Stacey Levine is one of the 12 writers and musicians Hugo House has commissioned to create new writing—and songs—at the 2010-2011 Hugo Literary Series. Get your tickets today! Series passes and single tickets can be purchased online here, or by calling us at (206) 322-7030. Read more about the upcoming season here.
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For those of you that haven't heard, on July 30 of this year Kevin Morrissey, managing editor of the Virginia Quarterly Review, took his own life. Some blame was attributed to his boss, editor Ted Genoways, and the media took it from there. In today's Rumpus, Steve Almond brings some levity to the event, the nature of the publishing industry as well as the nature of us who are a part of it. It's worth reading: check it out here. |
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Docent [doh-suhnt ] –noun: 1. German: privatdocent. 2. A college or university lecturer. 3. A person who is a knowledgeable guide, esp. one who conducts visitors through a museum and delivers a commentary on the exhibitions. Ben kept a Word document listing every influential and encouraging person—first friends, dead family members, docents and tutors—he had met since kindergarten, which he would include in the back of his first novel. All definitions are courtesy of Dictionary.com. Word of the Day appears on weekdays and features words taken from books that Hugo House staff and volunteers are currently reading. This week’s series is brought to you by web site and blog intern, Abby Hagler, who has selected words from the pages of "Magic for Beginners" by Kelly Link. |
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Yesterday, we began the "Buy Tickets! Get a Book!" promotion where we give away a free book from a past Hugo Literary Series author with the purchase of passes for the upcoming Literary Series or tickets to the first event, Under the Influence. Due to the overwhelming popularity of the promotion, we've had to cross a couple of books off the list and add a few others. The updated list of books to choose from is below with new books in bold: "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian" by Sherman Alexie The "Buy Tickets! Get a Book!" promotion is running through the end of the day on Friday. If you'd like something good to read and want to see a mixed-bag of risky writers and musicians tackle themes and writing prompts with a full head of steam (I mean this metaphorically, of course!), please call us at (206) 322-7030 to purchase your passes or tickets today, or just pop by Hugo House during our normal business hours. We're open until 9 this evening for Alex Wrekk's Zines on Toast tour. And, if you're one of those people with an infinite library and you own all of the books on the list above, you can buy your passes or tickets online here. The steam is still included, promise. |
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No conflicted feelings for the literary journal, Hobart, however. Only love for their fine print and web literary journal, growing collection of minibooks, and—of course—the hilarious likes and dislikes. Many thanks for Aaron Burch, editor, for taking the time to answer a few questions for us. RM: Tell us how Hobart got started. AB: I started Hobart in my year or so after undergrad, when I'd moved from Seattle to California. It started mostly just as a "fun" web site, something I thought I could do with my college buddies wherein we could entertain ourselves with funny/goofy humor pieces, and maybe a couple people would randomly stumble onto it and enjoy it, and it would maybe be a way of staying connected to all the friends I had just moved away from. I was also working at a bank and generally kind of bored, and had just discovered things like McSweeney's. It turned out most of said buddies were too busy doing their own shit and, over time, I found the thing I was most interested in was short fiction. The one remnant of those days is the online (dis)likes. Over time it grew into a print journal and then we also started publishing books. Here and there I enrolled friends to help out, and it grew from something I basically did out of my bedroom to something with multiple arms that a handful of people did out of their respective bedrooms and/or extra corners in their apartments (Jensen Beach and Andrea Kneeland currently run the web site, and Elizabeth Ellen is the mastermind behind the minibooks). RM: Where to you see the American short story headed in the next decade? Are their any writers out their you might consider "ahead of their time?" AB: Not to sound too flip, but I really don't spend much, if any, time thinking about the future of short stories. Maybe this will be to the detriment of Hobart, but I'm really most interested in what I think is good and fun and interesting and entertaining right now, which is ideally ignoring any current "trends" or the like, while also not worrying too much about predictions. I don't want to overgeneralize, or overpraise myself via Hobart, but I honestly believe every single Ho' contributor is part of the collective writing group that is pushing writing ahead, helping take writing wherever it is going/headed/etc.
AB: Our two most recent minibook authors are Mary Miller and Adam Novy. Mary writes maybe the baddest ass stories around right now—in fact, I suck at this type of thing, but here's something Elizabeth wrote for promo for the book, which I think hits the nail pretty hard and square: "Mary Miller's writing is unapologetically honest and efficient and the gut-wrenching directness of her prose is reminiscent of Mary Gaitskill and Courtney Eldridge, if Gaitskill's and Eldridge's stories were set in the south and reeked of spilt beer and cigarette smoke." And Novy's book is maybe the most ambitious thing we've published yet—this weird, amazing, crazy, apocalyptic (?) novel where a city is cursed by a plague of birds, and it's like part Biblical allegory, part romance, part suspense, part violent destruction. RM: Some literary journals seem to be idea driven, others seem to be emotion driven. I realize that dichotomy isn't quite fair, but where would you see Hobart on that spectrum, or do you have something entirely different that drives you? AB: Hm. I'm tempted to say the former (idea-driven), but if those ideas aren't dealt with in a way that causes a strong emotion in me as a reader, it's pointless, of course. Dan Wickett (arguably Hobart fan #1) asked a similar question and, as part of his question, kind of answered it himself: "Are you looking more at the writing and how the author pulls off what they're trying to do, than at the story and plot/characters? As a reader, I see Hobart as a great mixing of the two—the writing is always great, but it seems that as an editor you're also looking for something kind of badass to happen within the great writing, or to find a great character to latch onto." I think he seemed to nail it. I like when, describing a story to someone, I'm able to sum it up in a sentence or two in a way that makes it sound kind of badass. "This one's about a fishing trip and a dude gets mauled by a bear." "A post-apocalyptic love story where the male has lost the ability to speak and expresses himself only in grunts." "A dude wants to hunt the biggest deer he's ever seen, and then guts it in front of everyone in town, to prove his love to his ex." Of course, these simple summaries are never what the story is really "about" but they pull you in, no? If not... I don't know. Go read Glimmer Train or Ploughshares, maybe. RM: Do you have any advice for us submitters? AB: Nothing that every editor doesn't say: read the journal. Submit your best work. Submit stories you believe in. Submit a story you 1) really, really love yourself, and 2) would be excited to see in the pages of Hobart, as opposed to just whatever you have that's done. The biggest thing we look for is really just a story that excites us as readers. Keep writing, keep reading. I don't know. All those cliches. They're all true. All of them. Every single cliche you've ever heard is 100% true. Ha. Hobart is currently accepting submissions of short fiction. For submission info, visit hobartpulp.com. |
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Warren [wawr-uhn, wor-] –noun: 1. A place where rabbits breed or abound. 2. A building or area containing many tenants in limited or crowded quarters. Before heading back to the grim block of warrens where she resided with her family, Elsie liked to walk through the sunny markets and sparkling street cafes on her way home from work. All definitions are courtesy of Dictionary.com. Word of the Day appears on weekdays and features words taken from books that Hugo House staff and volunteers are currently reading. This week’s series is brought to you by web site and blog intern, Abby Hagler, who has selected words from the pages of "Magic for Beginners" by Kelly Link. |
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This week only, Hugo House is running a special promotion—if you buy Hugo Literary Series passes or tickets to Under the Influence between today and Friday, you will receive a book of your choice from the list below:* "The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian" by Sherman Alexie You can only receive this special offer if you purchase passes or tickets by phone at (206) 322-7030, or in-person during our normal business hours (12-6 p.m. Monday through Friday unless we have an evening event). When you call, just mention the offer and let us know which book you’d like. This offer is not available for online purchases, though if you’d like to purchase tickets online, you may do so here. Happy reading!
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Those planting pumpkins now, in hope of a harvest for their front doors, in order to properly greet young’uns dressed as vampires and werewolves, must pay homage August 30 to Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, who was born in London in 1797. Her brilliant novel “Frankenstein,” is considered by many to be the first science fiction book ever, breathing life into a genre that has landed Forks, WA a seat in Halloween infamy, while also managing to be an oh-so-much finer piece of literature than its distant genre relatives, the "Twilight" series. Also in London, just a day shy of four years before the birth of Shelley—September 1, 1773—“Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral,” was published. The author, Phillis Wheatley, was born in West Africa and brought to London as a slave before being bought by a family in Boston, where she was taught to read and write. The first African-American to publish a book of poetry, Wheatley traveled in support of her publication all around London, meeting big-wigs and toasting her good fortune, even gaining the admiration of a pre-presidential George Washington. It ended tragically, though, for Wheatley. Her husband fell into debt and abandoned her while she was still pregnant, and she died in childbirth at the age of 31. Finally, on September 3-5 (as well as the 6-13), 1752, nothing at all was published in England, as the Gregorian calendar was adopted, and those days disappeared. Eleven days total were “erased” from existence by the move, causing riots, and the call to arms “Give us our 11 days back,” as it was assumed that the government had, in fact, stolen those eleven days from its citizens, and perhaps would use them for nefarious purposes. The constituents soon got over the matter and went on with their lives—too soon, I think. Never again shall we let that sort of thing happen. Never. |
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One thing you can do without using your legs, however, is read. In future years, I will remember these past few months as Dystopic Summer. It began in June when I read Justin Cronin’s “The Passage.” Now there is a world where if you can’t run, you’re dead! 769 pages of post-apocalyptic zombie-vampire creatures terrorizing the remnants of humanity later, I decided I should move onto something a little lighter—in physical weight if nothing else. So I picked up a cheery little YA novel called “The Hunger Games.” No zombie vampires here—just a hideous post-apocalyptic world where most of North America is mired in poverty and ruled by a fascist regime that controls its populace through terror, starvation and a yearly lottery that sends children into an arena to slaughter one another as a reminder of the power of the state. My co-worker, Rebecca Brinson, has written about this book so I won’t say much about it except to say that a girl with a bum knee wouldn’t survive a New York minute in that world, either. Now “The Hunger Games” is just the first of a three-book series, but though I had the second one right there on the nightstand beside me, I decided to take a break from the grim future and turned, instead, to Tom Rachman’s “The Imperfectionists”—a book described by the New York Times book review as a “comic first novel.” Okay, maybe it’s just me. Maybe having spent the preceding weeks immersed in death and terror and struggles to survive (that seem pretty pointless given the environment you get to survive in) did something to my sense of humor, but I pretty much wept through every chapter of Rachman’s book. This is not to suggest it’s not a good book—it’s a very good book. I’m not even saying that it doesn’t have its comedic moments—but these are definitely more along the lines of Bergman’s “The Seventh Seal” than the Marx Brothers’ “Duck Soup.” It turns out the Human Comedy ain’t all that funny. After days spent absorbed in the Ur ontological dilemma playing out in the newsroom of a failing newspaper—the inevitable decline of love, of career, of youth and family and even of the industry itself explored in “The Imperfectionists,”—it was almost a relief to turn to book two of the "Hunger Games" trilogy, “Catching Fire.” Because frankly, whereas there is absolutely no doubt that I am facing my own inevitable declines, there’s also no chance I will ever (a) be 17 again or (b) find myself in a televised fight-to-the-death with other 17-year-olds for the entertainment of a totalitarian regime. It could be worse, I tell myself as I wrap an ice pack around my knee and settle in to read another chapter. At least I’m not being chased through the woods by a high school kid with a trident. I find this thought comforting. Next up: maybe a little Cormac McCarthy...?
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Anyone who has donned a plastic apron and gloves and spent time in the back room of an establishment that serves food has a love/hate relationship with the name Hobart. You love the steam that washes into your face when it's done and you've lifted up the panels of the dishwasher. You hate how the forks always get stuck in the bottom, and you have to swim your hand around the murky water to find them. You love that you can fit the enormous mixing bowl inside. You hate the fact that you have to get into awkward yoga positions to try and find a way to make the panels fully close on it.
RM: Tell us a little bit about Hobart's current lineup of writers.
All in all, this has been a pretty crummy summer. The weather, of course—we all know about the weather. But on top of that, I suffered a knee injury over Memorial Day weekend that pretty much derailed any physical activities that require more than one good leg for the entire season. I can’t run, I can’t walk, I can’t bike, I can’t even swim. And since these are things I generally do every single day of my life—well, let’s just say my mood has been about as sunny as the month of July this year.Hugo Blog
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