Alex Kudera's Blog, page 118
July 26, 2014
Sonnets, Riggs, and Roll
Don Riggs is dynamic on video here for his book party for Bilateral Asymmetry, his first bound collection of sonnets. They are selected from his morning's work, the sonnet he writes daily before he does anything else. When you have a spare thirty minutes, watch until the end to see Dr. Riggs perform his signature closing poem, "Dialogue of the Hands." I happily received my inscribed copy of the book earlier this week.
July 21, 2014
Comic Duffleman
Inspired by the Joseph A. Domino book review posted at the end of this exclusive interview with Cyrus Duffleman, H.E. Whitney, in The Disposable Adjunct, included some of Joe's text and rendered this graphic interpretation:
Post by Disposable Adjunct.
Post by Disposable Adjunct.
July 20, 2014
July 17, 2014
Buk on work
Charles Bukowski Rails Against 9-to-5 Jobs in a Brutally Honest Letter (1986) | Open Culture http://t.co/h2AVwmCnYC
— Eric Gilliland (@E_Patrick909) July 17, 2014
I remember once, working as a packer in this lighting fixture company, one of the packers suddenly said: “I’ll never be free!” One of the bosses was walking by (his name was Morrie) and he let out this delicious cackle of a laugh, enjoying the fact that this fellow was trapped for life. So, the luck I finally had in getting out of those places, no matter how long it took, has given me a kind of joy, the jolly joy of the miracle. I now write from an old mind and an old body, long beyond the time when most men would ever think of continuing such a thing, but since I started so late I owe it to myself to continue, and when the words begin to falter and I must be helped up stairways and I can no longer tell a bluebird from a paperclip, I still feel that something in me is going to remember (no matter how far I’m gone) how I’ve come through the murder and the mess and the moil, to at least a generous way to die. To not to have entirely wasted one’s life seems to be a worthy accomplishment, if only for myself. yr boy, Hank
from Buk on work
Charles Bukowski Rails Against 9-to-5 Jobs in a Brutally Honest Letter (1986) | Open Culture http://t.co/h2AVwmCnYC
— Eric Gilliland (@E_Patrick909) July 17, 2014
I remember once, working as a packer in this lighting fixture company, one of the packers suddenly said: “I’ll never be free!” One of the bosses was walking by (his name was Morrie) and he let out this delicious cackle of a laugh, enjoying the fact that this fellow was trapped for life. So, the luck I finally had in getting out of those places, no matter how long it took, has given me a kind of joy, the jolly joy of the miracle. I now write from an old mind and an old body, long beyond the time when most men would ever think of continuing such a thing, but since I started so late I owe it to myself to continue, and when the words begin to falter and I must be helped up stairways and I can no longer tell a bluebird from a paperclip, I still feel that something in me is going to remember (no matter how far I’m gone) how I’ve come through the murder and the mess and the moil, to at least a generous way to die. To not to have entirely wasted one’s life seems to be a worthy accomplishment, if only for myself. yr boy, Hank
July 15, 2014
new review of Fight for Your Long Day
Fight for Your Long Day review from the prolific and talented Lavinia Ludlow: http://t.co/3x4kuQO5q4
— Alex Kudera (@kudera) July 15, 2014
Follow these links for complete lists of reviews, interviews, comics, videos, and more.
Please consider supporting small press by purchasing alt.punk or Fight for Your Long Day direct from the publisher.
June 30, 2014
Getting into the Grove at the Paris Review
“Had we just gone ahead and published Burroughs it would have been a mess because we already had so many lawsuits.” http://t.co/DWHrWYADpG
— The Paris Review (@parisreview) June 28, 2014
MT "Alfred Kazin was another witness. Picked him up from the New School, where I’d taken a course with him." http://t.co/u8aI4D1xtj
— Alex Kudera (@kudera) June 29, 2014
Miller did not have the kind of reputation that Lawrence did. He was thought of as a sort of bum, an early Kerouac. http://t.co/u8aI4D1xtj
— Alex Kudera (@kudera) June 29, 2014
"I got to hate Quakers. Detest them. They were anti-Semitic at Swarthmore, and there were no blacks, not one." http://t.co/u8aI4D1xtj
— Alex Kudera (@kudera) June 29, 2014
"My father somehow made friends with them, but I couldn’t. To them, I was a Jew. My Irish Catholic half didn’t count. . .[T]hey were snobs."
— Alex Kudera (@kudera) June 29, 2014
June 20, 2014
from A Moveable Feast
“The only thing that could spoil a day was people and if you could keep from making engagements, each day had no limits. People were always the limiters of happiness except for the very few that were as good as spring itself.”“The one who is doing his work and getting satisfaction from it is not the one the poverty is hard on.”― Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast
(Both quotations are from Chapter 5, "A False Spring"; I'm rereading the book as edited in The Restored Edition.)
(Both quotations are from Chapter 5, "A False Spring"; I'm rereading the book as edited in The Restored Edition.)
June 5, 2014
college affordability and creative writing
"The college affordability dream is dead for these students" notes that the median debtor now owes $29,400 and includes this section relevant to the teaching of creative writing:Lucy Parks, 18, enrolled at New York University in 2012 armed with a $60,000 college fund — the fruit of decades worth of her parents’ diligent saving — and a $30,000 annual scholarship from the school itself.NYU is one of the most expensive universities in the country, running more than $60,000 a year for a full-time student, including room and board. After applying her scholarship money, she still had to pay $30,000 a year for tuition, room and board. For Parks, who wanted to take advantage of the school’s unique creative writing program, NYU was her first and only choice.“I didn’t want to sacrifice my dream simply because I may not have enough money,” she says. To make ends meet, Parks worked three part-time jobs and eventually moved into an apartment in Bushwick, Brooklyn with two friends to save money on housing."“There were some unpleasant periods when I wasn’t working and I would run out of money and I wouldn’t eat,” she says. “Another issue is that when you have to work 20-plus hours a week, your schoolwork takes a major hit. So does your social life."When her college funds dried up in sophomore year, she went to the school’s financial aid office for help. She left with $2,000 in grants and advice to take out more loans. Rather than take on more debt, Parks, who has a 3.75 GPA, decided to drop out. It was a decision she didn't make lightly, and she says she may enroll at a more affordable college sometime in the future. In September, she’ll move with a friend to Atlanta and try to find part-time work until something more permanent comes along.“That kind of debt severely limits the amount of things I could do with my life,” she says. “I want to continue educating myself, but I don’t want to pay $60,000 a year for it.”When I was 18, more than anything I wanted to read Western classics, and I didn't listen to my father's advice about choosing a more vocational track. Even as I drifted into adjunct teaching, greatly enjoying teaching and the fact that I could continue to pay back my student loans and support myself in modest fashion as an educator and not have to return to car sales after taking a meagerly paid vacation from harder work in a two-year MA with a 9K stipend, I didn't listen again when he told me if I wanted to get anywhere teaching college I would have to get a PhD (he had one semester of a PhD program under his belt although for years I thought he was ABD and even proudly used that expression as a teenager). I still support myself in a modest fashion although sometimes I get a chuckle thinking about what some of my students would think of the primary residence I rent or the 12-year-old vehicle I drive (which could easily be a 20-year-old car had that one not unfortunately been rear-ended last summer).Anyway, lives take all kinds of twists and turns, so it's hard to say what will happen to Lucy Parks, but I hope her involvement with N.Y.U. (well regarded as Manhattan's leader in unbridled capitalism both home and abroad) does not prove catastrophic to her life's finances or long-term plans. It sounds like this particular young writer made the smart move of leaving, and I only wish she had recognized before she enrolled that there are quality people teaching creative writing at almost every state school in the country (typically, you can get in-state tuition after a full year of state residence) as well as private universities offering better financial aid. Affordable college should be a national priority.If any young writers reading this would like advice on writing, submitting, publishing, or trying to survive in a world where it often appears as if the game is rigged against them, find me online and drop me a line. I'll answer for free.
