“We live in a time of image explosion, but without that network images are just content. There’s simply no possibility of a viral digital success—a ‘Call Me Maybe‘ of painting or photography—because a work only becomes successful upon its art world approbation.”
Like Etsy, But For Art
The Benefits of Reading
Infographic of the Week: The Benefits of Reading presented by the National Reading Campaign at Electric Literature. Carolyn Ross, a New Jersey high school teacher, discusses how to make reading more enjoyable for students.
“Jeux de mot-dièse”
The Commission Générale de Terminologie et de Néologisme – the division of the French government responsible for preserving the integrity of the Gallic language – ruled last week that enough is enough when it comes to “hashtag.” They feel the word is just too English for the banks of the Seine. They recommend instead using the decidedly softer “mot-dièse” (pro: 'Mo-Dee-YEZ'). Previously the group asked residents to replace “email” with “courriel.”
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Fail Music
Novels written by accomplished writers about failed artists are nothing new. What is new is seeing a once-successful novel about a failed artist -- one that’s been out-of-print for twenty years -- get a burst of renewed attention.
No Word on What He Thought of Richard Simmons
In a review of My 1980s & Other Essays, Adam Kirsch reveals that Wayne Koestenbaum once compared a verse from a Robert Lowell poem to Buns of Steel. (Yes, that Buns of Steel.)
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Appearing Elsewhere
I have a short story in the latest issue of Avery, a young literary magazine I've written about before. Avery 4 also includes fiction by Hannah Tinti, Kevin Canty, Rumaan Alam, Samar Fitzgerald, Sophie Rosenblum, Scott Garson, Callie Collins, James Iredell, Jessica Breheny, Sean Walsh, Anna Villegas, and Michael Bourdaghs. It's wonderful to have found my story such a sleek and beautiful home, filled with so much good company.Here's the opening of my tale, called "A Love to Calm the Body": My grandmother fell in love with her doctor. She liked the way he scrubbed his hands. He also washed his forearms, held them wet in front of his body before taking them to the towel. My grandmother had a weekly appointment; she'd been diagnosed with Hysteria - an excess of emotion, a deep feminine sadness. This was in 1899, when my grandmother was twenty-three, two years married. My mother was only an idea then, hovering at the edges. I wasn't anything at all.Want to read more? You can order the issue online here.
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Kesey Documentary
A new documentary on Ken Kesey and his band of Pranksters "presents the LSD-loving pioneers who spawned ’60s counterculture in their own words and images."
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