006-04-12T10:35:00.000-04:00

If you are interested in donating to NOPL, check out the following URL with tips and FAQ:

http://nutrias.org/~nopl/foundation/donationsfaq.htm

Queens Eats

2006-04-06T20:52:00.000-04:00

For anyone in the New York area (or anyone who likes reading about yummy eats), my good buddy Alexis (of Jackson Heights) has a great new website about the food scene in Queens. The site digests everything from grocery stores and snack shops to diners, street vendors, and restaurants. There's even a section for Manhattan Honorable Mentions. Dig in.

Belated Report of An Outing.. and Nawlins Libraries

2006-04-03T11:27:00.000-04:00

A little over a week ago I went to Boston. Normally this would not be blog-worthy, but I went to Boston and to its JFK Library to see the estimable yl receive the PEN/Hemingway award! I also ran into KAB of Babies, as well as DAlarcon, who was a finalist for PEN/Hemingway.

It was SO nice to see other writers! I have realized (anew) that other writers, and cities, are things that I like. Congrats once again to yl and DAlarcon. (The other finalist, Doug Trevor, is a prof in UI's English Dept.)

---

I also received the following e-mail. Now, I know that we all collect books, generally, but perhaps there are some you need to get rid of? A good cause, etc. etc.

>> Subject: Please help restock New Orleans libraries by culling from
>> your own
>>
>>
>> The New Orleans Public Library is asking for any and all hardcover
>> and
>> paperback books for people of all ages in an effort to restock the
>> shelves
>> after Katrina.
>>
>> The staff will assess which titles will be designated for its
>> collections.
>>
>> The rest will be distributed to destitute families or sold for
>> library
>> fundraising.
>>
>> If you tell the post office that books are for the library in New
>> Orleans,
>> you will be given a library rate which is less than the book rate.
>>
>> Keep a record of the books sent, value and cost of shipping.
>> This information can be used for tax purposes.
>>
>> Rica A. Trigs, Public Relations
>> New Orleans Public Library
>> 219 Loyola Avenue
>> New Orleans, LA 70112
>>
>> The information was supplied by the Westchester Women's Bar
>> Association and
>> asked to be distributed.
>>
>> Feel free to forward this e-mail to anyone whom you think would be
>> interested.

Good News from up North

2006-03-29T10:00:00.000-05:00

Rob Hicks' "Family Day" has received an honorable mention in The Fiddlehead's annual fiction contest. Make that honorable-with-a-U, as both Hicks and The Fiddlehead are Canadian. The issue will be out in April. Canadians can score their copies at bookstores. The rest of us should send a $10 (US) check to The Fiddlehead,Campus House, 11 Garland Ct., UNB, PO Box 4400, Fredericton NB E3B5A3, Canada. Ask for issue No. 227 (Spring 2006). I have a tentative plan to smuggle a crate or so of Fiddleheads across the border on my next prescription drug run, but my contacts in the seedy Canadian underworld are not to be relied upon.

Our Dear Hynes

2006-03-24T12:34:00.000-05:00

Visit the Boston Review and read

The Dreamlife of Rupert Thomson

in which our dear Professor Hynes makes the dream of the continuous dream seem dreamy. You'll see what I mean. It's a great read and one that will make you desire more fully those superhuman reading powers.

al gore must be spinning in his grave...

2006-03-19T16:48:00.000-05:00

"while in the bathroom, you notice a coworker has a gun in her purse. she says she only uses it for protection after work."

i came across this little gem yesterday, during the four hours of self-directed, online training i underwent for my minimum wage job. i realize that posting this hypothetical violates the acceptable use policy of the company —i was read a copy of this policy by a disembodied human resources henchwoman. the sadist who designed the system made it impossible to click through without listening to every last word, but it was worth it at the end; i got to print a certificate with my name on it and everything. for four hours, i watched classy animations made out of tasteful calligraphy, serif typefaces, and stock photography. one of the photos depicted a black man in a suit sharing a document with an asian woman. those two must work at a different branch, because everybody who works here is white.

i kind of just glazed over and stopped listening for a while, but i distinctly remember the computer telling me i had to adhere to "the code" under penalty of referral to the vice-president of finance. the training module malfunctioned, however, so no word yet on what is actually in the code to which I have pledged allegiance.

the greatest part is that for sitting at a computer and not choking myself to death with the chord of the mouse, i got paid thirty whole dollars! ironically, i felt a strong urge to use a gun after completing this training. i went shooting this morning (only paper plates were killed in the outing). is this how office rampages start?

the recommended action, by the way, is to immediately contact the vice president of finance, i guess to warn him that the lady flashing her pistol in the shitter wants to blow his fucking head off.

Solicitation

2006-03-15T21:51:00.000-05:00

I am soliciting opinions on "new" or recent books. Since I am always struggling to keep up with my reading, I often feel that I missing out on great newer books.

What are your favorite books published in the last year or so, in any genre?

Has anyone read Veronica by Mary Gaitskill? Thoughts? I just got it from the Iowa City Public Library, that beautiful institution.

Your recommendations are appreciated. Also, if anyone knows how to acquire superhuman powers (like the ability to read dozens of books a day), I'd like the lowdown on that, too.

Appetite for Appetities

2006-03-10T11:45:00.000-05:00

I've been thinking lately about those New Yorker pieces that feature the lives of famous writers, politicians, mathematicians, painters, prostitutes, and the like. It seems that generally the occasion for these pieces is the release of new scholarship. The article serves as a sort of gloriously executed annotated bibliography, reviewing past and present treatments of the individual's life and contribution, often summarizing those sources' weaknesses in comparison with one another. But it also serves as a bite-sized biography, often positing its own notions with authority and veracity. I feel sated and informed after reading them. Happily educated and not super interested in further reading. More often than not, they satisfy my appetite, rather than creating one. And I do have guilt about this.

I've often wondered how all this might sit with writers whose works appear in summation or in passing. Perhaps they've made it their life's work to study and dig and write -- how must it feel to see the field reduced to a single large-circulation magazine article? We get a little glimpse of that in this series of e-mails from Valerie Lawson, the author of a decades long in the making biography on Pamela Travers, to the editors of the New Yorker:

The Secret Life of A Letter to The Editor

Thanks to Powell'sBooks.Blog for the link and to CJR for the publication of the exchange.

Just a warning

2006-03-09T19:03:00.000-05:00

Unfortunately, just like with Babies Are Fireproof somebody is apparently sending out unpleasant emails linking to this blog.

PEN/Hemingway Award

2006-03-09T13:15:00.000-05:00

I know SER already posted this over at BabiesAreFireproof, but I thought we should probably call some attention here to the fact that Yiyun won the PEN/Hemingway award for A Thousand Years of Good Prayers. I didn't personally catch the post until last night. Daniel Alarcon and Doug Trevor were the finalists. Congratulations!

The ineluctable modality of our experience

2006-03-09T00:48:00.000-05:00

All you Marilynne Robinson and Tim O'Sullivan fans, I suggest you pick up a copy of the first issue of A PUBLIC SPACE -- I just got mine in the mail. Tim's story is excellent - one of my personal favorites, and Marilynne's essay is a compelling articulation both of why fiction matters and why we shouldn't forget the hypothetical nature of our narratives.

Also, there's fiction from Charles D'Ambrosio, Kelly Link, John Haskell and a bunch of others. I'm personally not connected with the magazine/journal in any way, btw, in case this sounds like an ad.

Book Tour From Your Couch

2006-03-07T19:00:00.000-05:00

Solution to a problem I don't have...

duh

2006-02-27T17:49:00.000-05:00

i finally got a personalized rejection today! I had really been looking forward to it. when i open that SASE and there's nothing in there but a shitty mimeographed page with a generic "go fuck yourself," it feels so devastating. someone at zoetrope had nice words for me (which is more than i can say for most people. mom, i'm talking to you). but then i was thinking: do some magazines always send personalized rejections? if one receives a nice letter saying that an editor liked a submission, should one believe them? does it mean you made it closer to publication before being shitcanned? just curious. maybe those of you who work for magazines can provide insight.

The Tangled Web

2006-02-19T20:50:00.000-05:00

So, it's easy to use the web as a procrastination device. It's also easy to attempt to do "work" on the internet and become distracted by the millions of different portholes that live therein. For instance, the other day, in the course of my work, I had cause to find information on figs. That's right, figs. So I Googled figs. And one of the first hits was www.godhatesfigs.com, a site devoted to (as the name implies) God's hatred of figs (with Biblical citations). How strange, how silly!

What silly sites do you love?
Forget about The New York Times, The Guardian, all the real stuff...let's load up on fluff.

There are certain sites I go to nearly everyday, just to provide love and distraction and amusement (and procrastination):

www.cuteoverload.com (which I learned about from a post by SER; go there to do amazing things like "Kitten War")

www.televisionwithoutpity.com (I even read about the shows I don't watch)

www.knitty.com (adorable knit cat complete with "burgundy slacks")

http://users.wolfcrews.com/toys/vikings/ (hopefully this works--it is a video of Viking kitties crossing the ocean to a Led Zepplin song, originally on rathergood.com)

What's your silly poison?

XXOO,
Jo
listless in Iowa City

world's ugliest (continued)

2006-02-13T18:21:00.000-05:00

just sitting around thinking up new excuses to give the student loan people (sallie mae, call me. i miss you. tell your sister fannie i didn't mean what i said), when i came across these pretty ladies. if you, like me, have never recovered from the loss of the world's ugliest dog, perhaps these monstrous cats will satisfy your craving for that thing inside you that's missing. supposedly the result of a spontaneous mutation, these cats are playful, soft, and hungry. i predict...wait, i guarantee that these cats will soon spread from hawaii and, hungry for sweet human flesh, devour the whole country coast to coast. adorable!

Take That

2006-02-07T16:31:00.000-05:00

Having lived so many years in towns without local television programming and without the cable, I have become inordinately infatuated with the local news programming in Cincinnati. Their coverage is notoriously misleading and inflammatory. Of the recent cottony snowfall: WHITE DEATH STRIKES THE TRISTATE. I love it when they pick up the national stories and misconstrue them. Why might Cincinnati appeal to the average terrorist in wait? THE SEVEN BRIDGES OF DOOM. And so when the local news made the recent ABC '20/20' news program, "Where are American manners? Are we creating a culture where rudeness rules?" the focus of their own evening reporting, I decided to watch. Are residents of Porkopolis becoming more rude? The Channel Nine Eye-Team says, yes. The evidence: cursing overheard in restaurants where children are present. And that's when I decided to listen. I've just moved here, after all, and it is also true that I am as likely to say 'fuck' as 'hello.' Could I be a part of the problem? Am I creating a culture of rudeness? I decided to do a little investigating of my own.

Here are the first six bullets in a list of twenty-nine Basic Rules for Basic Cincinnati Table Manners:
• It is inappropriate to ask for a doggy bag when you are a guest.
• It is best to order foods that can be eaten with a knife and fork. Finger foods can be messy and are best left for informal dining.
• Do not order alcoholic beverages. Drinking too much when dining out is one of the most disliked behaviors.
• Do not smoke while dining out.
• Sit up straight at the table. It makes a good impression.
• When you are not eating, keep your hands on your lap or resting on the table (with wrists on the edge of the table). Elbows on the table are acceptable only between courses, not while you are eating.
• Do not season your food before you have tasted it.

Though I have never asked a doggy bag of a host, my guilt is otherwise complete. My behavior has been disliked most. I have made a bad impression with my spine. But are these definitive signs that I am rude? If you, like me, are looking for the kind of proof that can only come from national news organizations, you might find your savior in this ABC rudeness test. The results are instant, though (I warn you) the test itself is not entirely painless.

Quiz: How Rude Are You?

Your Favorite Poem

2006-02-01T13:04:00.000-05:00

Dear poets,

I'm teaching a class in April, and need to cover a poetry unit. Since my own knowledge of poetry is embarrassing, and I don't want to fall back on old J.Alfed Prufrock, I was thinking of teaching some W.H.Auden and Denise Levertov, just because I like them personally. But I was hoping some poets out there could suggest a poem or two, and tell me a little about why they like it, or why they liked teaching it. Feel free to comment here or shoot me an email: skrasikov@gmail.com. Thanks a lot.

how long, sweet jesus

2006-01-23T11:41:00.000-05:00

i spent the summer i was 14 trying to read the the grapes of wrath. i'd get to page 300 and then realize i had already read it. this went on for several years until finally, during senior year, i got to the end and felt something other than boredom, a little titillation (ha ha), some emotional return on the 800+ pages i had stuck it out. i figured out early on what the book was about and how it was going to go down, so the little bit at the end was somewhat surprising. i returned the book to the library three or four years overdue.

so, now i'm about 50 pages from the end of everything that rises must converge. i've been reading this book for two months. i can only take a few pages at a time because it's so bleak and heavy-handed (spoiler alert: everyone goes to hell at the end). i can't explain why, but i just feel determined to finish. i don't like this book at all, in fact, i find it unpleasant. i think i'm just being stubborn, but i won't give up and move on to another book and, in books only, i am quite monogamous (ok-well unless it's an afternoon quickie like running with scissors or something).

so my question is this: how long should one keep trying to get into a book that one is not enjoying? what's the longest you ever took to successfully read a book? and what's up with flannery o'connor? is it going to be all shiftless niggers, overeducated know-nothings, and lupus? i just need to know if the hope i have that, at the end, flannery o'connor will use her powers to make the bicycles fly over the police roadblock is justified or foolhardy...

Yiyun in NYT Magazine Once More

2006-01-22T09:19:00.000-05:00

She's impressive, folks. This time she's musing on the wonders of Tang, the from-a-funky-powder orange beverage my mom used to give me when I was sick. (Now I think it tastes kind of nasty, but back in the day it was the beverage of choice.)

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/22/magazine/22food.html

Keep in mind that if, like me, you also want to check out the chocolate chip cookie recipes that are next in the food section, you should click "next article" at the top of Yiyun's piece. The link on the front of the magazine that should go to the recipes actually takes you to Yiyun once more. :) The first time this happened to me, I actually just read her article again.

-Viz

What's That You Say?

2006-01-20T16:53:00.000-05:00

Its's the

AWP

Wonder if any of you are thinking of going, presenting on panels, leaning into the hotel bar for seventy-two hours.

It's in Austin this year, which I heard was burned. Perhaps Hynes can confirm or deny that. I've always enjoyed the bookfair, when I've gone to AWP, and watching that bird-woman dance at the ball in her sequined, cut to the thigh gown. I've enjoyed too the drama of it all, the little packs that follow the Komunyakaas and the Hannahs like they're littering money, the drunks riding the escalators and elevators, the presentations like, "Birds in Literature: What's to Say?" And I remember fondly, seeing some of you that year in Chicago, even though you were in Iowa City too when I got home.

Get Your Rejection Printed Onto Toilet Paper!

2006-01-09T23:23:00.000-05:00

It only costs you $90.

http://www.lulu.com/content/122436

-Viz

You almost beat me to my post Chauncy! Fiction, non-fiction, who gives a shit if it's readable?

2006-01-09T19:56:00.000-05:00

I was on vacation this week, and this book,

A Million Little Pieces

, was literarly everywhere - people were reading it by the pool, on the beach, in the plane, in the lobby of the Ramada where the airline stuck us when we missed our connection.

Now there's a "scandal" because James Frey embelished a number of events. Here's the

NY Times Article

.

I think this debate says a lot more about what people expect from labels like "fiction" and "non-fiction" than about Frey himself. It's a fluid line for most writers - and I doubt that this memoir was any more fictionalized than most others. One of my favorite books "Bastard Out of Carolina" was marketed as a novel, but it's mostly memoir. The publishers might have marketed it as a novel because they were trying to target a more "literary" audience. On the other hand, a recent memoir from Russia called "White on Black" has an entire chapter that's told from the points of view of a charater who's not the author. The book is being claimed as an "expose" of human rights abuses and nobody is claiming it's not strict non-fiction.

I think the label of "non-fiction" freed it from comparisons with more literary work, and people could read it as a really good, faced-paced story. It seems a little naive to expect strict reality from non-fiction. As far as I'm concerned, it's fiction the moment the words are on the page.

Lacquered

2006-01-06T11:45:00.000-05:00

Like speed bumps, the holidays. And now that we're over them, I have a set of festive holiday dishes, a culture of bath products, and some giant under armor to wrangle. I wonder what the right thing to do with these things is. Returning would mean requesting a receipt. A terrible prospect. Stowing it all away would make me feel fat. Where does one donate such a thing as a lacquered sports towel? A pair of loafers made of memory foam? A calendar about Elvis's dietary compulsions?

More props to Yiyun

2005-12-29T12:13:00.000-05:00

I saw the Ropes' own YL yesterday, and she's heading to Marfa, TX soon on a prestigious Lannan Foundation residency - the kind you don't apply for but just get selected for if you're really awesome (not that this will help her green-card application). Still, Marfa rocks! Lannan rocks! I would buy property in Marfa if the New York Times hadn't fueled a real-estate boom there, pricing out everyone except affluent NYC and LA residents in the market for a vacation home.

Word!
SER

Mood Pieces

2005-12-26T18:05:00.000-05:00

Once in a while you read a story that's so strange and poetic, it completely envelops you in its world. A couple of years ago I read William Gay's "The Paperhanger" and didn't quite understand or appreciate it. But I remembered it, and a few days ago I read it again. It felt a little like being attached to a heavy rock that was slowly sinking in a cold green lake. There are stories you appreciate for character, or wit, or plot, and then there are stories that capture a mood. I'd love to know what stories have cast those kinds of spells on people.

Gilead Wins $200,000 Religion Award

2005-12-23T00:59:00.000-05:00

http://www.publishersweekly.com/article/CA6293076.html

What do you get the Grandpa who has everything?

2005-12-22T14:44:00.000-05:00

So I have a couple of days left in my pathetic low-budget holiday shopping run. But, Ropes, I'll admit I'm really stumped this year about what to get Grandpa!

I don't know if others have this problem, but it's hard shopping for somebody who is five decades older than you. In my case this is a man who taught me how to swim, gave me driving lessons, and told me how Native Americans should stop complaining about their problems.

And he already has everything. He was a pretty successful business man in his day so he already has all the right-wing books that can fit on his shelves. He has a giant television and every John Wayne movie ever made. He has lots of Grandpa shirts and lots of those hats that the Newsies wore. He even has a juicer and a machine that turns things into jerky.

I want to get him a thoughtful gift, but Ropes, I'm lost.

Help me.

What should I get Grandpa?????

Return To This Place

2005-12-21T12:02:00.000-05:00

The latest on Yiyun's immigration case:

Washington Post

Camus Phase?

2005-12-20T17:21:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago I was talking to this man who started telling me about how much he used to read when he was younger. Especially in his twenties - Camus, Sartre, all the existentialists. Then he realized that the world was bleak enough and finally snapped out of it. He spoke a lot about "The Plague," assuming I'd read it (which, to my embarrassment, I hadn't). So Fine. Two weeks later, I started chatting with another guy, an accountant in his fifties who, unprompted, started telling me about his "existentialist phase" when he read nothing but Sartre and Camus, and lay for a whole week with hundred degree fever reading "The Plague." Then he grew out of it, because, hey, life is hard enough without being reminded. Coincidence?

How many others, I wonder, have gone through this "Camus Phase," as they call it, and later gone on to lead normal lives? Is this more typical of men? I know plenty of women who went through a Madeleine L'Engle phase. I personally had a period of three months when I read nothing but those fictional accounts of the Holocaust aimed at young adults. I'm curious to know what other people's "phases" were and if anyone can shed light on the "Camus" one?

Please, Continue

2005-12-20T16:56:00.000-05:00

Don't want to put a halt to the catching up, but thought we could use a new post host for our reconnecting. (Please, you more recalcitrant of Ropes, we do want to hear.)

I hope you'll all be charmed to know that my local aquarium (just across the river in Newport, KY) submerges Santa in a 385,000-gallon shark tank five times a day. You may have read about him in the Times. Said one local reader of the article, "I thought all aquariums had underwater Santas, but I guess it's just ours."

Partnering Santa, who has exchanged his reindeer for magical sea-horses, is an elf who protects Santa's hat from careening sea turtles with a carefully wielded plastic candy cane. Visitors may communicate with Santa via a microphone system in his diving mask. Heated debates have sprung up this month regarding what the best question to ask tank-Santa, if you were only allowed to ask one question, would be. Some approach the debate as though he is some sort of oracle, others as though he is an astronaut. Though I don't find "How do you go to the bathroom?" an appropriate victor, it often is. "Who Dey?" runs a close second.

I've Always Liked It Spicy...or Where Are They Now?

2005-12-14T12:15:00.000-05:00

My favorite magazine articles are always the where are they now features...you know the ones: in 1983, he was on top of the world, with a number one single "Jessie's Girl," and a recurring role as Doctor Noah Drake on number one-rated soap opera General Hospital. Where is Rick Springfield now? Oh wait, he's back on GH. Nevermind.

Anyway...in order to live up to SAS's lofty expectations, I am going to post...on a random, yet crucial topic. Where are all the Ropes and what are we doing? This may be fruitless but then again, it took me about a month to figure out that Sugi was Vizzini, so maybe I'm not the best person to kick this off.

But I'll start. I am in Tallahassee, Florida, and about a third of the way through my PhD. It's a great program here, with a lot of fine up and coming writers, too...the only downside is that the department is HUGE, which means that competition for jobs etc. is ridiculously fierce. Still working on the novel that many of you generously read, and still hoping to finish for good this spring (I write this in case my agent is reading). My lovely and talented wife got a job as the in-house editor at a think tank, which is dull and dry but provides a roof over our heads and some money to keep hubby in drinks.

And our house has has a few IC-related visitors, notably including Mr. Ian Stansel, who managed to get hisself a real fine sunburn and drink most of my bourbon. So if you're ever this way, come on down.

Next?

Spicing up the Blog

2005-12-09T11:36:00.000-05:00

Dear Ropes -

I read in an unreliable online resource that "fantasies begin with the ideas of one, can blossom into a shared fantasy, and can become a reality as easily as making a wish -- as long as you make that wish out loud." I thought about the blog, decided it was time to start talking and stop inside-wishing. I've been warned that "many who are introducing fantasy exploration might receive a mixed reply -- part curiosity, part apprehension." I may be met with "a reluctance to talk about it." I may even be met with "outright refusal." This seems likely as many of our contributors have remained mute. But I've noticed that we haven't been blogging as much as we used to blog. Maybe it has become too routine, too familiar. Maybe it's time we started introducing a few new elements into our blog. I want to take our shared bloglife to the next level -- even it it's just the level of open discussion.

I've got a few ideas to start us out:
1. Toys
There a number of inexpensive gadgets out there that might enhance our blog. They can easily be downloaded and appended to our current format. Word games, puzzles, dancing graphics.
2. Outfits
It is possible for us to put a new dress on this blog, though I've heard parts of its face might fall off if we try.
3. Public Blogging
We can re-open our blog to the comments of others, provided some security measures are in place. We may need a volunteer lookout, for example.
4. Dirt Talk
We might invite contributors to talk to us on a more regular basis. Review, sling arrows, gab.
5. Frequency
(Couldn't think of a good title for this one.) We might agree to blog more freely more often.

tragedy strikes again (and again and again)

2005-12-06T14:25:00.000-05:00

regretfully, I must add to the collective grief of our group, gentle readers. my friend and former partner-in-crime died of natural causes last week. he was 1.25 years old. some of you may recall ingomar's fondness for chewing on things and pooping on stuff, or the way he marked his trail with micro-droplets of urine. he also enjoyed nesting, sniffing things, and going on romantic trips with ivan breedlove.

lots of people hate rats; society seems to think that is ok. i have to believe ingomar helped break down some of these walls, or at least bit little holes in them.

Dec.8 at Pete's Candy Store Reading

2005-11-30T11:49:00.000-05:00

If any of you lovely people will be in Brooklyn next THURSDAY, DEC.8, please come and see the reading at Pete's Candy Store "The most intimate reading space in Brooklyn. Think of a fine pre-war dining car with an endless supply of booze.” Unfortunately, I just got an email that Adam will be in Cali this week. I'll try to make it entertaining. Cheers.

It's Free, on Thursday December 8, at 7:30 p.m.
- pete's candy store -
709 lorimer street - williamsburg, Brooklyn - 11211
(718) 302 - 3770

For More info:
http://www.petescandystore.com/reading/index.html

Tragedy Strikes

2005-11-23T13:26:00.000-05:00

I thought you would all want to know that Sam, the ugliest dog in the world, has died at age 14. A moment of silence, please.

SER

In Praise of Difficult...Novels

2005-11-23T09:28:00.000-05:00

On Monday night, we had a benefit reading here to raise money for the local food bank, and I got Rick Moody to come and read from DIVINERS, his new book. And we had an interesting conversation over dinner and I wanted you folks to weigh in. I think I may have had this same conversation with Mr. Renfro in the corner of the Foxhead once.

Over dinner, we were talking about difficult novels. And by we, I need to let you know up front that I was likely the LEAST QUALIFIED PERSON EVER to be participating in this conversation...but here I was, seated amongst Robert Olen Butler, Rick Moody and Mark Winegardner at dinner (yes, Iowans, we get real writers here too). And we got to discussing the American book critic's reticence to read and comment favorably on longer books.

One of the shockers of the evening was Mr. Moody's admission that he had been asked to review Thomas Pynchon's Mason and Dixon by one of the big magazines precisely because no other reviewer would touch it, given its 1000-page length.

In order to achieve maximum brevity and pith, I am asking--what is the hardest book you've ever read, and ideally, what did you learn from it. I'll start with two...Women and Men by Joseph McElroy, and The Man Without Qualities by Robert Musil. I felt I had to read them both, though I'd like the 3 months I spent with Musil (reading about 100 pages a day--it's a 2 volume door stop, and no, I didn't finish) back.

No votes for Infinite Jest are allowed, because none of you actually read all of the ancillary material, or all of the footnotes, did you?

The Unbird

2005-11-21T21:39:00.000-05:00

A fancy holiday recipe from the fancy new vegetarian in Ohio.
I don't know yet how the unbird tastes, but it sounds delicious:

Artificial Turkey-Flavored Protein Loaf
1 1/2 lb. white beans
1/2 cup bread crumbs
1 egg or egg substitute
1 cup milk
1 small onion, chopped
1 T. Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. dry mustard
1/4 tsp. pepper
1/4 tsp. sage
1/8 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 cup artificially flavored turkey gravy
Mix all the ingredients except the gravy. Spread mixture into an ungreased pan loaf, or shape into a loaf (a turkey-shaped loaf, if you want to) in an ungreased 13x9 inch pan. Spoon artificially-flavored turkey gravy over the top. Bake uncovered in a 350 degree oven until done, approximately 1 - 1 1/2 hours.

What are the rest of you Ropes cooking up this year?

taking it in the pokey

2005-11-09T02:16:00.000-05:00

did anyone else happen to read close range: wyomng stories? i picked it up because i am too excited to see jake gyllenhaal and heath ledger do it. anyway, it turned out to be really good. it's kind of affected, but if you can get over your distrust of the author of the shipping news appropriating the cowboy idiom, it's very energetic prose. one might say the author is drunk on honky-tonk, but it's still pretty good.