The Book Pile

It grows and grows.
I was making headway until another late night visit to the library...

First the thrill. I picked up Alana Wilcox's book A Grammar of Endings (attracted by the title) read the first sentence, then the first page, then the glance became a marathon. This is a stunningly written book, her language is simply thrilling. After reading and reading so much sort of average stuff, when one reads a terrific writer one feels new running shoes are on the feet, there's no limit to the distance and freedom they offer.

Now perhaps we head down into the mire of the everyday. I finished Invisible Writer, a biography of Joyce Carol Oates -- my original viewpoint remains: prolific but is she great? I basically hate her short stories, having tried three books worth. But then I picked up a couple novels by her and read a bit and liked what I read, so the jury is still out. I will read her in conjunction with Philip Roth. I'm also half way through Local Color by Truman Capote. It ain't no breakfast at Tiffanys. Maybe breakfast at a wholesaler on 47th Street?

And now downward again.

I finshed Haunted by Chuck Palahniuk. What a piece of crap. Crap. CRAP. It's not the idea, that's great. It's not the pseudo-riske quality, I like that when it transcends cliche. No it's the terrible characters, the predictability, the horrifically sophomoric writing. This is the pulp junk of Grisham and King, of Dan Brown, of any of that gigantic army of writers who don't give a shit about putting words together, whose only goal is to offend and shock to tease and stroke. The joke though, is it's not the fact someone sticks rod of candle wax down his wee wee that shocks but Palahniuk's appalling lack of ability to hear the sound of words and sentences that shocks the most. People Magazine reads better than this junk. Now that is a terribly haunting thought.

Burgess, Clockwork Orange et al.

Anthony Burgess, Have you read him? Probably, you like most of us, have seen A Clockwork Orange, but the story of Burgess is quite fascinating. He was a linguist, taught grammar, was misdiagnosed by a doctor as having a brain tumor and given a year to live. He began writing close to age 40 and continued for the next forty years. He was known to say he wrote for money and never turned down a job that paid.

In addition to two books on James Joyce, he wrote many fiction novels, and for clockwork orange delved into the slang of Britian and the US, Jacobean prose and Gypsy talk. His other works such as The Malayan Trilogy are quite astounding. He was known to write 2,000 words of clean copy a day. An interesting interview with the writer is found here:

In other news: the book pile grows, and grows. New inductees to the tower are James Meek's The People's Act of Love and Cock and Bull by Will Self -- pretty amazing I have not read that one at this late date. As for Meek, there's a great short story by him in Children of Albion Rovers, from 2001 -- great bit of sophisticated humor. Now with TPAOL he is working hard to be the next Tolstoy -- and as hard as he works, some of the scenes are actually very nice.

Recent NEWS

Garbage Head has now made the shortlists for three awards.

The most recent was the Canadian Library Association Young Adult Canadian Book Book Award shortlist !!


In the visual art world, I just created a wall piece for a show titled "Heavy" in Calgary, at the Hi Fi Club. It's a fluourescent rectangle and centered in it is text that says:

It's all ha ha ha

until it's boo hoo hoo

Nice looking group show with lots of interesting works -- get down there!

Writing Class

Writing class is over. Throughout this semester students worked with determination -- and I appreciate their efforts. It was a process of learning to write and one of learning to let go.

Summer reading, for those who like books on the process: A great little book I came across at Powells in Portland, Oregon (I need to do a reading there, hint hint) is From Where You Dream: The Process of Writing Fiction, Janet Burroway's transcriptions of lectures by Robert Olen Butler.

The main thesis of the book is that writers must write from an inner core, a zone, a place were emotion rules and the thinking analytical brain shuts off. Good advice that I won't knock. Yet it is not the entire story. You learn to write by writing, by feeding off the inner emotion that drives work, but at some point really considering the craft. Think back to any critiques you've ever had (I'm thinking art and writing) and a significant part of that class dealt with sloppy craftsmanship. Rarely did everyone agree the craft was perfect and be willing to move along to something more. Still, read this one. It's fun, it's quick, it's important.