Fleas on the Hair of the Dog that Bit Me

 

Hello one and all. Here in New York, we're coming up to the one year anniversary of the lockdown. What a year or lack of a year it's been. The folks over at Fleas on the Dog have published several of my poems. Just search for my name or scroll on down to get to the good stuff. CW: descriptions of Eczema.

Taking Sweden by Some Kind of Storm

 

Hello all. Two poems of mine are up at Tistelblomma a "litterärt nätmagasin" run by Jenny Enochsson. In addition to those works, there's an interview with me as well.

An Interview with the Poet/Writer/Former Actor/Celebrity Pharmacist

 

Thanks to Meagan J. Meehan for asking me some questions, allowing me to answer them, and then publishing said answers. Come read all about me.

Call Me Brackets. Some years ago - never mind how long precisely, having little or no money...

I have two poems in the "Heroes" themed issue of Call Me [ ] (that's the way the title of the journal is structured that's why it's called Call Me Brackets in official correspondence, no, I won't explain it further). Not only that, there's an interview with me. So if you were wondering what the process is behind my writing, you can read about it!

Poet of the Week: Christine Stoddard

My friend Christine Stoddard was interviewed by Brooklyn Poets. She discusses her life, work, and the communities she's lived in. Oh, and she mentions a young poet living in Brooklyn and who writes for this blog.

Part Moron, Part Genius and Part Ogre: Reviewing Paris Review Interviews

As I mentioned in my last blogpost  I'm getting back into the publishing game, trying to find and agent and with their help, scale the heights of the...um...publishing world. To that end I'm immersing myself in the world of writing, authors, and publishing. I'm reading articles about getting published, instructions, lists of agents, how-to manuals, all of it. Hopefully something will rub off on me. Or I will at least be inspired. The key is to make it what I do when I'm bored or when I need something to kill time. No more idle following the news, gossip, music, or movies. No, instead, I'm going to listen to an interview on Bookworm with Michael Silverblatt or watch a documentary about Hemingway, Fitzgerald, or the whole Lost Generation!

However, I save that for when I'm submitting and searching for presses and agencies. When I can't play something in the background, or watch it in the foreground, I have to turn to the text in order to continue my immersion in the affairs of the writ. It makes sense, words for a would-be up-and-coming wordsmith. A favorite of mine are the interviews at the Paris Review. They span the decades from the 1950s to the present day and contain several gems from poets, playwrights, and novelists. Reading through them, you realize how the same problems with editors, audiences, booksellers, publishers, and writer's block keep recurring through literary history and never fail to spare the famous, infamous, unknown, and rightfully ignored. 

In the 1950s, a goatee like this automatically landed you on the Blacklist

I particularly enjoy John Steinbeck's complaint about the "reader" as imagined by his publisher:

"He is so stupid you can't trust him with an idea. 
He is so clever he will catch you in the least error.
He will not buy short books.
He will not buy long books.
He is part moron, part genius and part ogre. 
There is some doubt as to whether he can read."

Terry Southern's interview was interesting, if for no other reason, I think I look like him with my bangs and beard. He also predicted rise of cable and movies on demand. At one point, the interviewer asks “will success spoil Terry Southern?” judging from his Wikipedia page, I’d say yes, yes it did.

Over time, the interviews slowly evolve and the interviewees change the way they write them. In Harold Bloom's piece, the interview strangely incorporates his wife and him wandering through rooms and watching television. In the end it becomes a screenplay of the time the two of them spent together. In his interview, he revealed that he liked the Band (“there hasn’t been any good American rock since, alas, The Band disbanded”), as well as his view of foreign policy ("Our foreign policy basically amounts to making the world safe for Gnosticism").

Reading the more recent pieces in the Paris Review, it seems they are becoming self-aware. Not that the subject and the interviewer suddenly know they are in the midst of a friendly interrogation. That's always been the case since the interviews started. It's more the case that the Paris Review is now dealing with writers like Matthew Weiner and Wallace Shawn who grew up reading the interviews. Wallace even believed he would end up being interviewed by the publication eventually.


Perhaps one day I'll get to make a comment about commenting on the interviews while being interviewed by the Paris Review. Meta Squared. 

Read a Poem I Wrote About DFW

DFW is quite the Shibboleth, no?

It's highly experimental and goes through all the different facets of the subject. I amassed it from listening to interviews. Read it at ALTPOETICS (They wrote me a letter threatening me if I didn't refer to them in all caps. Strangely enough, said letter was all lower-case).

Unknown Words With Ben Nardolilli

Hello everyone. I've got a new medium to share with you. SOUND. Matthew Anderson was kind enough to interview for his podcast Unknown Words.  Sit down, pour yourself a stiff one, and listen to me here.

The Parade of Hits Continues

Still looking for a job and a way to punch my ticket to get out of my childhood abode. Currently reading a terrible book and not sure if I want to bother reviewing it or not. Being a member of the lumpenproletariat is no fun. AND YET I still get poems published. One even has a reference to Proust. Got to keep the synapses I cultivated in college still firing. They die people, they really do. If you do not keep them activated, one day you will wake up and say "My God, what have I done!" and not get the reference!  Nevertheless, go to the Aperion Review and Misfits' Miscellany. They are waiting for you. Also, I am mentioned here.