SOUNDTRACK: COLIN MELOY-Colin Meloy Sings Live! (2008).
Colin Meloy is the lead singer and songwriter for the Decemberists. This is a recording of Meloy’s solo acoustic tour from 2006. The recording is from several venues on the tour, although it is mixed as if it were one concert.
Meloy is a great frontman, and this translates perfectly into the solo atmosphere. He is completely at ease, telling stories, bantering with the crowd, and generally having a very good time.
The set list includes some popular Decemberists songs as well as a track from Meloy’s first band Tarkio (whom I have never heard, but figure I’ll get their CD someday). Meloy also adds a couple of covers, as well as snippets of songs added to his own (Pink Floyd’s “Fearless” gets a couple of bars, as well as a verse from The Smiths’ “Ask.”)
This disc is not going to win anyone over to the Decemberists, as Meloy’s distinctive voice is a love it or hate it deal. However, if you’re on the fence about them, hearing these songs solo can only convince you of what great songs they are. The Decemberists add a lot of arrangements to their songs. You get a lot of interesting and unusual instruments. Which I like a great deal. But to hear that these songs sound great with just an acoustic guitar is testament to Meloy’s songwriting.
The intimacy of the venues also really lets these songs shine.
[READ: May 29, 2009] McSweeney’s #4
This is the first time that McSweeney’s showed that it might be something a little different. #4 came, not as paperback book, but as a box full of 14 small, stapled booklets. Each book (save two, and more on those later) contains a complete story or non-fiction piece.
There is something strangely liberating about reading the stories in this format. It gives me a sense of accomplishment to finish a book and put it down, so having 14 makes it seem like I’ve accomplished a lot.
This was also the first issue that I’m certain I didn’t read when it originally came out, for whatever reason. So, it’s all new to me.
DIGRESSION: When I was looking up publications for my Wikipedia page about McSweeney’s publications, I kept encountering records for these individual booklets. This was rather confusing as I couldn’t find any other records or ISBNs for these booklets. Rest assured they are all collected here.
SUBSCRIBER AGREEMENT
This one page item (complete with a graph on the front which contains many sections that say only the word “Forget” is a lengthy contract that one must agree to in order to subscribe. Some terms include: I agree that $36 is not all too much to pay for a subscription to McSweeney’s. In fact, I agree that I am being given a deal. A deal I scarcely deserve, considering my many faults and sins.”
The booklets include:
NOTES AND BACKGROUND AND CLARIFYING CHARTS AND SOME COMPLAINING
This booklet contains all of the usual copyright information. It also offers their new motto: “We Do Not Want What You Cannot Give Us.” The price of subscriptions has increased from $20 to $28 to $30 and now $36 (that’s an increase in each issue). There are new addresses for correspondence. And new submission guidelines. (You’re more likely to get published if you want it online). There’s several charts/drawings in this publication (which they attribute to the fact that they didn’t have to think of covers themselves… more on that in a moment). A lengthy list of subject matters encouraged for submitting includes: land whales, and anything at all about people named Lucy, Isabelle, Paulina, Geoffrey or Will. Style changes are noted, especially concerning em dashes, and that Wednesday will now be called “Hump Day.”
We then get into the “meat” of this issue. It is not a theme issue, because those are never good; but rather, they had a policy for this issue regarding covers. Each author (except Murakami who could not be reached in time) was asked to submit his or her own cover for her booklet [If you click on the covers they will go to a Flickr page…note that all covers are copyright McSweeneys and/or the authors.] There follows a lengthy explanation as to why this was done and what a good idea it is for the artist/writer.
Then there is a lengthy Bill of Rights for the author and book enjoyer at least insofar as the book jacket is concerned. This list includes: “5) The influence over jacket-creation process, between the designer, illustrator or photographer (whichever applicable), the editor, and the author, with the input of the above players working out roughly to: 10%,10%,10% an 70%. And there is no room for the input of what is known as, in parlance, as ‘the sales force.'”
It also includes: “25) The cover should choose personality over style” and
“27) For a happy author makes a good books (sic).”
And I agree with this Bill of Rights.
The last bit includes conditions in Iceland as of printing and the cause of the delay (finding the correct thickness of cardboard for the box).
RACHEL COHEN-“A Chance Meeting”
This is the last in a series of analyses of historical meetings by Cohen (this is the first published by McSweeney’s). Cohen cites a piece by Katherine Anne Porter who expresses regret that she never met Willa Cather, even though they were somewhat contemporary and living in the same city at the time (Cather was established while Porter was a new writer). Cohen looks into the lives of Cather and Porter and how they differed. A very interesting piece. I’m curious about the other pieces in the series, too.
PAUL COLLINS-“Symmes Hole: A Man from Ohio, and the Distinct Possibility of a World Within This World”
Paul Collins returns to the world of unheralded geniuses/lunatics with this fascinating look at John Cleves Symmes. Symmes was a decorated military veteran from the early 1800s. After his service, rather than settling into a veteran’s lifestyle, he became convinced that the earth was hollow. But beyond hollow, he believed that there were entrances to this hollow earth at each of the Poles (the poles had not been “reached” yet and were impassable due to ice). Not only all of that, but inside the earth were a series of concentric rings. And, best of all, inside the earth, on the rings, was an Edenic paradise of beautiful weather and all manner of heavenly splendor.
Symmes went on lecture tours where he was soundly mocked. However, over the course of his life, he was able to garner a few prominent believers including Edgar Allen Poe and Jules Verne (Journey to the Center of the Earth was inspired by Symmes). Despite his being discredited by science, his hometown of Hamilton Ohio has erected a monument to the man. Fascinating!
LYDIA DAVIS-“A Mown Lawn”
A piece of Flash fiction, I suppose. This is a paragraph-long piece that plays on the words and letter combinations of “a mown lawn.” I’m not sure it works as a logical piece, but it is fun with pronunciation and letters.
SHEILA HETI-“The Middle Tales”
I reviewed Heti’s book of the same title a little while ago. I didn’t enjoy it all that much. This is a collection of five short pieces, three of which are in the book of The Middle Tales and two which are not. The three stories from the book are probably the three best from that book. And the two others included here are also pretty good. These stories are not as negative overall, although they take a rather twisted look at things. Heti is not my favorite author, but these stories are some of her best.
JONATHAN LETHEM-“K is for Fake”
This story is listed as a “cover version” of The Trial by Franz Kafka. I have not read that book, so I can’t comment on it.
This short story is, I have to use the word, Kafkaesque. Lethem includes quotes from various sources that impact the story. The first one is a discussion about forged paintings of waifs with large eyes. Margaret Keane sued her husband Walter Keane because he took credit for her paintings. At the trial, she painted a waif in front of the court to prove they were hers. Walter declined to paint because of a sore shoulder.
In Lethem’s story, the surreal nature starts from the beginning when K, an artist, gets a phone call explaining that he is to be put on trial. No other information is given. As he heads to the gallery, a big eyed waif takes him to the back room of the gallery where he meets the person from the phone call (who turns out to be Orson Welles). At the gallery, K is asked to sign paintings of a deceased artist so that they will sell for more (if they have his name on it). When the trial finally comes, he is accused of forgery. It is very hard to summarize this story because there are so many facets. In fact, I fear I may be giving away too much as it is. Yet the story is so surreal, that that is the joy of reading it. Don’t let my disjointed summary keep you from reading this cool piece.
BEN MILLER-“Dar(e)apy”
Dar(e)py is a type of therapy in which you push yourself to do something about half as extreme as your evil impulses want you to. So, rather than say running with a knife in your mouth, you run with a straw. Or, rather than setting yourself on fire with gasoline, try cooking oil. This therapeutic technique is used….
Wait, this is fiction. That summary is accurate for the story, by the way. The narrator’s sister has created this sort of therapy designed around a feeling of catharsis. In the story, the narrator’s sister has doused herself with canola oil and is holding a match. She is sitting across the street from the narrator’s catering job. The story tackles the narrators defense of her sister as she performs this therapy as well as her own dealings with her coworkers. The conclusion of the book shows a perfect example of dar(e)apy in action.
This story has something that I haven’t seen in a story for a while (and maybe it’s being ten years old has something to do with it): a totally postmodern attitude. From the parenthetical title to the stream of consciousness/beatniky prose employed, to the made up lingo, it was an almost nostalgic use of something that was pretty out-there at the time.
DENIS JOHNSON-“Hellhound on My Trail”
At 76 pages, this is the longest piece in this collection. It is a Play in Three Acts. Each act consists of a dialogue between two characters. Two of the six are related, all of whom are talking about the same events.
The play concerns events of Marigold Cassandra and her brother regarding those who are monitoring the cleanliness of a jam factory. An event is mentioned in which a traumatic experience has happened. I can’t decide if, through the course of the play all of the details are revealed and I just missed them, or if the information is vague enough to show a degree of trouble without giving explicit details. The First Act, “An Exploration of the Colorado River” has Marigold Cassandra being interrogated by Mrs May. Ms Cassandra has been accused of explicit sexual behavior to a coworker, and of accusing her supervisor of being a homosexual menace. In The second Act “Head Rolling and Rolling” Kate Wendell and Jack Toast discuss the situation, specifically Ms Cassandra. (Wendell is the homosexual maniac of Act I). In Act III, “Hellhound on My Trail” Mark “Cass” Cassandra (Marigold’s brother) gets in a heated discussion with Mr Salazar who may or may not be an FBI agent. He also may or may not be the head of a splinter group from the Jehovah’s Witnesses trying to retrieve the drugs that Cass discovered in his hotel room. Cass thinks he has been on a bender for several days, but Salazar claims otherwise. The three pieces are quite gripping, and yet it was tough going trying to wring all of the details out of the people. I’m sure seeing it performed would be more rewarding.
PAUL MALISZEWSKI-“Paperback Nabokov”
This non-fiction article starts with the observation that Nabokov was very critical of the covers of his books, especially the paperbacks. In Nabokov’s saved letters he had criticized the covers of his books throughout his life. Nabokov eventually asked that his son provide covers for the books.The piece then details what typically went into the painting of a paperback book cover: usually the artist submitted a design based on the ideas of the publisher, and then had a week to provide the finished product. Typically, the artist did not read the book.
The centerfold includes 44 examples of the covers that Nabokov’s books have had. It details which he liked, which he hated and which he had input into.
Perhaps the most interesting part of the article is the inclusion of the full letters that Nabokov wrote to his publishers concerning his covers. If you are a Nabokov fan, which I am, these offer a cool insight into the meticulous nature of the man.
In the “Notes” booklet they claim that this article had nothing to do with the idea of letting all of the authors use their own cover ideas.
RICK MOODY-“The Double Zero”
This story is listed as a “cover version” of “The Egg” by Sherwood Anderson. I have not read that story so I can’t comment on it, but I see that it is available here, so I will endeavor to read it shortly.
This short story is told in the vernacular, as they say. It is set in The Buckeye State, where the narrator grew up. His father, after a series of letdowns in life, marries a woman who is, shall we say, disappointed in him. She convinces him to take part in a variety of money-making schemes: selling yew trees or Angora rabbits. They finally settle on ostriches. The description of the ostriches themselves, as well as the narrator’s derision for them is quite hilarious. When this scheme inevitably fails, the family leaves town and opens a diner in a nearby town. In addition to home-cooked meals, they display the freaks from their ostrich farm (two headed babies and the like) and they proudly display their leftover eggs, which are the size of footballs. When the narrator’s dad’s short temper combines with a snack food that he finds indigestible, chaos and hilarity ensue. Despite the comic story parts, there is an overwhelming sadness to the story. Very good stuff.
HARUKI MURAKAMI-“Dabchick”
Before reading this I was sure that “dabchick” was some kind of Jewish word. Imagine my surprise to find that it isn’t. I have enjoyed Murakami before. In fact, I’m going to be reading The Wind Up Bird Chronicle very soon. This story is another in his surreal exercises. The narrator is arriving for his first day at a new job. The directions are wrong; he is wandering through an endless corridor (that is viscerally described) until he finally arrives at the door. And this is where “dabchick” comes in. The epilogue is about as surreal as the rest of the story. Weird but cool.
GEORGE SAUNDERS-“Four Institutional Monologues”
Of the four monologues, the final one: “(93990)” appears in In Persuasion Nation and concerns monkeys receiving lethal doses of a drug which causes renal failure. They monitor all of the monkeys who quickly die except one who thrives. It keeps getting higher and higher dosages but seems to be unaffected. The piece is written in complete science-ese making the detachment even more horrible than the actions described.
The funniest one is “A Friendly Reminder” which is indeed just that, a reminder that the people who work in the Knuckles department of the abattoir don’t like all the negativity or nicknames from the other departments.
The second one “Design Proposal” is a headache-inducing proposal for an architecture design which in intended, as far as I can tell, to make people angry.
And the first piece, “Exhortation” is a plea from the CEO of Judson Associates to buck up and work harder. As the story progresses you realize that their work is rather unsavory. Although it is never explicitly stated what they do, there seems to be some mental anguish felt by the workers.
The greatness of all of these documents is the perfection of the formal, detached, mechanical style. Except for “Friendly Reminder” which is written in an uneducated and vulgar style, perfectly mirroring the employees of the workplace.
LAWRENCE WESCHLER-“Threadworkers of the Seventeenth Century: Two Further Convergences”
Two more convergences from Weschler. Both of these are available in his book, Everything That Rises. The first is an interesting comparison of Valasquez’ painting “The Spinners” and the myth it is based upon (The Fable of Arachne). In this myth, Arachne weaves beautiful tapestries. The tapestries are so beautiful she boasts that she is better than the goddess Minerva (Athena in the Greek version). Valasquez paints a scene from this fable, but the focus of the story is actually the women in the foreground who are spinning the thread that Arachne uses to make the tapestries. By inverting the emphasis of the story he showcases laborers to the patrons of the art who are typically anything but.
The second piece compares Vermeer’s “Lacemaker” with a poem by Wislawa Szymborska (called “Maybe All This”), which sheds new light on the painting.
Although neither of these Convergences works like his previous ones, they are both welcome art analysis.
VARIOUS-“Shorter Stories”
This booklet contains the letters column, as well as some short pieces.
THE LETTERS:
CHRISTOPHER P. RILEY-ZALENIEV
Writes four letters seeking assistance from McSweeney’s readers for four upcoming books about: a biography of Charles W. Burbaggery; the working conditions “on the floor” in U.S. potato-chip factories 1960-present; the Great Big Book of Human Regrets; and a memoir of his own formative years.
SARAH VOWELL-“Nationalism Roundup”
Vowell submits four episodes of Nationalism in action. 1) Uncomfortableness at a Midwestern University after a discussion of Bosnia 2) The word “Absolutely” has negative connotations (see Napoleon). 3) A tour of Washington Irving’s house reveals the phrase “enslaved Africans” which is a euphemism for “slaves” and does a disservice to the horrible conditions that slaves underwent. As if “enslaved” was an adjective not what they were. [I’m not sure I agree with this]. 4) a woman walked out in front of a speeding ambulance (!); Sarah hopes she gets hit by another ambulance someday.
SEAN WILSEY-“Do You Know What Seaweed Is?”
An amusing tale about a man’s Aunt. His Aunt is in her 70s, recently remarried, and something of a dangerous driver (she seems to crash a Cadillac once every 5 years, often blaming the other person). But the crux of the story is that even though she is not at all senile, she treats the narrator as if he were eight-years old. Including asking him the titular question and seeming disappointed when he says yes.
ARTHUR BRADFORD
A story from the author about working in the Texas School for the Blind. He was in charge of Jarvis, a blind and deaf boy who was hard to work with. One day Jarvis hurt himself though the author’s negligence. He was reassigned to other boys.
THE STORIES:
JOHN WARNER-“On the Set”
This is a surreal look at working with a difficult film director. Somehow hyenas enter into the picture. I was rather lost by this one.
DAN POPE-“In the Cherry Tree”
This is a fast-paced, weird little story about kids in a cherry tree. They have nicknames for each other as well as the boy who wants to join them in their tree. The nicknames keep changing as they will do with little boys, so it’s rather confusing. However, the initiation of sticking a bicycle pump up your butt until you have a fart explosion was pretty darn funny.
RALPH WORSEY-“Bad Luck”
A series of things that are bad luck, most of which are nonsense.
GABE HUDSON-“The Size of My Heart”
His heart is dead, and is the size of a raisin.
MARCY DERMANSKY-“Cow Juice”
A fight between a girl and her sister, Theresa. Theresa is a vegetarian and is disgusted that the narrator is dating a boy who has introduced her to the joys of eating cows. The titular cow juice is used as an aphrodisiac, but it’s not quite as disgusting as it sounds.
AMY FUSSELMAN-“Journal”
An encounter with a overly friendly dry cleaner and his journal.
JOSHUAH BEARMAN-“In a Little Valley in West Jerusalem”
This looks at the machinery that is being used to “read” parts of the Dead Sea Scrolls which are so damaged they can not be read by the human eye. The first section is brief narrative about the success of the spectroscopy. The second part is an interview by the author with his dad who does the spectroscopy of the Scrolls. His dad is impatient with the silly questions he asks. A very funny interview. I have no idea if any of this is true.
J. ROBERT LENNON-“Idea”
A stream of consciousness page about a young woman who has a great idea for a millennial piece of art: a 40 x 50 grid of cubes representing each year of the century. She has this idea while she is listening to her friend complain about her mom. The friend realizes she was daydreaming. Good flash fiction.
Two Stories About Dee Dee Myers
These two stories are weird and mildly amusing. But they seem to point to larger issues. Dee Dee Myers was press secretary for President Clinton.
STEVE FEATHERSTONE-“Dee Dee Myers Has No Comment”
Dee Dee Myers feels hounded by her life as press secretary. She rails out at a man shouting in the streets under her window
DAVID PACHECO-“Dee Dee Myers in the Morning”
Dee Dee Myers has retired from being press secretary and is simply wandering the streets healing people.
JASON EATON-Three Picture Deal
This was easily my favorite piece in this booklet. The conceit of it is that a studio is calling an artist to offer him a three picture deal. But rather than it being about films, it is about painted art. To hear art talked about in terms of mass marketing and reaching a wider demographic is very funny. If you like art, and I do, this is a winner.
NICHOLAS LAUGHLIN-“Various Dangers”
Examples of the dangers inherent in: Intercontinental Travel; The Parcel Post; Linguistic Inadequacy; Reading Poetry; Nominal Egoism. Each is a paragraph of fairly unusual concerns.
We end with Notes on Contributors (the order is not clear).
And finally, the back page has: The Sister Herschel Series. The fourth installment of the Meg McGillicuddy series of books. Sister Herschel fights crime, saves souls and keeps kosher. (Sorry, Sister Herschel Confesses All! is Out of Stock).
Although the content of this issue isn’t that different from the other three: a few non-fiction, a few stories, letters, and general nonsense, the packaging of this issue really opened up the journal to a lot of possibilities. And, indeed, I feel that the writing has improved. The stories all seem tighter and more focused.
UPDATE: I found a story which I missed, thanks to The Art of McSweeney’s. Read about Ben Greenman’s story here.
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