On Yates’s “The Best of Everything” By DeWitt Henry, Contributing Editor I first read Richard Yates’s short story “The Best of Everything,” some fifty years ago. Yates was in his prime then as the promising author of Revolutionary Road, which he had just followed with the collection, Eleven Kinds of Loneliness, where this story appears.…
Tag: author
Book Review: Grabbing the Apple
An Anthology of New York Women Poets By Joyce Peseroff, Contributing Editor Edited byTerri Muuss and M.J. Tenerelli JB Stillwater Publishing The foreword to Terri Muuss and M.J. Tenerelli’s anthology of poems by New York women poets, Grabbing the Apple, could have been written forty years ago. “In response to the glaring lack of parity…
Site Review: The Poetry Conversation
Poet Sharon Bryan in the Cyber Arena By Emily Jaeger, Features Editor The first word that comes to mind when thinking of Sharon Bryan’s new website, The Poetry Conversation, is generosity. An award-winning author of four collections of poetry, Sharp Stars, Flying Blind, Objects of Affection, and Salt Air as well as a professor of…
Richard Gilbert: Word by Word
Writing’s Values—Intelligence, Sensitivity & Beauty—Challenge Me By Richard Gilbert, Contributing Editor “The ability to forgive oneself … is the key to making art, and very possibly the key to finding any semblance of happiness in life.”—Ann Patchett English departments inherently espouse reverence for thoughtfulness, sensitivity, and comely expression. I codified this recently for myself while…
From Novelist to Poet
On Logophilia and Process By Stephen Mead See his work in Vol IV. #7 Just as some have a natural proclivity for math or sports, I have had one for actual words since an early age. “Chrysalis” was a particular favorite, the name of an old Jethro Tull record – I remember the icon on the…
Literary Spotlight: Tess Barry
Emptied of All But Wildness See her work in Vol. IV #7 Running past an urban field emptied of all but wildness, I see a scattered patch of bricks, sprawling weeds grown brown and tall and in among them glimpse some purpled heads of summer clover. They bend and blow toward me. A single Queen…
Review: Dani Shapiro's Still Writing
Memoir: the Personal vs. the Universal By Contributing Editor Richard Gilbert “Demons haunt your pages because they already exist.”—Dani Shapiro “Do what you love. Know your own bone; gnaw at it, bury it, unearth it, and gnaw it still.”—Henry David Thoreau Neat sentiment, Henry David, and it seems apt for writer Dani Shapiro, who has…
Book Review: Versed by Rae Armantrout
Judging by the Blurb By Joyce Peseroff, Contributing Editor I’m writing for the first time about a book I haven’t finished yet. My friend Sharon Bryan recommended Rae Armantrout’s Versed, and I’m enjoying a precision as sharp and startling as the plunge of a needle in Armantrout’s spare, tight lines. Who expects “mass market” to follow…
Black Hand Rose Garden
Video by Rose Knapp Rose Knapp is a poet, novelist, electronic music producer, and multimedia artist. She has an experimental novel forthcoming and poetry publications in Chicago Literati, PDXX Collective, BlazeVOX, OccuPoetry, Danse Macabre, and others. She currently divides her time between Brooklyn and Minneapolis. Twitter Handle: @Rose_Siyaniye About the work: “This video/audio project combines several…
Site Review: Richard Gilbert's Draft No. 4
The Literary Memoir “Gilbert explores the enterprise of literary memoir in particular, and of good writing in general.” By DeWitt Henry, contributing editor Blogs can serve as anthologies-in-progress or on-line learning seminars, open studios, book drafts, self-dramatizations, lectures, guided conversations, and spiritual and intellectual explorations: Richard Gilbert’s Draft No. 4 Blog and its predecessor “Narrative”…
Richard Gilbert: My Dog Tale Published
Relearning the Essay What our crazy canine teaches me (again) At last I’ve documented our family dog’s epic weirdness—and, well, mine. My essay “Why I Hate My Dog” explains on Longreads. Bottom line and fair warning to the rescue-minded: every adult pound dog I’ve known or heard about has suffered from scorching separation anxiety. Belle’s is…
River Love—Ndaba Sibanda
Audio Poetry for your Listening Pleasure River Love Flow flow with fury With buckets and buckets Of love sweet love for my lover Fall fall for me fall for all time`s sake Rain on me fire none to put out Each time l slap my eyes on you slow I feel like pouring pouring my…