Books :: Hotel Stories by Mike Tyler
Hotel Stories
by Mike Tyler
Published by The Art Cannot be Damaged
When Tyler was on tour with the Nuyorican Poets Café, he was locked out of his apartment by a girlfriend. He moved into a hotel – not just any hotel, The Carlton Arms Hotel, on East 25th in Manhattan, where all the rooms are decorated by artists from around the world. Tyler found a home there, becoming the poet-in-residence for eight years. These eleven “hotel stories” cover everything from the sharp edges of intimacy and the posing extremes of a high, to the complexities of friendship and the philosophy of everyday life, all prospering or wilting under the atmospheric protection of anonymity that a hotel provides.
Tyler is a celebrated artistic writer, but more akin to street artists like Banksy (who regularly sprays his words) and musicians like Beck (credited by Spin magazine as influenced by Tyler). His work includes appearances in magazines, anthologies, college-reading lists, as well as three books of his own, and is an acclaimed and influential performer (infamous for breaking an arm while doing a reading).
