ABJECTIVE turned one year old over the weekend officially with Stump by David Peak. I as a human being want to personally thank everyone who submitted over the last year. As an editor it was humbling to be able to have so much to choose from. Maybe peruse the archives. They are already in love with you and ready to be loved. Love.
Let's do some more.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Monday, November 9, 2009
Etc.
Music in my car right now: Rachmaninov(ff) 2nd concerto. Not sure who's version actually, it's an old cd I made of it.
I had never heard of Steve Reich until last night and saw some yt videos. His phases are some of the most music of being like what I like music, want music, to be, but will I grow?
Dzanc Best of the Web 2010 noms from Abjective:
The Sky as John Saw It the Night Kate Sparkled by Molly Gaudry
Carolina, Open Invitation by Patrick Whitfill
The Heliotrope by John Myers
Good luck to them!
I have been teaching myself some basic music theory and piano. I know a little a piano. I took lessons when I was five or something. I have been addicted to reading sheet music lately. Here is a good resource for free downloadable sheet music that is in the public domain. I have been spending more time at this site than anywhere else on the internet lately.
Mel Bosworth is reading other people's words at youtube. He read a piece I wrote called Reflexive. Thanks Mel. I like this project a lot.
Lee Klein at eyeshot graciously nominated Mel for Dzanc's Best of the Web 2010. Thanks Lee!
More great stuff as usual at bright stupid confetti.
I started a youtube channel for abjective. it's here. I'm not sure why.
I had never heard of Steve Reich until last night and saw some yt videos. His phases are some of the most music of being like what I like music, want music, to be, but will I grow?
Dzanc Best of the Web 2010 noms from Abjective:
The Sky as John Saw It the Night Kate Sparkled by Molly Gaudry
Carolina, Open Invitation by Patrick Whitfill
The Heliotrope by John Myers
Good luck to them!
I have been teaching myself some basic music theory and piano. I know a little a piano. I took lessons when I was five or something. I have been addicted to reading sheet music lately. Here is a good resource for free downloadable sheet music that is in the public domain. I have been spending more time at this site than anywhere else on the internet lately.
Mel Bosworth is reading other people's words at youtube. He read a piece I wrote called Reflexive. Thanks Mel. I like this project a lot.
Lee Klein at eyeshot graciously nominated Mel for Dzanc's Best of the Web 2010. Thanks Lee!
More great stuff as usual at bright stupid confetti.
I started a youtube channel for abjective. it's here. I'm not sure why.
Friday, October 30, 2009
"The Failure Six" by Shane Jones
I read The Failure Six yesterday and today I am thinking about it a lot, which equals Success.
In some ways, I like TFS more than Light Boxes, and that's as far as I'll go to compare them. (Actually I compare them once more two paragraphs down)
TFS is six stories that kind of bleed into each other, elements reintroduce themselves in each of the six making sure a reader has got everything [square]ly in their head when considering the book as separate stories and as a whole.
More than the plot (which itself brings up things to think about forever but that I won't comment much on here), it's really the aesthetic and the way the story is told that allowed me to fall into it. These are the kind of books I want to read more of, that have the unlimited imagination of a children's book but with a momentum and surreality that never tries to explain itself. Unapologetic! Confidence! LB was the same, but TFS is doing this more concretely to me, or is more grounded in something. TFS is closer to fiction, where LB is closer to poetry.
Reading TFS as a writer is like a lesson in writing magic realism. I hate 'magic realism' as words, but for lack of a better term. What I mean by this is fiction that challenges a reader to suspend disbelief extraordinarily. TFS is acheiving this on a level that I strive for when I try to write. There is so much author-confidence here, a sense that the author really knows this all exists absolutely, because it's hard to believe a human being could actually imagine this.
Another thing that makes the book a relief to read is that it doesn't feel modern. I emailed Shane a bit about the book, and he used the term 'old-world' and I think that nails it. It is set in a time and place that feels very old, like 19th century old, and that historical feeling helps ground it all I think. The book feels bigger than a hundred pages. It feels like an entirely new world/atmosphere where different laws of physics apply, driven by all the little descriptions that are pure imagination. I have the same sensation of being twelve and reading Raold Dahl for the first time.
Part of me doesn't like writing this and reviews in general because they seem self-serving in a way, but this is one of my favorite books I've read this year, and i think more people should buy it and read it and talk about it. TFS is a perfect example of what I like the most about Shane Jones's writing.
buy it
In some ways, I like TFS more than Light Boxes, and that's as far as I'll go to compare them. (Actually I compare them once more two paragraphs down)
TFS is six stories that kind of bleed into each other, elements reintroduce themselves in each of the six making sure a reader has got everything [square]ly in their head when considering the book as separate stories and as a whole.
More than the plot (which itself brings up things to think about forever but that I won't comment much on here), it's really the aesthetic and the way the story is told that allowed me to fall into it. These are the kind of books I want to read more of, that have the unlimited imagination of a children's book but with a momentum and surreality that never tries to explain itself. Unapologetic! Confidence! LB was the same, but TFS is doing this more concretely to me, or is more grounded in something. TFS is closer to fiction, where LB is closer to poetry.
Reading TFS as a writer is like a lesson in writing magic realism. I hate 'magic realism' as words, but for lack of a better term. What I mean by this is fiction that challenges a reader to suspend disbelief extraordinarily. TFS is acheiving this on a level that I strive for when I try to write. There is so much author-confidence here, a sense that the author really knows this all exists absolutely, because it's hard to believe a human being could actually imagine this.
Another thing that makes the book a relief to read is that it doesn't feel modern. I emailed Shane a bit about the book, and he used the term 'old-world' and I think that nails it. It is set in a time and place that feels very old, like 19th century old, and that historical feeling helps ground it all I think. The book feels bigger than a hundred pages. It feels like an entirely new world/atmosphere where different laws of physics apply, driven by all the little descriptions that are pure imagination. I have the same sensation of being twelve and reading Raold Dahl for the first time.
Part of me doesn't like writing this and reviews in general because they seem self-serving in a way, but this is one of my favorite books I've read this year, and i think more people should buy it and read it and talk about it. TFS is a perfect example of what I like the most about Shane Jones's writing.
buy it
Sunday, October 25, 2009
50, 40
Excerpt from Fences by Ben Brooks at abjective this week. Also, this marks abjective's 50th piece.
A really great version of Shostakovich's Cello Sonata (D minor, Op. 40) played by Martha Argerich and Mischa Maisky...
A really great version of Shostakovich's Cello Sonata (D minor, Op. 40) played by Martha Argerich and Mischa Maisky...
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
post in me
I've posted more comments at htmlgiant today than I have for a long time and times. Why?
Big Other is a new thing John Madera made from digital air, it looks like a new and good other thing to me. I have been reading all the posts and saying to myself, ah, these are posts at a website called big other, it smells nice in here and I wonder if these contributors have any immune deficiencies because I'm watching these shows about immunity oh.
I think I am getting away from my beefs with things and chilling out a bit. Yesterday I thought, I should join fictionaut. I won't, but I mean, what's my problem with it, really. I don't know. Today I thought, I should submit something to kill author. My attitude for the last few months has been kind of retarded. Actually, it's not that I have an attitude, it's that I get into mindframes of being a computer dismissing human concerns.
Here is The Heliotrope by John Myers, a play in fie acts. Please consider it worth considering and then put your leg into it.
I'm about a hundred pages away from finishing William Gass's The Tunnel. I probably have a long post in me about this book and being exposed to Gass's writing so much this year. I have another post in me probably or not about where are all the long books in the world? I like reading books that are long for length's sake. I plan on reading Against the Day, JR, the Recognitions, 2666, Mason & Dixon. Are there any other long books to read out there that I haven't yet? I guess Vollman. I haven't read any Vollman. I'm kind of intimidated by him. Against the Day seems the most interesting to me because the biggest complaint I hear about it is it is too big and too complex and too many characters, and I'm interested in that upper limit of fiction. We all seem to be focused on the lower limit, like 6 words or something, how small can a fiction be and function, but is there an upper limit? What is the longest, most complex, most characterful a fiction can be successful in.
I received proofs for my pieces in the next Caketrain. Looks pretty nice. They are trying to do a December release. Saw a handful of other's who have work in it who are on the same contents page as my name is. I won't say who they are but it feels good that my text will be amongst their text.
Nov. Harpers has new stories by Diane Williams and Christine Schutt.
Athe ohl todl
Big Other is a new thing John Madera made from digital air, it looks like a new and good other thing to me. I have been reading all the posts and saying to myself, ah, these are posts at a website called big other, it smells nice in here and I wonder if these contributors have any immune deficiencies because I'm watching these shows about immunity oh.
I think I am getting away from my beefs with things and chilling out a bit. Yesterday I thought, I should join fictionaut. I won't, but I mean, what's my problem with it, really. I don't know. Today I thought, I should submit something to kill author. My attitude for the last few months has been kind of retarded. Actually, it's not that I have an attitude, it's that I get into mindframes of being a computer dismissing human concerns.
Here is The Heliotrope by John Myers, a play in fie acts. Please consider it worth considering and then put your leg into it.
I'm about a hundred pages away from finishing William Gass's The Tunnel. I probably have a long post in me about this book and being exposed to Gass's writing so much this year. I have another post in me probably or not about where are all the long books in the world? I like reading books that are long for length's sake. I plan on reading Against the Day, JR, the Recognitions, 2666, Mason & Dixon. Are there any other long books to read out there that I haven't yet? I guess Vollman. I haven't read any Vollman. I'm kind of intimidated by him. Against the Day seems the most interesting to me because the biggest complaint I hear about it is it is too big and too complex and too many characters, and I'm interested in that upper limit of fiction. We all seem to be focused on the lower limit, like 6 words or something, how small can a fiction be and function, but is there an upper limit? What is the longest, most complex, most characterful a fiction can be successful in.
I received proofs for my pieces in the next Caketrain. Looks pretty nice. They are trying to do a December release. Saw a handful of other's who have work in it who are on the same contents page as my name is. I won't say who they are but it feels good that my text will be amongst their text.
Nov. Harpers has new stories by Diane Williams and Christine Schutt.
Athe ohl todl
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
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Monday, October 5, 2009
Believe
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