Baseball Update (Cards, Rays in Playoffs!)

Albert Pujols, at potentially hisfinal game at Busch Stadiumin St. Louis, September 25, 2011(Ed Szczepanski/Getty)I'll keep this simple, but let me first note that although I'm not a superstitious person (yet grew up around quite a few such folks), I did fear that if I blogged at all about the amazing late-season comeback of the St. Louis Cardinals, who'd some St. Louis-area media and fans by early August had considered failures, I would somehow...

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Quote: Binyavanga Wainaina

"Throughout the book, adopt a sotto voice, in conspiracy with the reader, and a sad I-expected-so-much tone. Establish early on that your liberalism is impeccable, and mention near the beginning how much you love Africa, how you fell in love with the place and can’t live without her. Africa is the only continent you can love—take advantage of this. If you are a man, thrust yourself into her warm virgin forests. If you are a woman, treat Africa as...

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Raúl Zurita @ Northwestern

Earlier this evening, the university's Poetry and Poetics Colloquium and Workshop held its first event of the fall, a reading by Raúl Zurita, accompanied by one of his many fine translators, Anna Deeny.  A number of units within the university, as well as the Poetry Foundation, sponsored Zurita's visit, and for their generosity I offer deep thinks. I have previously written a little about Zurita's work on this blog, noting his former compatriot...

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Political Impressions (Saturday Silliness)

Some serious silliness for a Saturday.  Unfortunately for all of us, so much of the current rhetoric echoes what's being ridiculed and spoofed below (note how the recent GOP debates echo the UK conservative candidate impressions featured at the bottom of the page.) Plus ça change, plus ça reste, but nevertheless, enjoy!From SNL: The real Ronald Reagan (Phil Hartman) From SNL: George H W Bush (Dana Carvey) debating Michael Dukakis (Jon Lovitz), with Diane Sawyer (Jan Hooks) moderating From Dana Carvey show: H. Ross Perot (Dana Carvey)...

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Classes Underway + End-of-Summer Poems: Basho & John Ashbery

September is nearly over, the quarter charges forward, my classes have begun.  This fall I am teaching two fiction classes, one undergraduate, the other a graduate workshop. The undergraduate course, "The Theory and Practice of Fiction," is a required course for all the fiction majors and minors, and runs into the winter quarter's midpoint, or early February, making it one of the rare semester-long classes in the university's undergraduate curriculum. ...

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Troy Davis, 1968-2011

"May God have mercy on your souls." -- Troy Davis's final wordsI am opposed to the death penalty in all circumstances. I do not believe any state or State should be in the business of executing anyone, for any reason. As more than enough investigations over the last three decades, including ones pursued at the university's Innocence Project, have shown, innocent people not only have been locked up for years, but have been put to death for a variety...

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DADT Finally DOA + OccupyWall Street Protests

Don't Ask, Don't Tell, the failed "compromise" policy restricting the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender service people to serve openly, which President Bill Clinton signed into law in 1993 after the Republican-controlled Congress passed it, is now officially no longer on the books.  As of today, LGBTQ people, who have been members of the US military since its establishment, can now serve without fear of prosecution simply because...

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2011 MacArthur Fellows Announced

Historian Tiya MilesTonight the John T. and Catherine D. MacArthur Foundation announced its 2011 MacArthur Fellows, popularly known as recipients of "Genius" grants. Congratulations to all of them! As always, the new fellows comprise a mixed group of artists, scientists, activists, and people doing work that doesn't easily fall in any categories.  I am familiar with the work of several: Roland Fryer, a 43-year-old professor of economics at Harvard...

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Abramovic Video Game + Gamers Solve Difficult Chemistry Puzzle

In the spring of 2010, while I was teaching that wonderful Conceptual Art/Writing class, one of my most favorite of all the courses I've taught over the last 15 or so years, I had the good fortune to be in New York and go to the Museum of Modern Art to see Marina Abramovic perform "The Artist Is Present" live, and subsequently blogged about it. I even stood in line to participate in the face-off, but after waiting for a long while I bagged and instead...

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Quote: Isabel Wilkerson

"At one point in the research process, I was reading a book a day — books on citrus production or southern geology or obscure court cases in Florida. I took to paying close attention to the footnotes and actually enjoyed reading them. I was reading the footnotes of the annotated version of Richard Wright’s autobiography, Black Boy, when I saw a passage that had been in the original published version of the book but omitted in the text of the...

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Via the Wayback Machine

c. 1997When I first started blogging in 2005 I had no idea who my blog visitors were outside of very rough statistics or posts in my comment section.  I still don't know exactly, apart from commenters or people who tell me in person, but it's quite easy now to view the weekly, monthly or yearly stats and get an idea. To give an example, this week my top 5 most visited posts have been 2007 Rugby World Cup (always high on the list since it first...

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"The Lanier Effect" + Authors Sue HathiTrust Over Digitization

J's Theater is not turning into the Jaron Lanier blog, but I came across the text and video link below (I've posted a screen grab but I cannot embed it) of a conversation--a monologue, really--he engages in with Douglas Rushkoff at Edge, the online tech site.  Entitled "The Local-Global Flip, or the 'Lanier Effect'," Lanier touches upon and goes far beyond some of the issues I previously mentioned in my review of his last book, as well as in...

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Photos: Life Burning In Every Moment, Part 2

_____ was here (building site, John St. at the Fulton St. station, lower Manhattan)World Trade Center Freedom Tower, nearing completionWorld Trade Center building site, with the 9/11 Memorial Museum visible on the rightWashington Square Mews, at nightWashington Square Arch, now renovated, at nightWashington Square Arch, by dayWashington Square North, where Henry James passed his youth, Edward Hopper painted for years, Catherine Sloper refused her...

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Photos: Life Burning In Every Moment, Part 1

Desperate landlordBang Bang (décollage with right-wing scribblings, East Village)Shuttered Mars Bar (sic transit Gloria Mundi)Mural tribute to the now-closed Mars BarWatchful eye, East VillageEast Village street scenePhoto shoot, outside the Cooper Union"There but for the grace of God....": West Village "Street poet," near NYUKumquats, on the High LineLafayette Street[Z]ÜRCHER STUDIO doorsPeering inside Zürcher StudioBMW Guggenheim Lab, empty...

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