Aug 29
Wake up your saints.
I don’t like the recent evacuation of Combat Words. The only problem I ever had with it being hosted here was the way the guy was posting it in every category. Had he knocked that off and simply posted the thing in the category named for it, everything would have been fine as far as I was concerned. But I saw no reason for him to just pick up and go like that.
Aug 27
Publishing, random 11 Comments
Yesterday I got an email from a guy/poet who I have corresponded with for a year and a half. I’ve never met him in person or talked to him on the telephone but I considered him a friend. I like his poetry, but I do not love it, and have only read maybe 20 poems that I have seen on the internet, because that is all that is available. What I enjoyed about our friendship was the chatting and talking about the small press and life in general.
In the email my friend told me that My Favorite Bullet was on a hiatus, and had returned his submission. I already knew this because my submission had been returned too. My friend was pissed off about it, but this isn’t the point of my story. The point is that my friend was also angry at me for not pushing his poetry onto the editor of My Favorite Bullet earlier. I told my friend that I had indeed mentioned his name to the editor and told him I thought he was a good poet, and was not sure what else I was supposed to do. My friend never answered this and then went on to tell me I’m a piece of shit and a dick and my poetry sucks and has always sucked and I am not a poet no matter who had told me I was. We argued all day over email. I woke up this morning still angry about it, but also saddened.
That My Favorite Bullet is on hiatus makes the whole idea of publishing there a moot point, but still, it makes me wonder about the nature of these literary friendships. The purpose of this post is to ask you: Has this ever happened to you? Have you ever pulled this trick on someone else?
Aug 20
Art, Combat Words, Craft, Literature, TWAK, evolution, guns, humor, memes, philosophy, poetry, politics, promotion, random, richard dawkins, science, web, writing combatwords 27 Comments
CombatWords! August 20, 2010: Evolution
This cycle of cells is vicious, isn’t it? Predator and prey all germinated from the same batch(es) of cells and filled every exploitable niche on this planet: an endless cycle of growth and consumption. Parasites, symbiotes; eater and eaten all draw energy from the sun and its legacy. When I think of the chain of life, I sometimes think I am a skin cell that has forgotten it is part of a bigger organism. Of course, most of the time, I just think my cluster of cells is precious and the rest have little to do with me. Evolution can be metaphorical as well; I find it hilarious for example when I hear about technology ‘evolving.’ Do creationist engineers hide in secret covens and call their manifold works the products of intelligent design? Do they grit their teeth when their colleagues discuss the ‘evolution of the business process’? There’s more than one angle to this one.
Combat Expiration: Sunday, August 22, 2010; 12am PST
Critique Expiration: Sunday, August 22, 2010; 6pm PST
Bonuses: Flat bonus of +1 for compositions posted before Friday, August 20, 2010 9pm PST. +2 for compositions posted before Friday, August 20, 2010 6pm PST.
Rules: http://combatwords.blogspot.com/2010/07/official-rules-for-combatwords-updated.html
ps: Okay, this is posting >1min early. Those who got here early have some extra initiative.
Aug 15
Art, Combat Words, Craft, Literature, Publishing, books, humor, memes, poetry, promotion, random, web, writing 8 Comments
CombatWords! August 15, 2010: Lightning Round
You have one hour to weave the below keywords into a composition. I’ll be really impressed if you can find more than one theme to unify the keywords/concepts.
Keywords/Concepts: tropic, sound, insanity, strategy
Combat Expiration: August 15, 9PM PST
Critique Expiration: August 16, 6PM PST
Time Bonus: +1/5 minutes ahead of deadline, max +5
The Official Rules: http://combatwords.blogspot.com/2010/07/official-rules-for-combatwords-updated.html
Jul 22
Literature, TWAK, humor, random 6 Comments
If you had burned those papers per my instruction, I wouldn’t have to write this and those geriatrics wouldn’t be getting rich off my toilet paper. Really, twenty-first century? Toilet paper? What do you do with erroneous manuscripts, throw them in the trash?
Also, stop fucking using the term “kafkaesque.” All of you.
Look at me, I reference everything slightly esoteric as “kafkaesque,” I’m so literary-chic because I made a Kafka reference.
You aren’t.
God damn you, Max Brod.
Jul 19
Literature, random dennis cooper, inception, stuff 2 Comments
I have been very absent (not only from here, but from the internet in general). This has been due to personal and medical issues. I am back. Here are a couple of things.
Gavin Broom has something to say about Inception.
Dennis Cooper talks Mountain Goats.
Lit Uphas new stuff.
Jul 12
Literature, TWAK, Uncategorized, poetry, random 28 Comments
The only genuine excuse for anonymity, in my opinion, is fear for your life. The anonymouses that are sprouting up around here, what are they afraid of? I believe poetry and all writing should be grounded in real life, and if you are not even willing to put your own name up against your words, what kind of reality are you writing from? Fantasy, game playing, tidly winks. People like this stand against individuality, identity and personal style, though they would all claim not to, simply out of pc, and the truth is they don’t know who they are or what they are doing. They are anonymous to the world because they are anonymous to themselves. They say their words should be enough, but their words sound anonymous too, edgeless, academically objective and dull, adhering to too many rules, the kinds of words that could be written by pretty much anybody who was born without a spine or any will toward personal identity. And when your anonymous comments and poems are loved and lauded by other anonymous commentors and poets, well then, anonymity wins, lowest common denomitor wins, banality wins.
Jul 06
TWAK, poetry, random Hipsters, HTMLGiant, mather schneider, poetry, tao lin, TWAK 3 Comments
HTML GIANT
They got it figured
out yo
they got it all
figured out:
anything that doesn’t make
sense is profound, and nothing
juxtaposed
with more nothing
is suddenly something.
Jul 03
A core belief of mine is that literature will be produced both in the absence and abundance of money. It will be produced regardless and always. Now, I haven’t added the box to this site yet, but nonpress is trying to raise cash for the next book. At time of posting we have raised 11% of the goal. That’s not bad. I’d like to reach and exceed the goal if possible. Thanks for all your help.
Jun 29
Literature, philosophy, random philosophy, questions, time travel, writing 28 Comments
I watched this bad time travel movie (I forget the title). It did pose what turns out to be an interesting question. In the film the characters have come up with an idea and written it down. This idea will make them rich, famous and culturally significant. There are time travelers who kill culturally significant people just after they make their greatest creation (you know, so we wouldn’t have to put up with the last fifteen years of Billy Joel).
Anyway, our heroes are faced with a choice: they can destroy their creation (forgoing fame, fortune and a sort of immortality) and live or they can refuse and die at that moment, knowing that their work will live on for centuries.
As writers how would we deal with that. What if you just wrote THE novel. The thing that would live on for generations after you, but the only way to avoid immediate death was to destroy it? What would you do?
