Encyclopedia Out + Jean Wyllys, Brazilian Congressman + Revolt Hits Egypt

A while back I mentioned that the journal Encyclopedia's second volume, F-K, would soon be out, and it is now on bookstands and available for order ($25).  I've flipped through a copy of this newest volume and am delighted to say that like the first one, it is a beautifully designed and produced journal, but it's also an inventive, intellectually provocative anthology and a substantial (and hefty, in terms of size and weight) book. I'm also...

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On David Kato

David Kato (Photo: Frontline, CAHR)Gukira has one of the best (as always), most thoughtful and considerate memorial posts I've read on David Kato (Kisule), the Ugandan teacher and LGBT rights activist, who had served as advocacy officer for Sexual Minorities Uganda (SMUG). Kato was brutally beaten to death in his home on Wednesday, January 26, 2011. As the New York Times reports, Kato was one of a number of people Rolling Stone, a notorious Ugandan...

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Nabokov's Butterfly Hypothesis + Poem: Nabokov

In the introduction to his brilliant study of MFA programs and their effects on American literature, The Program Era: Postwar Fiction and the Rise of Creative Writing (Harvard, 2010), UCLA professor Mark McGurl relates the anecdote of how, when Vladimir Nabokov (1899-1977) was proposed as a potential professor in Harvard's English department, the eminent scholar and linguist Roman Jakobson (1896-1982) responded negatively, stating, "I do respect...

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Sabin Howard's Pop-Up Gallery

Wandering around Chelsea a few weekends back when I was home for an event, I passed by one of the empty storefronts (300 W. 22nd Street) I often passed during the summer and early fall, and noticed that a new pop-up exhibit had been installed, a series of bronzes and plaster sculptures by artist Sabin Howard. The show was entitled "Apollo."I wasn't too fond of the work, which I found well-crafted but not especially original, but the atmosophere of...

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Adam Pendleton's Band @ the Kitchen

Over the winter break I dropped by The Kitchen to check out artist Adam Pendleton's solo exhibit BAND.  I've followed Pendleton's work for awhile, and have regretted having missed several earlier shows of his in Chicago, all word art pieces at the Rhona Hoffman Gallery--2007's "Rendered in Black and Rendered," 2005's "Gorilla, My Love," and 2004's "It's about memory"--so I beat a path to Chelsea to catch this one before it closed on December...

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Kanye West's Art Film

It's his video for "Runaway," but actually contains a condensed medley of many of his songs on his recent album, My Dark Twisted Fantasy, and I think it's one of the best music videos I've seen in decades; so good, in fact, that it approaches the status of art. If you aren't among the 8 million or so people who've seen it yet imagine a cross between Liquid Sky and The Man Who Fell To Earth but with a female phoenix, ballerinas, and an African last...

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Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Day

Last week Defense Department General Counsel Jeh Johnson claimed that were the late Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (at left, Riverfront Times) still alive, Rev. Dr. King would have supported the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Without hesitation a wide array of people across the internet decried this evidently nonsensical assertion, and cited many examples, from throughout his life and career, of his anti-war and anti-violence stances. But why...

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Google's Poetry Translation Software

The more my workload increases, the more I find myself dreaming of books, writing, reading, blogging, immersing myself in works of imaginative writing. But there simply is not enough time. Such is the irony of my life these days, but one result is the scarcity of posts here. I don't want to quit blogging, but sometimes I fear it's too difficult to keep it up. Ah well--it's a new year, so I'll keep trying.***Desparapluies, one of my brilliant former...

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(E-)Revolution in Tunisia

Holly Pickett/NY TimesSo the Tunisian people have driven out their corrupt, authoritarian president, Zine el Abidine Ben Ali, in office since 1987. Mohamed Ghannouchi, the prime minister, has stepped into the breach on his ouster, to form a coalition government and work with the former Speaker of the Parliament, Fouad Mebazaa (below, at left), who has now temporarily assumed the presidency according to the Tunisian Constitution. Mebazaa has promised...

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RIP Ellen Stewart, Founder & Steward of LaMaMa

One of the truisms of this world is that someone somewhere is always leaving us. Years ago I realized that if I were to note the death of everyone I considered significant or admired, I could fill this blog up with nothing but such accounts--and I love reading obituaries, especially the fuller and more fulsome British versions--but that struck me as macabre and time-consuming, so, as regular J's Theater readers know, when I have time to blog I will...

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My "Subway Stores" in German Zine Show

Last year about this time, on a whim, I submitted a zine I'd offered for free on this blog (there was only one taker, eheu, who never sent me an address) to a zine exhibit open call at D21 Kunstraum in Leipzig, Germany.  The self-assembled, limited-edition zine, "Subway Stories," featured some of my iPhone drawings, with minimal text, though the images created something of an associative narrative.  I never heard anything back from the...

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Snow (Again) + The Attempted Assassination of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords

Snow, snow, everywhere snow. Or at least it feels like I'm trailing or it's trailing me here in Chicago. It wasn't snowing in Los Angeles, which I just returned from a few days ago, but it was chilly, though I can't complain because a little chill in the air is better than sliding across icy roadways as snow pour down from an infinite white sky. That was my experience this morning on the way to my first class. But I got there, and am now hoping that...

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New Year Links

I have been intending to blog more this year than I did last year, but the first week of the new year has coincided with the first week of classes (my first two, the introductory fiction writing course and the course on writing and publishing for senior writing majors, were on Tuesday), and now I am off to the Modern Language Association's annual convention in Los Angeles, so I haven't had any time to focus on any of the topics I've wanted to. Instead,...

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Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!Feliz año nuevoFeliz Ano NovoBonne annéeBuon Anno e tanti auguriKull 'aam wa-antum bikhayrAliheli'sdi Itse UdetiyvasadisvNa MwakaMweru wi GikenoFeliĉan novan jaron聖誕快樂 新年快樂 [圣诞快乐 新年快乐]Bliain úr faoi shéan is faoi mise duitNava Varsh Ki Haardik Shubh KaamnaayenEin gesundes neues JahrMwaka MwenaPudhu Varusha VaazhthukkalAfe nhyia paUfaaveri aa aharehEr sala we pîroz beسال نوС наступающим Новым Годомšťastný nový rokManigong Bagong...

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