Catie Copley is swiftly becoming the Godine celebrity author. Yesterday, July 16th, Catie appeared on Fox News Boston with Deborah Kovacs, the author of our book, and her handler Jim, the concierge at the Fairmont Copley. She even made the headlines of the Boston Globe, schmoozing down in the Big Apple with Mary Tyler Moore and other fabulous celebrities:
Dog's life leads to Broadway
She made no special demands for her Broadway debut, but Catie Copley, the Fairmont Copley Plaza's canine in residence, was the toast of the ninth annual Broadway Barks cat and dog soiree held on Saturday. Actresses and well-known animal lovers Bernadette Peters and Mary yler Moore presented Catie with a special services award at the event held in the Shubert Alley to benefit the ASPCA and other New York animal shelters . The Labrador retriever made the trek to the Big Apple with her faithful companion Jim Carey, the hotel's director of concierge services. Catie walked the red carpet with Peters and Moore and pose d for photos with a host of Broadway luminaries including Angela Lansbury, David Hyde Pierce, Charlotte d'Amboise, Jo Anne Worley, Christine Ebersole, and Hollywood couple Harry Hamlin and Lisa Rinna. However, we're told the Boston pooch showed the most tail wagging when meeting Bruiser and Rufus, the dogs from the musical "Legally Blonde."
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Monday, July 16, 2007
Punctuating their Origins
Have you ever wondered about the origin of modern punctuation? I happened upon this interesting article, thanks to Outside the Lines, which describes the origins of the ampersand ( & ) and the question mark ( ? ), among other common modern punctuation marks. I've personally always favored the ampersand, especially in more formal contexts, and no wonder since it is derived from a stylized version of the latin et. The explaination for the question mark seemed dubious to me, so I looked elsewhere and found this hypothesis at Wikipedia: "The point has always indicated the end of a sentence. The curved line represented the intonation pattern of a spoken question and may be associated with a kind of early musical notation, like neumes."
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Alfred Chester
Hot off the press is Black Sparrow Books' Jamie is My Heart's Desire, cult-icon Alfred Chester's first novel. Chester was a curious fellow. He'd lost all the hair on his head and face from a case of childhood scarlet fever, and was one of the more charming and extraordinary literary men of his time. Fellow BSB author Edward Field wrote an excellent account of Chester in The Boston Review:
"...a doomed, self-destructive, but larger-than-life mad genius, much in the 'outlaw' genre of a Rimbaud, a Genet, or perhaps more pertinently, J.R. Ackerley, the English author famous for his multiple pickups of soldiers, sailors, and guardsmen. In a review, Alfred Chester was described as 'one of the most bizarre characters in an expatriate community (Tangier) where eccentricity was the norm,' and an article about him in a New York paper, recently, was headlined, 'A Charming Monster's Comeback.' "
One of the great figures in American literature at the start of the 1960's, Chester sunk into a solitary world of paranoia and delusion. One has to think of Ginsberg's "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked," written before Chester was lost to his disease, but a vision none the less. Field writes, "He heard voices in his head and exaggerated sounds from outside, making the children's taunting and banging on his fence [in Jerusalem, just before he died] unbearable." Field quotes a reviewer as once writing, "Circle his name with your red pencil. He out-writes such other and better known writers as Faulkner, Steinbeck, Jean Stafford and Saul Bellow."
You can find all the Black Sparrow Books titles by Chester HERE.
"...a doomed, self-destructive, but larger-than-life mad genius, much in the 'outlaw' genre of a Rimbaud, a Genet, or perhaps more pertinently, J.R. Ackerley, the English author famous for his multiple pickups of soldiers, sailors, and guardsmen. In a review, Alfred Chester was described as 'one of the most bizarre characters in an expatriate community (Tangier) where eccentricity was the norm,' and an article about him in a New York paper, recently, was headlined, 'A Charming Monster's Comeback.' "
One of the great figures in American literature at the start of the 1960's, Chester sunk into a solitary world of paranoia and delusion. One has to think of Ginsberg's "I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked," written before Chester was lost to his disease, but a vision none the less. Field writes, "He heard voices in his head and exaggerated sounds from outside, making the children's taunting and banging on his fence [in Jerusalem, just before he died] unbearable." Field quotes a reviewer as once writing, "Circle his name with your red pencil. He out-writes such other and better known writers as Faulkner, Steinbeck, Jean Stafford and Saul Bellow."
You can find all the Black Sparrow Books titles by Chester HERE.
Friday, July 6, 2007
Dutton's Brentwood Books
Score one for the good guys. It doesn't happen very often, and I don't feel there is about to be a surge of businessmen's turned hearts, so this particular case is probably one for the scrapbook. On the other hand, I could be (and hopefully am) wrong. The LA Times reports on this Disney-esq, feel-good story:
Billionaire Charles T. Munger said Thursday that he has scrapped plans to build 60 luxury condos on San Vicente Boulevard in favor of erecting a two-story retail complex that would retain Dutton's Brentwood Books in a new and improved space.
"I was wrong," Munger said of his plans, made public in January, to build high-end residential units as part of a mixed-use development at the property just east of Bundy Drive. The idea sparked an uprising among residents and longtime fans of Dutton's, who feared the store's demise.
Munger, 83, said the neighborhood's staunch opposition to the project and concern for Dutton's prompted his change of heart.
"Bookstores are fragile," he said. "Jostle them slightly and they never reopen. The best thing is to make sure it never closes."
Billionaire Charles T. Munger said Thursday that he has scrapped plans to build 60 luxury condos on San Vicente Boulevard in favor of erecting a two-story retail complex that would retain Dutton's Brentwood Books in a new and improved space.
"I was wrong," Munger said of his plans, made public in January, to build high-end residential units as part of a mixed-use development at the property just east of Bundy Drive. The idea sparked an uprising among residents and longtime fans of Dutton's, who feared the store's demise.
Munger, 83, said the neighborhood's staunch opposition to the project and concern for Dutton's prompted his change of heart.
"Bookstores are fragile," he said. "Jostle them slightly and they never reopen. The best thing is to make sure it never closes."
Tuesday, July 3, 2007
Andrew Motion / American Boys
* Soon-to-be Godine author and British poet-laureate Andrew Motion is making the news in Britain. Motion is pressing the new Prime Minister to help keep literary manuscripts in British institutions via tax-incentives.
"The writer has expressed concerns that work by figures including Tom Stoppard, Ted Hughes and Evelyn Waugh, is being snapped up by US institutions. Professor Motion told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that there are 'magical and meaningful' reasons to preserve original documents for the nation. The British Library has said it cannot pay as much as US universities."
He worries that there is a cultural “black hole” developing in Britain because of the loss of these literary-historical documents. I'd never heard of this as a problem, but I'm glad Motion is working to make changes. Intellectuals flock to universities and libraries for manuscripts and letters, even contracts, for research on authors, so having these kinds of papers is much more than a matter of national pride. Collections like the ones to which he is referring can be the building blocks of intellectual communities.
* In other news the Dangerous Book for Boys is topping all kinds of sales lists and recently got a long review in The Weekly Standard. Roger Kimball of the New Criterion writes, "The Dangerous Book for Boys is a book that implicitly endorses Aristotle's observation that courage is the most important virtue because, without courage, it is impossible to practice the other virtues." Too true. The success of Dangerous Book for Boys has created some new interest for our American Boy's Handy Book series.
Dangerous Book for Boys and American Boy's Handy Book are pretty similar. Their aims are to occupy children without the assistance of a TV or video-game system, and maybe even to enbolden them towards courage and virtue, as Kimball writes. The biggest difference is that our retro look comes from the book's being written in the 1880's, and our author – Daniel Carter Beard – was a founder of the Boy Scouts. The Dangerous Book for Boys is more up-to-date in a few ways, with chapters on making a battery and the fifty states (there were only 41 when American Boys was first published), where Godine's Handy Books include things like making blow darts, how to build a number of rafts, war kites, novel modes of fishing, and – my favorite – 12 illustrated pages on snowball warfare. We also have two volumes for boys, the American Boy's Handy Book and its more outdoor companion the Field and Forest Handy Book, and a girl's volume—the American Girls Handy Book.
Ah the joys of childhood.
"The writer has expressed concerns that work by figures including Tom Stoppard, Ted Hughes and Evelyn Waugh, is being snapped up by US institutions. Professor Motion told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that there are 'magical and meaningful' reasons to preserve original documents for the nation. The British Library has said it cannot pay as much as US universities."
He worries that there is a cultural “black hole” developing in Britain because of the loss of these literary-historical documents. I'd never heard of this as a problem, but I'm glad Motion is working to make changes. Intellectuals flock to universities and libraries for manuscripts and letters, even contracts, for research on authors, so having these kinds of papers is much more than a matter of national pride. Collections like the ones to which he is referring can be the building blocks of intellectual communities.
* In other news the Dangerous Book for Boys is topping all kinds of sales lists and recently got a long review in The Weekly Standard. Roger Kimball of the New Criterion writes, "The Dangerous Book for Boys is a book that implicitly endorses Aristotle's observation that courage is the most important virtue because, without courage, it is impossible to practice the other virtues." Too true. The success of Dangerous Book for Boys has created some new interest for our American Boy's Handy Book series.
Dangerous Book for Boys and American Boy's Handy Book are pretty similar. Their aims are to occupy children without the assistance of a TV or video-game system, and maybe even to enbolden them towards courage and virtue, as Kimball writes. The biggest difference is that our retro look comes from the book's being written in the 1880's, and our author – Daniel Carter Beard – was a founder of the Boy Scouts. The Dangerous Book for Boys is more up-to-date in a few ways, with chapters on making a battery and the fifty states (there were only 41 when American Boys was first published), where Godine's Handy Books include things like making blow darts, how to build a number of rafts, war kites, novel modes of fishing, and – my favorite – 12 illustrated pages on snowball warfare. We also have two volumes for boys, the American Boy's Handy Book and its more outdoor companion the Field and Forest Handy Book, and a girl's volume—the American Girls Handy Book.
Ah the joys of childhood.
Monday, July 2, 2007
July Sale!
The Monthly Online Specials page is hot off the html press! In case you don't already know, we hand pick a number of back-list titles each month to sell at a discount only available through www.Godine.com. Think of this month as Godine's summer reads. The discounted titles are:
Adultery & Other Choices, by Andre Dubus, softcover was 13.95 | now 6.00 — Animal Fables from Aesop, by Barbara McClintock, softcover was 10.95 | now 5.00 — The Brooklyn Novels, by Daniel Fuchs, SC was 24.95 | now 11.00 — Emerald Ice, by Diane Wakoski, SC was 19.00 | now 7.00 — The Green Piano, by Janine Pommy Vega, SC was 19.00 | now 7.00 — Here & Elsewhere, The Collected Fiction of Kenneth Burke, SC was 22.95 | Now 11.00 — In the Flesh, by Christa Wolf, SC was 15.95 | now 10.00 — Mirage, by Bandula Chandraratna, SC was 15.95 | now 7.00 — New American Poets, ed. by Jack Myers & Roger Weingarten, hardcover was 21.95 | now 10.00 — The Poems of Charles Reznikoff, SC was 21.95 | now 11.00 — The Riot Inside Me, by Wanda Coleman, SC was 18.95 | now 10.00 — Six Israeli Novellas, SC was 19.95 | now 8.00, HC was 27.95 | now 12.00 — A Year with Emerson, ed. Richard Grossman, SC was 18.95 | now 10.00
From your friendly neighborhood independent publisher.
Adultery & Other Choices, by Andre Dubus, softcover was 13.95 | now 6.00 — Animal Fables from Aesop, by Barbara McClintock, softcover was 10.95 | now 5.00 — The Brooklyn Novels, by Daniel Fuchs, SC was 24.95 | now 11.00 — Emerald Ice, by Diane Wakoski, SC was 19.00 | now 7.00 — The Green Piano, by Janine Pommy Vega, SC was 19.00 | now 7.00 — Here & Elsewhere, The Collected Fiction of Kenneth Burke, SC was 22.95 | Now 11.00 — In the Flesh, by Christa Wolf, SC was 15.95 | now 10.00 — Mirage, by Bandula Chandraratna, SC was 15.95 | now 7.00 — New American Poets, ed. by Jack Myers & Roger Weingarten, hardcover was 21.95 | now 10.00 — The Poems of Charles Reznikoff, SC was 21.95 | now 11.00 — The Riot Inside Me, by Wanda Coleman, SC was 18.95 | now 10.00 — Six Israeli Novellas, SC was 19.95 | now 8.00, HC was 27.95 | now 12.00 — A Year with Emerson, ed. Richard Grossman, SC was 18.95 | now 10.00
From your friendly neighborhood independent publisher.
Thursday, June 28, 2007
Merchant of Noises / World Literature
First off, a quick note about the very nice review at this month's Library Journal of the Godine children's titles The Merchant of Noises and Little Red Riding Hood. Kirsten Cutler seemed to really get the off-beat, funny title Merchant: "This quirky offering spoofs the highbrow world of 'sophisticated' visual-arts appreciation. The title gives a hint of the tongue-in-cheek humor so wonderfully expressed within. . . .this creative gem is sure to appeal to savvy children who will appreciate their roles as creators and consumers of sounds." Joy Flieshhacker had high praise for our Little Red Riding Hood as well: "Visual details abound, and observant youngsters will notice that a calico cat plays a heroic role in the story. An eye-catching addition to folk and fairytale shelves."
Second, and related, Scott Esposito at Conversational Reading has been doing an interesting series of entries regarding world literature, specifically translation. Personally I have always loved literature in other languages, and in my youth I at times forgot that writers like Dostoevsky or Kafka were in translation at all (aside from just being young, I'd like to think this speaks of the translators' work). Since then I've come to appreciate works in translation and the work of translators (such as with Merchant of Noises, an excellent translation from the French) more and more. I've translated short prose and poems myself with greater and lesser degrees of success, and am continually in awe of works of translation such as A Void, whose avant-garde prose poses enormous challenges of language and meaning, and where the two conform or split.
Second, and related, Scott Esposito at Conversational Reading has been doing an interesting series of entries regarding world literature, specifically translation. Personally I have always loved literature in other languages, and in my youth I at times forgot that writers like Dostoevsky or Kafka were in translation at all (aside from just being young, I'd like to think this speaks of the translators' work). Since then I've come to appreciate works in translation and the work of translators (such as with Merchant of Noises, an excellent translation from the French) more and more. I've translated short prose and poems myself with greater and lesser degrees of success, and am continually in awe of works of translation such as A Void, whose avant-garde prose poses enormous challenges of language and meaning, and where the two conform or split.
Friday, June 22, 2007
John Yau Feature
We just received two issues of Pasatiempo in the mail, New Mexico's arts, entertainment, & culture magazine sponsored by The Santa Fe New Mexican, which contained a very nice two-page interview by staff writer Elizabeth Cook-Romero with the Black Sparrow Books author John Yau. Cook-Romero and Yau discuss his own writing, the scene in New York in the 1940's and 50's, visual arts, Frank O'Hara, and more. The article will be available at Pasatiempo, and likely you can order a hard copy at the Santa Fe, so I'll just pull one short Q&A:
Pasa: Many people like songs even when they can't understand the words. Why do you think so many people are impatient with poetry?
Yau: Most people believe that language is stable and corresponds to a reality that is stable and predictable. Most people don't want to wrestle with the fact that language is not necessarily stable, that meaning itself is slippery, that the world is not stable. There is no guarantee that everything will be the same way tomorrow as it is today. They are living in a reality that can become catastrophic at a moment's notice. . . I'm an optimist. I believe the audience will get bigger eventually, and I believe it's OK that the audience is what it is. Everybody knows who Andy Warhol is, but how many people have really stopped to look at his art or really think about him? I think the audience for many things is not as big as people say.
Yau's answers read almost as if they're scripted, and researched, in the best possible way, and I think they show the depth of his thinking about the issues of art and poetry as it relates to the modern audience. Cook-Romero's questions are well-researched and lead to some great discussion. Thanks to Elizabeth and Pasatiempo for the great article.
Pasa: Many people like songs even when they can't understand the words. Why do you think so many people are impatient with poetry?
Yau: Most people believe that language is stable and corresponds to a reality that is stable and predictable. Most people don't want to wrestle with the fact that language is not necessarily stable, that meaning itself is slippery, that the world is not stable. There is no guarantee that everything will be the same way tomorrow as it is today. They are living in a reality that can become catastrophic at a moment's notice. . . I'm an optimist. I believe the audience will get bigger eventually, and I believe it's OK that the audience is what it is. Everybody knows who Andy Warhol is, but how many people have really stopped to look at his art or really think about him? I think the audience for many things is not as big as people say.
Yau's answers read almost as if they're scripted, and researched, in the best possible way, and I think they show the depth of his thinking about the issues of art and poetry as it relates to the modern audience. Cook-Romero's questions are well-researched and lead to some great discussion. Thanks to Elizabeth and Pasatiempo for the great article.
John Yau Feature
We just received two issues of Pasatiempo in the mail, New Mexico's arts, entertainment, & culture magazine sponsored by The Santa Fe New Mexican, which contained a very nice two-page interview by staff writer Elizabeth Cook-Romero with the Black Sparrow Books author John Yau. Cook-Romero and Yau discuss his own writing, the scene in New York in the 1940's and 50's, visual arts, Frank O'Hara, and more. Since the article isn't available online, I'll pull a short Q&A:
Pasa: Many people like songs even when they can't understand the words. Why do you think so many people are impatient with poetry?
Yau: Most people believe that language is stable and corresponds to a reality that is stable and predictable. Most people don't want to wrestle with the fact that language is not necessarily stable, that meaning itself is slippery, that the world is not stable. There is no guarantee that everything will be the same way tomorrow as it is today. They are living in a reality that can become catastrophic at a moment's notice. . . I'm an optimist. I believe the audience will get bigger eventually, and I believe it's OK that the audience is what it is. Everybody knows who Andy Warhol is, but how many people have really stopped to look at his art or really think about him? I think the audience for many things is not as big as people say.
Yau's answers read like they're scripted, and researched, and I think they show the depth of his thinking about these issues well.
Pasa: Many people like songs even when they can't understand the words. Why do you think so many people are impatient with poetry?
Yau: Most people believe that language is stable and corresponds to a reality that is stable and predictable. Most people don't want to wrestle with the fact that language is not necessarily stable, that meaning itself is slippery, that the world is not stable. There is no guarantee that everything will be the same way tomorrow as it is today. They are living in a reality that can become catastrophic at a moment's notice. . . I'm an optimist. I believe the audience will get bigger eventually, and I believe it's OK that the audience is what it is. Everybody knows who Andy Warhol is, but how many people have really stopped to look at his art or really think about him? I think the audience for many things is not as big as people say.
Yau's answers read like they're scripted, and researched, and I think they show the depth of his thinking about these issues well.
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Reviews / Catie Copley Events
Hello hello! Hope things are warmer and sunnier where you are than they are here in Boston.
First up, an excellent new review in the New York Sun of the (Godine imprint) Verba Mundi title The Tartar Steppe, by Dino Buzzati (1906–1972). [Verba Mundi is the Godine imprint dedicated to publishing great works translated into English and published for the first time in the United States.] Eric Ormsby of the Sun writes, "Buzzati (1906–1972), though little known here, was one of the finest and most original Italian writers of the last century. Because he dealt in fantastic themes, and always delivered in dry style, he has been compared to Kafka and Borges as well as to Italo Calvino, whom he influenced."
Russel Hoban received a nice write up over at Dave Awl's Ocelopotamus. Awl is the "semi-official Webmaster and fan club founder" of Hoban, whose fan club The Kraken runs a variety of Hoban-tastic events.
Speaking of events (notice the nice transition?) we are ramping up the events on for Catie Copley, which will be listed on our Godine News page at the website. A few notable events are listed below. Check out the News page for a complete list, and contact either us or the venue for more information.
First up, an excellent new review in the New York Sun of the (Godine imprint) Verba Mundi title The Tartar Steppe, by Dino Buzzati (1906–1972). [Verba Mundi is the Godine imprint dedicated to publishing great works translated into English and published for the first time in the United States.] Eric Ormsby of the Sun writes, "Buzzati (1906–1972), though little known here, was one of the finest and most original Italian writers of the last century. Because he dealt in fantastic themes, and always delivered in dry style, he has been compared to Kafka and Borges as well as to Italo Calvino, whom he influenced."
Russel Hoban received a nice write up over at Dave Awl's Ocelopotamus. Awl is the "semi-official Webmaster and fan club founder" of Hoban, whose fan club The Kraken runs a variety of Hoban-tastic events.
Speaking of events (notice the nice transition?) we are ramping up the events on for Catie Copley, which will be listed on our Godine News page at the website. A few notable events are listed below. Check out the News page for a complete list, and contact either us or the venue for more information.
- Tuesday 19 June, 3.00 pm – Fairmont Copley Plaza – BOOK LAUNCH
- Friday 22 June, 10.30 am – Wellesley Booksmith – READING
- Saturday 23 June , 2.00 pm – Boston Public Library – READING
- Saturday 30 June, 2.00 pm – Children’s Museum, Boston – TBD
- Wednesday 11 July, 11.00 am – Barnes & Noble, Copley Plaza – READING
Monday, June 11, 2007
Every Eye
We were recently notified of a very nice review of Isobel English's Black Sparrow novel Every Eye, written by Debra Murphy at Catholic Fiction. "A beautiful, beautiful novel. Read it twice," Murphy writes. We agree, read it twice and – Why not? – buy it twice. Kidding (unless you really want to...), but the review is very complimentary, well-written, and detailed. It is the first review I've read at Catholic Fiction, but I plan on keep an (every?) eye on the site from now on. Oh, we do love puns today.
Friday, June 8, 2007
Here & Elsewhere (A love letter to The Believer)
Apparently (to my pleasant surprise) The Believer's Dan Johnson wrote a review of Black Sparrow's Here & Elsewhere: the Collected Fiction of Kenneth Burke that was subtitled Is it still postmodern if it came out in 1924? (ha!) and slipped right under our radar! The best part: they loved it. Which gives me hope for the future. Here is a short excerpt:
His mastery of the English language allows him to compose pieces that succeed as philosophy, domestic drama, myth, hallucination, or pure music—usually succeeding at several at once, sometimes becoming just one or two, and sometimes, thrillingly, swerving between all of them in baffling succession. “Let us build a great hippopotamus,” begins the coda to one otherwise realistic story—apropos nothing whatsoever—“to the glorification of our century.”
To read the rest of the review, check it out at The Believer. As an unrelated plug, the folks at this great and still-young magazine have begun publishing one poem per issue as well, and THAT makes us poor poetry people here at Godine and Black Sparrow mighty happy.
His mastery of the English language allows him to compose pieces that succeed as philosophy, domestic drama, myth, hallucination, or pure music—usually succeeding at several at once, sometimes becoming just one or two, and sometimes, thrillingly, swerving between all of them in baffling succession. “Let us build a great hippopotamus,” begins the coda to one otherwise realistic story—apropos nothing whatsoever—“to the glorification of our century.”
To read the rest of the review, check it out at The Believer. As an unrelated plug, the folks at this great and still-young magazine have begun publishing one poem per issue as well, and THAT makes us poor poetry people here at Godine and Black Sparrow mighty happy.
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
Edward Field Interview
There is an interview with a Black Sparrow author, the poet Edward Field, in The Bloomsbury Review's May / June issue, conducted by Christopher Hennessy. As it is not available online, I shall regale you with the opening portion:
"A list of the great poets of the 20th Century includes a healthy share who are gay or lesbian: W.H. Auden, Hart Crane, Elizabeth Bishop, May Swenson, Frank O'Hara, Allen Ginsberg, Robert Duncan, and James Merrill. Add to that the living poets such as John Ashbery, Richard Howard, Marilyn Hackard, and Frank Bidart, to name only a few of one generation.
Since the Early Sixties, however, another gay poet has been quietly amassing a corpus of work that chronicles life as a gay man perhaps more openly, intimately, and richly than many of the above contenders. Poet Edward Field writes about Bohemia, his own Jewish heritage, his beloved Greenwich Villiage, classic and quirky American celluloid, and of course being gay."
It is a very complimentary article, as you can probably tell from the opening lines quoted above. Hennessy goes on to call Field "a poet with a sharp wit and unmistakable voice," and I would ad humor. My favorite line is when Field tells Christopher (regarding the era of Ginsberg's popularizing poetry) "I identified with the rabble."
"A list of the great poets of the 20th Century includes a healthy share who are gay or lesbian: W.H. Auden, Hart Crane, Elizabeth Bishop, May Swenson, Frank O'Hara, Allen Ginsberg, Robert Duncan, and James Merrill. Add to that the living poets such as John Ashbery, Richard Howard, Marilyn Hackard, and Frank Bidart, to name only a few of one generation.
Since the Early Sixties, however, another gay poet has been quietly amassing a corpus of work that chronicles life as a gay man perhaps more openly, intimately, and richly than many of the above contenders. Poet Edward Field writes about Bohemia, his own Jewish heritage, his beloved Greenwich Villiage, classic and quirky American celluloid, and of course being gay."
It is a very complimentary article, as you can probably tell from the opening lines quoted above. Hennessy goes on to call Field "a poet with a sharp wit and unmistakable voice," and I would ad humor. My favorite line is when Field tells Christopher (regarding the era of Ginsberg's popularizing poetry) "I identified with the rabble."
Tuesday, June 5, 2007
The Super-Special BEA Blog
What a great time. I may just be a first-timer, but that was the most overwhelmingly fun and exhausting weekend of all time. From what I hear (although I wasn't there) our author event for The Half-Life of an American Essayist at 192 Books on Thursday was a blast. We hope that Arthur – the author of this really entertaining, smart collection of essays – was pleased with how it went. Friday was busy at the booth, the best location we've had at BEA, and the New Yorker party on Friday night was (again, from what I hear) tons of literary-star-studded fun. I'm bitter to have missed it, so, in my petty jealous rage, that's all I'll say about that now.
Saturday, when I arrived, was mobbed. We had the real-life Catie Copley at our booth, along with chocolate dog-bones (for people, for people!) and managed to make a ripple in the BEA Blog. We got some excellent bookseller feedback on our Fall 2007 list, went through cases of rolled-up posters (which we hope didn't get left in hotel rooms all across New York), got guilty compliments from the big-publishing-houses' editors, and saw a lot of familiar faces. I got to talk to some great people at Mark Batty Books, a truly fine publisher, and McSweeneys, or specifically The Believer (who somehow were sandwiched in with the educational / inspirational publishers, which is not to say that they are neither inspirational nor educational).
Overall a great weekend. I spent alot of time on the subway (tried not to call it the T) and avoiding any conversations about baseball (in respect for the dead) and by myself, waiting to meet various friends. Got some books I'm excited about reading, and re-lit my fire for the coming Fall list. Woo BEA!
Saturday, when I arrived, was mobbed. We had the real-life Catie Copley at our booth, along with chocolate dog-bones (for people, for people!) and managed to make a ripple in the BEA Blog. We got some excellent bookseller feedback on our Fall 2007 list, went through cases of rolled-up posters (which we hope didn't get left in hotel rooms all across New York), got guilty compliments from the big-publishing-houses' editors, and saw a lot of familiar faces. I got to talk to some great people at Mark Batty Books, a truly fine publisher, and McSweeneys, or specifically The Believer (who somehow were sandwiched in with the educational / inspirational publishers, which is not to say that they are neither inspirational nor educational).
Overall a great weekend. I spent alot of time on the subway (tried not to call it the T) and avoiding any conversations about baseball (in respect for the dead) and by myself, waiting to meet various friends. Got some books I'm excited about reading, and re-lit my fire for the coming Fall list. Woo BEA!
Thursday, May 24, 2007
Linger Awhile
The advance copies of our new Russel Hoban novel, Linger Awhile, just arrived and we are pleased as pie. The novel follows 83-year-old Irving Goodman, who has fallen madly in love (or lust) with a film star from the 1930's. With the help of a friend and some old-fashioned magic, Irving conjures up the (now deceased) beauty—in black-and-white, with a vampire's thirst for blood (and technicolor). It is a truly fun, inventive romp through London, gift-wrapped in that wonderful Hoban style.
I'm especially excited because this is one of the first titles I had a hand in producing – and the first novel (novels being one of my great loves). Check back at our website to place you order!
Wednesday, May 23, 2007
American Literature Association
Susan—the Black Sparrow Books chief—and I will be attending the American Literature Association's conference at the Westin Copley Hotel in Boston this Thursday-Saturday. The conference is a get-together of societies that have a dedicated interest to the study of American authors, including the Children's Literature Society, the Theodore Dreiser Society, The Herman Melville Society, etc. Since Black Sparrow Books and Godine have a veritable cornucopia of great American authors (including Dreiser, Melville, Reznikoff, Wanda Coleman, Donald Hall, to name a few), we're going to make an appearance. If you're there, come around to our booth and say hi!
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
DH Lawrence
This article by Elizabeth Tallent in The Threepenny Review reviews a new biography of DH Lawrence, DH Lawrence: The Life of an Outsider. Here is a bit:
The review spends a good amount of time on Lawrence's image and reputation, and the ways that the current modes of criticism and fiction – and society – have diminished most readers' appreciation of his motifs. It is very insightful, I think, and reminds me of the approach Henry Louis Gates Jr. takes with the Norton Critical Uncle Tom's Cabin. If you've never read Lawrence, it is a shame, and I recommend picking up his first volume of poetry (published by Godine's imprint – Black Sparrow Books) Birds, Beasts and Flowers!
If young writers can rarely name more than a dozen plants within a ten-mile radius of their writing desks, this isn't seen as detrimental to their work's verisimilitude, since the nonhuman world plays almost no part in contemporary fiction. It's as if this silence in fiction anticipates a hundred thousand species' extinction in the actual world. Lawrence would be enraged.
The review spends a good amount of time on Lawrence's image and reputation, and the ways that the current modes of criticism and fiction – and society – have diminished most readers' appreciation of his motifs. It is very insightful, I think, and reminds me of the approach Henry Louis Gates Jr. takes with the Norton Critical Uncle Tom's Cabin. If you've never read Lawrence, it is a shame, and I recommend picking up his first volume of poetry (published by Godine's imprint – Black Sparrow Books) Birds, Beasts and Flowers!
Monday, May 14, 2007
EVENT, etc.
The David R. Godine book launch for Arthur Krystal's Half-Life of an American Essayist will be held at 192 Books on Thursday, May 31 at 7:30 pm. 192 Books is located on 10th Ave. at 21st street on Manhattan. Space is limited, so give the store a call ahead and – as always – please stop by the store often to buy your books, and support independent book stores whenever possible.
Also, I found this interesting article on the brewing culture war between established literary-criticism / book review publications, and literary bloggers (courtesy of Arts & Letters, Daily). What I take from the article [this is only one man's interpretation] is that professional reviewers badly, badly want blogs to be seen as a sort of cheap version of their "real " work. It makes sense, considering that the internet is free to all, and if the online reviews are just as good – if not better – than the newspapers and magazines', there will be no book-reviewing business. Blogging would become a threat to the already precarious livelihood of literary academics and reviewers. On the other hand, newspapers are still cutting their arts coverage all over the country. This passage, I think, sums it up well:
Also, I found this interesting article on the brewing culture war between established literary-criticism / book review publications, and literary bloggers (courtesy of Arts & Letters, Daily). What I take from the article [this is only one man's interpretation] is that professional reviewers badly, badly want blogs to be seen as a sort of cheap version of their "real " work. It makes sense, considering that the internet is free to all, and if the online reviews are just as good – if not better – than the newspapers and magazines', there will be no book-reviewing business. Blogging would become a threat to the already precarious livelihood of literary academics and reviewers. On the other hand, newspapers are still cutting their arts coverage all over the country. This passage, I think, sums it up well:
... there is a growing sense that enough is enough — and that the friction between old and new book media obscures the fact that the two are in bed together now, for better or worse. Often the same people who churn out literary blogs are reviewing books for mainstream reviews.As a publisher, this is all hard to watch, since reviewers are so necessary to the success of a book by any small publisher. They are a big, important part of the wheel that makes our business turn.
Monday, May 7, 2007
Arthur Krystal
The Half-Life of an American Essayist recently landed (triumphantly) in our office, and I had the opportunity to read a few essays over the weekend. First, Let me say that Arthur Krystal is no ordinary essayist. There is very little of the John Milton here (and I mean that, having studied Milton's essays on marriage and free speech, in the best possible way). The introduction opens:
Somehow, without ever intending to, I’ve ended up a freelance intellectual. Not quite a man of letters, not really a critic anymore, but a sort of literary mule – a cross between haphazard journalist and restive seminarian. And it’s no fun.But he could have fooled me. In the course of being insightful Krystal has (through the same human, self-deprecating and, at times, other-deprecating sense of humor) kept me well entertained with a fantastic wit. Even in his essay on sin, a topic which, by virtue of 16 years Catholic and Jesuit schooling, I am well acquainted, I found myself enjoying every turn of the page. From the Godine website:
The twelve essays in The Half-Life - the title is from Goethe's "Experience is only half of experience" - go deeper than the standard book piece; they hew to the line first drawn by Montaigne and later extended by Dr. Johnson, Hazlitt, Woolf and Orwell. Although there may be no preordained way of writing about literature, Krsytal takes his cue from Edwin Denby, who maintained that the first duty of the critic is to be "interesting." No matter how large the subject - whether it is the history of boxing or the growth of the Holocaust industry, Krstyal paints broad subjects with precise brushstrokes. Erudite, lettristic, and informative, the essays here are nonetheless accessible to the general reader. The reason is simple: as Dr. Johnson noted, "What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure." To this one might add that there is satisfaction to be had in the effort itself. How else could one write as committedly and entertainingly about Paul Valery's Cahiers as about Joe Louis's left jab?
** Keep an eye out for Godine's Half-Life of an American Essayist book launch, date to be announced soon. **
Tuesday, May 1, 2007
Milton Hindus — Essays
Not having completed the whole book, I've read enough to say that Milton Hindus has a simple, agreeable and personal approach to essay writing. His essay on Charles Reznikoff is short, but obviously springs from a deep well of knowledge, and thankfully lacks the pretension that can often accompany championing an author such as Reznikoff as the underappreciated artist. I very much enjoy an essayist who does not feel the need to flaunt his knowledge, but can exhibit the sources of his opinion (and in this case the sources are great, like Allen Ginsberg).
As an unrelated note: Have you signed up for our E-mail Listserve?
As an unrelated note: Have you signed up for our E-mail Listserve?
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