Tan Lin
7 Controlled Vocabularies and Obituary 2004. The Joy of Cooking: [AIRPORT NOVEL MUSICAL POEM PAINTING FILM PHOTO HALLUCINATION LANDSCAPE]
Wesleyan
2010
222 pages
Paperback
$22.95
There are a lot of occurrences of the word “should” in this book, which is somewhat odd, considering how disarrayed the contents purposefully appear. But it’s this match of randomness and a kind of argumentative placetaking (a position) (positionings) that push this book to the top of the list of my favorite books of the year. Lin’s central focus is of having literature be read as a painting, as a film, etc., as a short burst and then on to the next one, the next thing. He refers to this elsewhere as an ambient stylistics, as a kind of relaxation. Heavy sampling mixes in with prose works replete with biographical riffs, semiotic remarks on major corporations, many images (moist towelette wrapper, pill packaging, found photos, etc.), metadata, and always with serious feet in the contemporary art world. Adler wrote his famous How to Read a Book 70 years ago, Lin’s vision is a successful entry on how to do it today.
June 26, 2010
June 24, 2010
June 20, 2010
REDUCED TO CONDENSITY 10
It’s clear that Facebook is dead, but there is still no alternative.
A few years ago, 50 Cent and Kanye West got into a promotional campaign, full of seemingly staged jousting, etc., to raise interest simultaneously for their records. I thought of this when reading about Flarf and Conceptualist writers’ recent mock provocations toward each other, in Denver and thereafter. But I can’t figure out who is 50 and who is Kanye. At first it seemed obvious that Fitty=Conceptualists, but recently he’s lost all of that weight.
Louise Bourgeois, Leslie Scalapino, David Markson.
In my job, which I cannot discuss, or In-my-job-which-I-can’t-discuss, I frequently come upon sites wherein the beginning of the narrative is not clear. It’s like starting in the middle of a book and reading a sentence, knowing nothing of what came previously. One of these places is here: http://thongboard.aimoo.com/errno-2/forumid-28086/warmtips.html.
The antimawkishness was mawkish in its antimawkishness.
There used to be phonebooths with doors on them specifically so people didn’t need to hear about whether or not you remembered to get the enchiladas.
SELECT joketext FROM joke WHERE joketext LIKE "%chicken%";
I also do not like greeters at the beginning of stores. They don’t want to be there either. Which is also why I don’t want to see them. So I don’t have to see them half-smiling while saying scripted things in order to market the store’s “friendliness”.
“Do you want forced friendliness with your order?”
“I do not.”
“Thank you.”
It’s clear that Facebook is dead, but there is still no alternative.
A few years ago, 50 Cent and Kanye West got into a promotional campaign, full of seemingly staged jousting, etc., to raise interest simultaneously for their records. I thought of this when reading about Flarf and Conceptualist writers’ recent mock provocations toward each other, in Denver and thereafter. But I can’t figure out who is 50 and who is Kanye. At first it seemed obvious that Fitty=Conceptualists, but recently he’s lost all of that weight.
Louise Bourgeois, Leslie Scalapino, David Markson.
In my job, which I cannot discuss, or In-my-job-which-I-can’t-discuss, I frequently come upon sites wherein the beginning of the narrative is not clear. It’s like starting in the middle of a book and reading a sentence, knowing nothing of what came previously. One of these places is here: http://thongboard.aimoo.com/errno-2/forumid-28086/warmtips.html.
The antimawkishness was mawkish in its antimawkishness.
There used to be phonebooths with doors on them specifically so people didn’t need to hear about whether or not you remembered to get the enchiladas.
SELECT joketext FROM joke WHERE joketext LIKE "%chicken%";
I also do not like greeters at the beginning of stores. They don’t want to be there either. Which is also why I don’t want to see them. So I don’t have to see them half-smiling while saying scripted things in order to market the store’s “friendliness”.
“Do you want forced friendliness with your order?”
“I do not.”
“Thank you.”
June 17, 2010
Castro, E. (2006). HTML, XHTML, and CSS, Sixth Edition (Visual Quickstart Guide). Berkeley, CA: Peachpit Press.
Lin, T. (2010). 7 Controlled Vocabularies and Obituary 2004. The Joy of Cooking: [AIRPORT NOVEL MUSICAL POEM PAINTING FILM PHOTO HALLUCINATION LANDSCAPE] (Wesleyan Poetry). Middleton, Connecticut: Wesleyan.
Place, V. (2008). La Medusa. Tuscaloosa: Fiction Collective 2.
Walser, R. (2010). The Microscripts. New York: New Directions.
Yank, K. (2009). Build Your Own Database Driven Web Site Using PHP & MySQL, 4th Edition. Stockholm: Sitepoint.
Lin, T. (2010). 7 Controlled Vocabularies and Obituary 2004. The Joy of Cooking: [AIRPORT NOVEL MUSICAL POEM PAINTING FILM PHOTO HALLUCINATION LANDSCAPE] (Wesleyan Poetry). Middleton, Connecticut: Wesleyan.
Place, V. (2008). La Medusa. Tuscaloosa: Fiction Collective 2.
Walser, R. (2010). The Microscripts. New York: New Directions.
Yank, K. (2009). Build Your Own Database Driven Web Site Using PHP & MySQL, 4th Edition. Stockholm: Sitepoint.
June 4, 2010
Aaron Kunin
The Sore Throat & Other Poems
Fence Books
2010
125 pages
Paperback
$16
I once noted in a review of Kunin’s first book, Folding Ruler Star, a child-like quality, and this holds true with this new book, involving a purposively reduced vocabulary. Conversational, disarmed, humorous, repetitive like a fugue, with a charming quality one wonders about. Is it faux naïve or the real deal? The book really plays with the risk of a kind of cleverness, which can be tiring and unsatisfying in other books, but here it somehow works. He is one of the finer line-breakers going, and the looseness within wins one over, most often by the shyly wondering, in-turning queries and comments, such as “Maybe / I’m from heaven?” and “I guess I’m with you. / But I don’t know where / I am.
The Sore Throat & Other Poems
Fence Books
2010
125 pages
Paperback
$16
I once noted in a review of Kunin’s first book, Folding Ruler Star, a child-like quality, and this holds true with this new book, involving a purposively reduced vocabulary. Conversational, disarmed, humorous, repetitive like a fugue, with a charming quality one wonders about. Is it faux naïve or the real deal? The book really plays with the risk of a kind of cleverness, which can be tiring and unsatisfying in other books, but here it somehow works. He is one of the finer line-breakers going, and the looseness within wins one over, most often by the shyly wondering, in-turning queries and comments, such as “Maybe / I’m from heaven?” and “I guess I’m with you. / But I don’t know where / I am.
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