Jennifer Acker's Blog, page 12
February 4, 2025
Postscript
KOMAL DHRUV
While the credits roll, Raj and Simran take the train to Amritsar International Airport. No one flinches at his bloodied face–they’ve all seen stranger things on these commutes. The couple returns to London, buys a flat with their parents’ money, sets up house.
While the credits roll, Raj and Simran take the train to Amritsar International Airport. No one flinches at his bloodied face–they’ve all seen stranger things on these commutes. The couple returns to London, buys a flat with their parents’ money, sets up house.
January 31, 2025
Podcast: Julia Sanches on “The Advice”
JULIA SANCHES
Translator Julia Sanches speaks to managing editor Emily Everett about translating “The Advice,” a story by Irene Pujadas, which appears in The Common’s fall issue in a portfolio of writing by contemporary Catalan women.
Translator Julia Sanches speaks to managing editor Emily Everett about translating “The Advice,” a story by Irene Pujadas, which appears in The Common’s fall issue in a portfolio of writing by contemporary Catalan women.
January 30, 2025
January 2025 Poetry Feature #2: Rafael Alberti in Translation
RAFAEL ALBERTI
Who are you, tell us, who do not remember you / from earth or from heaven? // Your shadow—tell us—is from what space? / What light, say it, has reached / into our realm? // Where do you come from, tell us, / shadow without words, / that we don’t remember you?
Who are you, tell us, who do not remember you / from earth or from heaven? // Your shadow—tell us—is from what space? / What light, say it, has reached / into our realm? // Where do you come from, tell us, / shadow without words, / that we don’t remember you?
January 28, 2025
A Tyranny of Dreams: Review of Proper Imposters
SAM SPRATFORD
Like all good surrealism, Proper Imposters is perhaps more properly called hyperreal—a version of reality that is so dazzling, so over-exposed that you can’t look away, however much it dizzies you.
Like all good surrealism, Proper Imposters is perhaps more properly called hyperreal—a version of reality that is so dazzling, so over-exposed that you can’t look away, however much it dizzies you.
January 24, 2025
What We’re Reading: January 2025
AFTON MONTGOMERY
The poem is a car with rear-wheel drive and the engine pushing it forward from the back is the notion that people just want something to believe in, whether that thing is God or logic, hope or America or the lights of a UFO twitching in the sky.
The poem is a car with rear-wheel drive and the engine pushing it forward from the back is the notion that people just want something to believe in, whether that thing is God or logic, hope or America or the lights of a UFO twitching in the sky.
January 22, 2025
In fall, the persimmon trees light their lanterns
CHRISTY TENDING
And I plunge my foot into the scalding water, dropping my resistance to its intensity. I move toward it, inward. I move fast so that my body is unable to register the purposeful heat this place contains—something primordial, obscured by a white, industrial exterior.
And I plunge my foot into the scalding water, dropping my resistance to its intensity. I move toward it, inward. I move fast so that my body is unable to register the purposeful heat this place contains—something primordial, obscured by a white, industrial exterior.
January 16, 2025
January 2025 Poetry Feature #1: Brad Leithauser
BRAD LEITHAUSER
I’m twenty-seven, maybe too old to be / Upended by this, the manifold / Foreignness of it all, the fulfilling / Queer grandeur of it all, // But we each come into ourselves / As each can, in our own / Unmetered time (our own sweet way), / And for me this day’s more thrilling
I’m twenty-seven, maybe too old to be / Upended by this, the manifold / Foreignness of it all, the fulfilling / Queer grandeur of it all, // But we each come into ourselves / As each can, in our own / Unmetered time (our own sweet way), / And for me this day’s more thrilling
January 14, 2025
The Common to Receive $12,500 Award from the National Endowment for the Arts
The Common is pleased to announce its ninth award from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA). The award approved for 2025 will support The Common in publishing and promoting global writing, thereby broadening American audiences’ exposure to international voices, and in elevating the work of debut and emerging authors.
The Valkyrie
ELIZABETH BROGDEN
Hilda, for her part, had come with nothing but the pioneer heart bequeathed to her by generations of anabaptist ancestors. Here in this land of softened consonants and abbreviated vowels she knows how to place orders in restaurants, how to apologize when she bumps into someone ... how to answer the telephone and say, “my husband is still at work, please try again later.”
Hilda, for her part, had come with nothing but the pioneer heart bequeathed to her by generations of anabaptist ancestors. Here in this land of softened consonants and abbreviated vowels she knows how to place orders in restaurants, how to apologize when she bumps into someone ... how to answer the telephone and say, “my husband is still at work, please try again later.”
January 13, 2025
On Fighting Back: Jonas Rosenbrück interviews Khuê Phạm
KHUÊ PHẠM
In Germany, I'm part of a generation of writers who come from immigrant families and who, through their work, write about the many faces of Germany today. My book was the first German novel from the Vietnamese diaspora over here, and I was unsure how readers would take to it. I was surprised and touched when the book did very well.
In Germany, I'm part of a generation of writers who come from immigrant families and who, through their work, write about the many faces of Germany today. My book was the first German novel from the Vietnamese diaspora over here, and I was unsure how readers would take to it. I was surprised and touched when the book did very well.
