Comics Archive Online
New at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln library: Government Comics Collection. With nearly 200 entries, there’s a wide range of content – from Fighting Apartheid to The True Story of Smokey the Bear. All are available full-text pdf.
Forgotten Pulitzers
Before adding a new author to the list of winners, AbeBooks has compiled a list of “forgotten winners of the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the Pulitzer Prize for the Novel as the award was known prior to 1948.” Winning does not secure lasting fame, or even books that can still be found on the shelf, as the price of some of these out-of-print editions will show.
New Lit Mag Reviews Posted
NewPages Literary Magazine Reviews for April 18 include The Antioch Review :: The Chaffin Journal :: ChiZine :: Eclectica :: The Farallon Review :: Journal of Ordinary Thought :: Manoa :: The Missouri Review :: storySouth :: The Sun :: Tuesday
Novelists Need to Write More in the Now
Amanda Craig argues that “Contemporary novelists are so busy writing about the past, they’re neglecting the times they live in.” Her article “Stuck in the past: Why is modern literature obsessed with history?” in The Independent considers the responsibility of novelists to represent and comment on their own time, the difficulty of the task, and the risks associated with public response that need to stop being avoided.
Passings :: Eve Sedgwick
Educator, Author Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick Dies at 58
By Advocate Writer Michelle Garcia
Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, a prominent theorist who is often cited as one of the founders of queer theory, died on April 12. She was 58.
Sedgwick was reportedly diagnosed with breast cancer in 1991, prompting her book A Dialogue on Love. Sedgwick taught English at several institutions including Boston University; the University of California, Berkeley; and Duke University, where she was a Newman Ivey White Professor of English.
Sedgwick has written many books on gender and sexual orientation, including Between Men: English Literature and Male Homosocial Desire; Epistemology of the Closet; and Tendencies.
Documentary :: Ferlinghetti
Lawrence Ferlinghetti turned 90 last month, and this month will see the premiere of a documentary about Ferlinghetti’s life and work on April 28 at the San Francisco International Film Festival.
Director Christopher Felver crafts an incisive, sharply wrought portrait that reveals Ferlinghetti’s true role as catalyst for numerous literary careers and for the Beat movement itself. The film features archival photographs and historical footage, with appearances by Allen Ginsberg, Michael McClure, Billy Collins, Dennis Hopper, Robert Scheer, Dave Eggers, and Pulitzer Prize winner Gary Snyder. The appearance of numerous other prominent figures from the literary, political, and art community further underscores the enormous social impact Ferlinghetti’s legacy continues to have on the American cultural scene.
Book Cover Banquet
With (currently) over 1000 images, The Book Cover Archive presents “An Archive of Book Cover Designs and Designers for the Purpose of Appreciation and Categorization.” You can browse all, or refine to browsing to full alpha lists of designers, titles, authors, art directors, photographers, illustrators, genres, publication date and publishers. Thanks for the feast goes to Ben Pieratt and Eric Jacobsen who edit and maintain The Book Cover Archive.
WoC Media Collective: SPEAK!
SPEAK! Women of Color Media Collective is a netroots coalition of media-makers interested in strengthening our communities through truth-telling, media justice and the creation of a network of women of color media makers.
SPEAK! members blend together personal experience with an intersectional [includes everyone] multi-issue feminist perspective. SPEAK! members believe in media that is for our communities, by our communities. The framework SPEAK! uses is the one created by earlier feminists of color: a life-long commitment to addressing interlocking forms of oppression by creating radical transformative relationships to each other and the world.
In addition to a zine of poetry, lyrics, and art, SPEAK! has produced a CD and encourages “Listening Parties” – including a PDF of discussion questions and related activities for each of the CD tracks – great for community reading groups and classroom use.
This is the track list for the CD:
1. Why Do You Speak? – Adele Nieves
2. Something Else to Be – Sydette Harry (Black Amazon)
3. Slip – Maegan “La Mamita Mala” Ortiz
4. We Will Never Forget – Nadia Abou-Karr
5. When I Speak – Aaminah Hernández
6. We Are the Daughters – Lisa Factora-Borchers
7. Severance – Sylvia Peay
8. Tears and Beauty – Cripchick
9. An Archaelogy of Freedom – Alexis Pauline Gumbs
10. My Cats – Baby BFP
11. Reality – Noemi Martinez
12. Sin – BrownFemiPower
13. On Cartography and Dissection – E. Rose Sims
14. Genocide – Nadia Abou-Karr
15. Chaos – Fabiola Sandoval
16. Song of Solomon – Sydette Harry (Black Amazon)
17. Sequestro – Maegan “La Mamita Mala” Ortiz
18. Wishful Thinking – Alexis Pauline Gumbs
19. I Feel Pretty – E. Rose Sims and SPEAK!
20. For Those of Us… – SPEAK!
Awards :: Ruminate
The newest issue of Ruminate (11, Spring 2009)features the magazine’s 2009 Short Story Prize winner, as selected by Brent Lott: Susan Woodring with her story “The Smallest of These.” Woodring’s story can also be read online. Anna Maria Johnson’s story “Charlie’s Arm” was the runner-up and is also included.
Art and Politics :: Guernica
From Guernica, an online magazine of art and politics:
POETRY: Acclaimed Puerto Rican poet Rafael Acevedo explores one of our last remaining taboos–cannibalism–in two poems.
FICTION: Panamanian author Justo Arroyo answers “The Question:” Why do we pay so much for our workaday lunch–and get so little in return?
ART: In “Beaufort West,” situated along South Africa’s N1 highway, with an island prison in the middle of town, Mikhael Subotzky captures the vivid characters and poignant social landscapes.
Detroit’s Media Renaissance
In addition to attracting moviemakers to the state (“Michigan will be the next film capitol of the world,” Clint Eastwood said in a recent interview following the release of his new film Gran Torino, shot in Detroit.), WireTap Magazine sees the full range of new media creativity booming in this auto-deprived town, from broadband to indie music to media arts and “allied media” projects. Can this be Michigan’s Phoenix?
Artist :: Soojung Cho
“Most frequently I paint the sky; it is a space where we can find peace; it is a space for our soul; it is a space where we can find hope.” Soojung Cho, artist
Check out Soojung Cho’s online portfolio for more beautiful, peaceful oil paintings.
Zyzzyva: Textimage in Review
The Spring 2009 issue of Zyzzyva offers readers a unique look at “textimage” with over 100 contributions in this single collection.
From the Editor’s Note:
“Digital screens mash up words and pictures and videos and sound and links (to everything). The printed page segregates elements, putting them into their linear, orthogonal, rightful places.
“In this issue, we explore the spectrum of textimage, instances in which text and image collide and collude on the page-from the artist playing with that basic literary unit, the letter, to the writer sketching and doodling in his notebook.
Our take is not scholarly, but deliberately ecumenical, using examples from our pages over the past quarter century…”
Read more from Howard Junker, as well as view several of the works from this issue on Zyzzyva.
Self Publish in the News
Victoria Strauss on Writer Beware Blogs! responds to the recent flurry of mainstream news articles on self-publishing, and “The Need for Balance.” Strauss notes that “articles on self-publishing often follow a similar formula” and include:
1. Pick a rare instance of self-publishing success
2. Segue to the growth of self-publishing and the great possibilities it offers for budding authors, while taking a swipe at the commercial publishing industry
3. Toss out a few random facts about self-publishing
4. Mix in some boosterish quotes from representatives of self-pub companies
5. Feature a happy self-pubbed author
6. Conclude (explicitly or by implication) that “traditional” publishing is [pick one] dead/dying/running scared
For more “balance” – WB offers highly informative page on self-publishing, which includes the pros and cons, sales statistics, issues to consider, and advice on if you decide to move forward with SP/POD, as well as further resources to help you educate yourself. Check it out here.
What is Poetry For?
In Chicago, February 2009, at the annual conference of the Association of Writers and Writing Programs, the editors of Poems Out Loud asked eleven poets – Martha Serpas, Todd Boss, Molly Peacock, Major Jackson, Cole Swenson, Kim Addonizio, Kimiko Hahn, Willie Perdomo, Beth Ann Fennelly, Julie Sheehan, and Honor Moore – “What Is Poetry For?”
Raise the Bridge: Ebert on O’Reilly
“Thoughts on Bill O’Reilly and Squeaky the Chicago Mouse” is a letter from Roger Ebert to Bill O’Reilly – apparently in response to O’Reilly listing the Chicago Sun Times on his ‘Wall of Shame.’ I don’t keep up with O’Reilly tit-for-tats outside of Olbermann, but this one ends with such a fitting parable that I had never heard before, it seems worth passing along. Squeaky the Chicago Mouse, indeed.
Changing Lives Through Literature
“Changing Lives Through Literature (CLTL) is a program that began in Massachusetts in response to a growing need within our criminal justice system to find alternatives to incarceration. Burdened by expense and repeat offenders, our prisons can rarely give adequate attention to the needs of inmates and, thus, do little else than warehouse our criminals. Disturbed by the lack of real success by prisons to reform offenders and affect their patterns of behavior, Professor Robert Waxler and Judge Robert Kane discussed using literature as a way of reaching hardened criminals.”
Started in Massachusetts, programs have also started in Texas, Arizona, Kansas, Maine, New York, Rhode Island, and Connecticut. An adaptation of CLTL is also running strong in England. California and Illinois are interested in starting programs, and one is almost underway in Canada.
The CLTL website includes information about starting and running a similar program in your state, with sample syllabi from men’s, women’s, and juvenile programs.
New Lit on the Block :: Country Dog Review
The Country Dog Review is a journal of poetry conceived and edited by Danielle Sellers. It is currently an online journal with “the hopes of becoming both an online and print journal soon.”
The first issue includes works by Jesse Bishop, Larry Bradley, Greg Alan Brownderville, Alicia Casey, Heather Cousins, Erica Dawson, Blas Falconer, Ann Fisher-Wirth, Daniel Groves, Chris Hayes, David Kirby, Nick McRae, Adam Million, Erin J. Millikin, Ren Powell, John Pursley III, Lynn Wagner, Susan Settlemyre Williams, and John Dermot Woods, as well as an interview with David Kirby.
The Country Dog Review is currently accepting submissions for its fall issue, deadline August 1st, 2009.
Celebration of the Chapbook
A Celebration of the Chapbook festival calls attention to the rich history of the chapbook and highlights its essential place in poetry publishing today as a vehicle for alternative poetry projects and for emerging authors and editors to gain entry into the literary marketplace. The festival will forge a new platform for the study of the chapbook inside and outside the academy and celebrate the importance of chapbooks to America’s cultural heritage and future.
Thursday April 23rd, 2009 – Saturday April 25th, 2009
The Graduate Center, CUNY
Residency :: Penn State Altoona
The English Program of Penn State Altoona is taking applications for a one-semester teaching residency in creative non-fiction writing. The residence, designed to offer an emerging writer substantial time to write, offers a $5,000 stipend & an additional $5,000 allowance to cover room & board in return for teaching one sophomore-level creative non-fiction writing workshop during the Fall 2009 semester (August 24-December 17).
The resident writer will also give two readings & work informally with our English majors. Benefits are not included. We are looking for a writer with publications in literary or commercial magazines. Emphasis will be placed on the quality of the work submitted. We may consider a preference for work focused on environmental studies. A Master’s degree in Creative Writing or English is required. Teaching experience is preferred. The application should consist of a writing sample (one essay or ten pages from a book); a c.v., including publishing history; & one or more letters of recommendation.
Send to: Emerging Writer Residency, Dr. Thomas Liszka, Misciagna Family Center for Performing Arts, Pos #: B-29761, Penn State Altoona, 3000 Ivyside Park, Altoona, PA 16601-3760.
Review of applications will begin May 18, & continue until the position is filled.
Margaret Atwood
NYT Joyce Hor-Chung Lau “chats” with Margaret Atwood.
International Lit Fest
Blue Metropolis Montreal International Literary Festival
Including the Blue Metropolis Children’s Festival
April 22-26, 2009
The world’s first multilingual literary festival – and the best five-day literary party there is. In 2008, Blue Met gathered about 350 writers, literary translators, musicians, actors, journalists and publishers from Quebec and from all around the world for five days of literary events in English, French, Spanish and other languages.
New Lit on the Block :: Wag’s Revue
Behind the screen at Wag’s Revue are Editors Sandra Allen (nonfiction), Will Guzzardi (poetry), and Will Litton (fiction), with Webmaster Dave Eichler.
Publishing interviews, fiction, nonfiction and poetry, with room to play the media card within these forms, the first issue includes interviews with Dave Eggers, Mark Greif, Wells Tower, and works by Alexa Dilworth, Ernst Jandl, Travis Smith, Jessica Laser, Pauline Masurel, Winston Daniels, Tina Celona, Robert Moor, Eve Hamilton, Alison Fairbrother, Michael Paul Simons, Brian Evenson, John Sellekaers, Raleigh Holliday, Raymond Sumser, Maureen Halligan, Brandon Chinn, Janine Cheng, and Julia McKinley.
Jobs :: Various
Centenary College seeks application for an instructor for 2-credit poetry writing course for the fall semester (September through December, 2009) at, Hackettstown, NJ. MFA required. The course meets once a week for approximately two hours. Salary $900. Centenary College is in the process of developing a creative writing minor and anticipates ongoing teaching opportunities. Please send c.v. and/or inquiries to: Mary Newell: newellm-AT-centenarycollege-DOT-edu
Savannah College of Art and Design, Atlanta is accepting applications for a part-time faculty position in the Professional Writing department to teach creative writing.
Central Michigan University seeks qualified part-time temporary instructors to teach Technical Writing (Metro Detroit, Michigan), Fantasy and Science Fiction (Michigan and Online), The Literary Dimensions of Film (Michigan and Online). Amy Courter, Off-Campus Programs. June 30
The program in Creative Writing at Hollins University invites applications for a one-year, endowed distinguished professorship to begin August, 2009.
The University of Mississippi Department of English invites applications for the position of half-time Instructor.
Grinnell College‘s Center for the Humanities seeks to appoint a visiting scholar actively engaged in research on Place and Memory. Daniel Reynolds, Director, Center for the Humanities. April 25
Ok, Ok, So We’ve Twittered on our Facebook
Yep. We’ll give it a shot. But you have to show us the love if you want us to keep at it. Follow us on Twitter, and/or be a fan on the NewPages Facebook page. Be patient as we learn the ropes, or, uh… the jargon. That’s a Big Ten-Four Big Buddy?
Passings :: Corin Tellado
Spanish romance writer Corin Tellado has died
Associated Press
MADRID, Spain — Corin Tellado, a well-known Spanish author of more than 4,000 romance novels, died Saturday while celebrating the Easter holidays with her family. She was 81.
Tellado, whose real name was Maria del Socorro Tellado Lopez, collapsed at her home in the northern seaside city of Gijon and died of heart failure, a Cabuenes hospital spokeswoman said.
A funeral service is to be held in Gijon’s Iglesia de la Inmaculada church on Monday, the regional newspaper El Comercio said Saturday.
Born on April 25, 1927, in the northern coastal village of Viavelez, Tellado’s novels became popular throughout the Spanish-speaking world, particularly in Spain and Latin America.
In 2007, the regional government of her native Asturias honored the author for a lifetime dedicated to literature with an exhibition called “Corin Tellado, 60 years of love novels.”
“I’m not a romantic, nor a dreamer or visionary,” Tellado said at the inauguration. “However, someone had to write novels about love and it just happened to be me.”
Despite ill health that forced her to have blood dialysis three times a week since 1995, Tellado kept on writing right to the end, delivering her final novel to Variedades magazine on Wednesday.
Tellado was survived by a daughter and a son, El Comercio said.
New and Noteworthy Books
Check out NewPages New and Noteworthy Books page for a list and information about some of the newest releases and soon-to-be-released titles from small, independent, alternative and university presses. Updated regularly, but also archived monthly, so you can go back and take a look at previous posts.
NewPages Book Reviews April
Swing by and check out this great lineup of book reviews for April:
Vienna Triangle
A Novel by Brenda Webster
Wings Press, January 2009
Review by Jason Hinkley
First Execution
Novel by Domenico Starnone
Translated from the Italian by Antony Shugaar
Europa Editions, March 2009
Review by Laura Di Giovine
The Bathroom
Novel by Jean-Philippe Toussaint
Translated from the French by Nancy Amphoux and Paul De Angelis
Dalkey Archive, November 2008
Review by Josh Maday
Camera
Novel by Jean-Philippe Toussaint
Translated from the French by Matthew B. Smith
Dalkey Archive, November 2008
Review by Josh Maday
Last Night in Montreal
Novel by Emily St. John Mandel
Unbridled Books, June 2009
Review by Christina Hall
The Adventures of Cancer Bitch
Memoir by S.L. Wisenberg
University of Iowa Press, February 2009
Review by Cyan James
First We Read, Then We Write:
Emerson on the Creative Process
By Robert D. Richardson
University of Iowa Press, February 2009
Review by John Madera
Bending the Notes
Poetry by Paul Hostovsky
Main Street Rag, December 2008
Review by Jason Tandon
The Suburban Swindle
Short Stories by Jackie Corley
So New Publishing, October 2008
Review by Josh Maday
Morning in a Different Place
YA novel by Mary Ann McGuigan
Front Street Press, February 2009
Review by Jessica Powers
At or Near the Surface
Short stories by Jenny Pritchett
Fourteen Hills Press, November 2008
Review by Josh Maday
Light Boxes
Fiction by Shane Jones
Publishing Genius, February 2009
Review by Brian Allen Carr
Comfort
YA novel by Joyce Moyer Hostetter
Calkins Creek Books, April 2009
Review by Jessica Powers
Shuck
Fiction by Daniel Allen Cox
Arsenal Pulp Press, April 2009
Review by Brian Allen Carr
Me As Her Again
Memoir by Nancy Agabian
Aunt Lute Books, October 2008
Review by Ryan Call
Joy Fielding :: Where do Stories Come From
Here’s a lovely short piece by Joy Fielding from the National Post, The germ of an idea: What is fiction but a reimagining and restructuring of reality?
“People are always asking, ‘Where do you get your ideas?’ It’s a little like asking a doctor where she gets her diagnostic or surgical skills, or a gardener where he gets his green thumb…”
Rejected? You’re in Good Company
Okay, so don’t feel so bad about that next rejection letter, since you’ll find yourself in the company of George Orwell, whose work Animal Farm was turned down by TS Eliot. Apparently, when Eliot was director of the publisher Faber & Faber, he rejected Orwell’s work as “good” but “not convincing.” Does that sound familiar?
Kids Say the Coolest Things about Books
Of course, this is from our state here, but I’m sure you’ve got some cool kids in your state too:
The Michigan Center for the Book announced the three state winners of Letters About Literature, a national writing contest in which young readers wrote letters to authors, living or dead, describing how the authors’ work changed the students’ way of thinking. One of the state winners also received recognition at the competition’s national level.
“We received many thoughtful, heartfelt letters that demonstrate the power of books to touch the lives and engage the minds of young people,” said Michigan Center for the Book Coordinator Karren Reish. “Each year we welcome this opportunity to help foster Michigan students’ interest in literature and encourage them to cultivate the reading and writing skills that are key to academic success.”
The Michigan winners are:
Level 1 (grades 4-6) – Valerie Reeves of Mancelona who wrote to author Erin Hunter about the book Warriors: Dawn.
Reeves reflected on how the book taught her about the value of teamwork and leadership, writing: “When I was younger, I sometimes felt like I was a loner at school. I always wanted my mom to go to school with me because I didn’t want to be alone. I felt just like the rogue cat, Yellow Fang, who was without a clan. After reading your book, Warriors: Dawn, I found I wanted to be a warrior, too.”
Level 2 (grades 7-8) – Daniel Harrison of Kalamazoo who wrote to author Ben Mikaelsen about the book Touching Spirit Bear.
In his letter, Harrison expressed how the book inspired him to change his negative behavior: “About two years ago, I had been a real bully. I used to pick on kids and call them names and not even realize how much of a jerk I was. I had been in trouble a couple times, and ended up in detention. It was there, ironically, where I read your book, Touching Spirit Bear. It transformed my life.”
Level 3 (grades 9-12) – Nilesh Raval of Saginaw who wrote to author Jhumpa Lahiri about the book The Namesake. Raval also was named one of 12 Letters About Literature national honorable mention winners (four per level of competition) and will receive an additional $100 Target gift card and an additional $1,000 grant for the selected library.
Raval’s letter described lessons learned about pride in our unique cultural heritage and identity: “After reading your culturally enlightening novel, The Namesake, I have realized the importance of my name in Indian culture and that I am not alone when it comes to possessing an unusual one. … The Namesake has compelled me to understand that a name has an inherently profound power to shape its bearer. It has bestowed upon me a newfound respect for names in our culture.”
Birds+Haiku+Watercolors
Another beautiful book of poetry from Candlewick Press. I just happened to come across several of these lately, so I’ll be having something to say about them here. This one is The Cuckoo’s Haiku and Other Birding Poems by Michael J. Rosen, illustrated by Stan Fellows. Divided into four seasonal sections, each includes 5-7 birds for a total of 24. Each bird gets a two-page spread that includes full color watercolor images, a haiku, and script-style notes on the bird, such as this comment on the Common Grackle’s call: “harsh song is a rusty gate: ‘readle-eak!'”
The illustrations are absolutely lush. Some are full two-page scenes of the birds and their habitats, others include scenes with a variety of collage inset images of the bird. I cannot image anyone who enjoys poetry or birds not finding a comfortable liking in this book. That it is a “children’s” book is almost a misnoemer; indeed, I know a half dozen adults who would appreciate it. The script-style text might actually even be difficult for some younger children, but that only helps to make it a book best shared between adult and child.
An additional four-page section at the back of the book, “Notes for Birdwatchers and Haiku Lovers,” includes more specific species details as well as some author comments on the influence of the bird on his haiku. A neatly complete little book, perfect for National Poetry Month, and *finally* spring!
DIY Glossy Mags? HP’s MagCloud
Do-It-Yourself Magazines, Cheaply Slick
By ASHLEE VANCE
The New York Times
Published: March 29, 2009
PALO ALTO, Calif. — For anyone who has dreamed of creating his own glossy color magazine dedicated to a hobby like photography or travel, the high cost and hassle of printing has loomed as a big barrier. Traditional printing companies charge thousands of dollars upfront to fire up a press and produce a few hundred copies of a bound magazine.
With a new Web service called MagCloud, Hewlett-Packard hopes to make it easier and cheaper to crank out a magazine than running photocopies at the local copy shop.
Charging 20 cents a page, paid only when a customer orders a copy, H.P. dreams of turning MagCloud into vanity publishing’s equivalent of YouTube. The company, a leading maker of computers and printers, envisions people using their PCs to develop quick magazines commemorating their daughter’s volleyball season or chronicling the intricacies of the Arizona cactus business.
Read the rest on NYT.
Math Across the Curriculum
Our English division just got done discussing ideas for integrating “Math Across the Curriculum.” Since English had asked for the same oh so many years ago, we felt it was our place to step up to the plate on this one and consider how we might be using or could be using math in our English classes. Thanks to Gerry Canavan, here’s an insightful collection of work by Craig Damrauer entitled, New Math. I’ll certainly be working this into my classes soon.
MLA Updates
In case you’re not all over it yet, MLA has come out with updates. Finally! Until the new publication is available, Purdue OWL has a quickie page that’s helpful. And those new editions of handbooks that just came out this year? Students will be thrilled to find there to be “no buy back” as the even newer editions are ordered for next year. Now, who planned that?
Film :: Autism: The Musical
ErikaJ on Disability Nation offers her response to Autism: The Musical, an Emmy-award-winning HBO documentary: “I don’t know what I was expecting from a film called ‘Autism: The Musical.’ It was just a title that attracted my attention, even as a dark-humored part of me wanted to suggest that it should be a rock opera to better accommodate all the head-banging…” [read the rest]
Writing Residency :: Great River Writers Retreat
Deadline June 15: The winning writer will receive seven nights accommodation at Fulton’s Landing Guest House on the Mississippi River, plus travel and meal stipends, as well as an invitation to read at the Midwest Writing Center. A spouse or partner may accompany the writer on retreat.
Great River Writers Retreat
Oct. 17-24, 2009
Fulton’s Landing
Davenport, Iowa
Odysseus’s Anniversary? April 16 – Noon
“In the epic Odyssey, one of the cornerstones of Western literature, the legendary Greek hero Odysseus returns to his queen Penelope after enduring 10 years of sailing the wine dark sea. Now scientists have pinned down his return to April 16, 1178 B.C., close to noon local time, according to astronomical references in the epic poem that seem to pinpoint the total eclipse of the sun on the day that Odysseus supposedly returned on.” Read the rest on MSNBC
Congrats Alimentum
Alimentum has won first place in the Bookbinders Guild New York Book Show for “Quality Paperback Series.” This is the second year in a row Alimentum has won this honor. Congratulations to Alimentum designers Claudia Carlson and Peter Selgin.
Poetry Festival :: Slash Pine Press
Slash Pine Press is pleased to announce the first annual Slash Pine Poetry Festival, to be held in five distinct locations in the greater Tuscaloosa, AL area on April 24th and 25th. With 40 readers, the festival draws from local and national writers, from first year graduate student poets to National Poetry Series winners, from the traditional writer to the highly experimental one. The festival aims to show that poetry at its best is an inclusive, community-building endeavor, and that such an endeavor is well and alive in one of many small cities in the Deep South.
Residency :: ArtsEdge, UPenn
ArtsEdge Residencies
University of Pennsylvania
The ArtsEdge Residency project is designed to encourage and support the careers of emerging artists and writers. rtsEdge Residencies offers two one-year residencies in a live/work space near Penn’s campus. ArtsEdge aims to support the creative work of young artists and writers, and create a live/work environment that will inspire interdisciplinary exploration. Deadline April 15.
Performance Summer Institute – Chicago
Abandoned Practices – something out of the ordinary
School of the Art Institute of Chicago
July 6-24, 2009
This New Performance Summer Institute looks forward by looking backward, researching, enacting, and embodying practices that for one reason or another have been disregarded in the wake of progress, and relegated to the archives of history. Students will participate in individual and collaborative projects involving writing, installation, documentation, and live performance. Teachers and visiting scholars will lecture on related subjects. Available for credit or non-credit enrollment.
Week one: Abandoned technologies.
Mode: installation.
Forgotten machines, crafts, stagecrafts, thought as craft, the place of the hand in art making, player pianos, slowness as resistance.
Week two: Abandoned concepts.
Mode: writing.
The archive as repository of outmoded ideas; the pastoral; the senses.
Week three: Abandoned behavior.
Mode: performance.
Forgotten labor practices; town criers; discontinued social customs.
Online Book Swaps
Phil Dzikiy of The Tonawanda News reviews five of the “most popular” online book trading Web sites that offer free membership: “Raw numbers and service details were taken into consideration, but we also checked to see if certain books were available, in ascending order of rarity: The relatively recent and popular Life of Pi by Yann Martel, anything by noted Japanese author Haruki Murakami and This Perfect Day, a dystopian novel by Ira Levin which has been out of print for years.”
Jobs
University of Wisconsin-Madison Teacher & Program Coordinator in Writing for UW-Madison Liberal Studies & the Arts. Tom Boll, Writing Area Search. April 15
Dead at Your Age
Ever look at the “born on this day” sections in papers/magazines to see who shares your birthday? Well, here’s a somber twist on that: Dead at Your Age matches your birthday and current date with people you’ve outlived: “Congratulations! You’ve just outlived some interesting people. Tell us your date of birth, and we’ll tell you who they were.” Includes biographical information on each person, and you can subscribe to receive daily updates to keep track of who else you have outlived. Cheery stuff!
Festival of International Literature
PEN World Voices
Evolution/Revolution
April 27 – May 3, 2009
New York City
A stellar line-up featuring 160 writers from 40 countries, established and emerging authors of world literature will take the stage in venues across the city for six days packed with conversations, panels, readings, film screenings, a translation slam, and a cabaret night.
2009 is a year of significant anniversaries—from Galileo’s telescope (1609) to Darwin’s On the Origin of Species (1859), from the Cuban Revolution (1959) to the collapse of Communism across Eastern Europe (1989) and Tiananmen Square (1989). For this year’s festival, writers from all over the world will consider how the world changes and how we change.
Ann Arbor Book Festival & Writer’s Conference 2009
The third annual Ann Arbor Book Festival, May 15-17, 2009, includes a full-day Writer’s Conference where attendees can hone their skills in sessions led by visiting Festival authors. The conference will be held on the University of Michigan central campus in Palmer Commons. Over the years, this campus has been home to many well-known writers from Arthur Miller to Elizabeth Kostova.
Dueling Austen Scholar Responds
Last week I posted a newslink re: Oxford academic and Austen authority Professor Kathryn Sutherland claims that Claire Harman (award-winning biographer) copied some of her ideas for a new book.
I said this should be interesting, and sure enough, not what I was expecting, but the post received a response from Claire Harman herself, which you can now read on the entry page.
Additionally, in a follow-up e-mail from Harman, she notes: “I was getting intensely frustrated by the end of last week that I couldn’t get ‘my side of the story’ heard at all, but now the Bookseller has quoted part of the same letter I sent you and I’ve been told (by my publisher) that another blog called Book Brunch might put it up in full. Also there’s an interview coming along on The Book Depository and a guest blog on a university site, both of which allude to Prof Sutherland’s horrible attack, and perhaps that’s enough. I have no desire to prolong the row unduly.”
Nor do we, though as an educator, topics own “intellectual ownership” are always of interest to me. Unfortunately, what’s of interest to one person is often the result of many sleepless nights to those living the story. So, for their sake, I hope this dwindles to downright dull, soon.
Kick Off National Poetry Month with A Foot in the Mouth
From Candlewick Press, A Foot in the Mouth, have Editor Paul B. Janeczko and Illustrator Chris Raschka teamed up again to create another playfully brilliant book of poetry for children (a-hem – including us really tall children!). The other two equally as fun and engaging books in this series include A Poke in the I, a collection of concrete poems, and A Kick in the Head, which focuses on poetic forms. This final addition, however, is a selection of “Poems to Speak, Sing, and Shout” and is more like the Wii of poetry (only much more affordable, and less likely to go out of use in two years).
Janeczko’s introduction encourages readers to play with the sound of poetry by reading aloud: “Poetry is sound…To hear the sound of a poem, really hear it, you need to read it out loud. Or have someone read it to you.” Janeczko also encourages memorization for the joy of recitation. And of course, getting others to join in is something the book begs for. Raschka’s artistry livens every page and helps to further create a playful environment for the poems and readers.
The contents are divided into categories of interest and performance, such as Poems for One Voice, Tongue Twisters, Poems for Two Voices, List Poems, Poems for Three Voices, Short Stuff, Bilingual Poems, Rhymed Poems, Limericks, and Poems for a Group.
The collection encompasses a broad variety and diversity of works, which is refreshing to see in a collection for young people. A couple of my favorites include “Speak Up” by Janet S. Wong (pictured), in which one speaker confronts the other about not being able to speak the language of her cultural heritage (Korean). The poem ends in the reality that both speakers are American born, and thus provides children a means of confronting such stereotypes. “The Loch Ness Monter’s Song” by Edwin Morgan is just plain silly fun, and yet one of the most challenging poems in the book, beginning: “Sssnnnwhuffffll? / Hnwhuffl hhnnwfl hnfl hfl?” I’m still working on it.
Other authors include: Tracie Vaughn Zimmer, Charles R. Smith Jr., George Ella Lyon, Irene McCleod, Lewis Carroll, Charles Follen Adams, Bobbi Katz, David McCord, April Halprin Wayland and Bruce Balan, Patricia Hubbell, Douglas Florian, A.A. Milne, Beverly McLoughland, Georgia Heard, J. Patrick Lewis, William Shakespeare, Edward Lear, Arnold Spilka, Max Fatchen, Sandra Cisneros, Eugenio Ablerto Cano Correa, Allan Wolf, Avis Harley, Rebecca Kai Dotlich, Walt Whitman, and a few traditional and anonymous selections.
Considering the NCTE’s continued lament regarding our culture’s demise of poetry reading, this kind of collection can’t help but influence the next generation not to give up on it entirely. Heck, it could it be helpful to share this book with some adults!