June 28th, 2008

Internet Abundance

There’s been much action on the interweb while I was away–yall just wait for me leave, don’t you? Or, actually, some of this stuff has been up a while, I’m just slow. But now I am alerting you! If you, you know, care about any of this.

–The last ever installment of rob mclennan’s “12 or 20 Questions” series–with rob himself. So interesting. I was shocked at the lack of enthusiasm for pears! Also involving mr. mclennan, witness via YouTube the intense run-up to the Throw-down in O-Town last night, vs. Nathaniel G. Moore. It’s too bad they couldn’t have had one here (or I couldn’t have posted about this earlier for the Ottawa reader(s) out there) but the videos are pretty amusing.
–In further bookishness, the always insightful Kerry Clare, writes movingly about the books we read again, on Descant Blog. I can’t quite nail down the metaphor here–if the past is a foreign country, books are open tickets…? Oh, she says it much better–go read.
–Toronto poet Dani Couture has started a photo blog called Animal Effigy in order to document the ways the urban environment is haunted by images–effigies–of the animals we have shut out. The pictures are often funny and sometimes sad, and you can contribute if you have a similar eye for this sort of thing.

Enjoy!

Your soul impedes on mine
RR

June 26th, 2008

Joy

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post about short stories, which *may* have had a “persecuted” air to it. Which was in reaction to things I’d read and heard, but that was also somewhat selective listening. Obviously, short stories have many defenders and protectors–thanks to all who wrote to me to say so! I felt much better, and more inclined to look on the bright side.

And there is much brightness, including the speech Lynn Coady made at Luminato, pointing out the artistic experimentation permitted in short stories (I wish I could reproduce it, but of course I can’t. This is why everything in the universe should be written down.) And then there is Emily Schultz’s new pro-story website, Joyland. Commmitted to keeping the living art of short story, and international, and cool, Joyland’s first story is actually one of Coady’s (and it is alive, and cool, and very funny and weird). One of mine, “Black-and-White Man”, will actually run there in September–I feel priviledged to be a part of the party.

Other joyful news from the land of writing, though not particularly story-focused:
–novelist, book-reviewer, cat-lover, friend-of-mine Lauren Kirshner writes as beautifully and warmly on her new blog as we all knew she would.
–writing, reader, friend to all things bookish Julie Wilson is bringing her crazy-cool literary voyeurism to the youths with Seen Writing, a workshop for teens with poetry readings, on-the-spot writing exercises, and reader models that (cough) you might know. This event is part of the The Scream Literary Festival, which has too many great events to name.

Obviously, the fate of literature, in its myriad forms, is in little danger. Not that we shouldn’t all be vigilant and all…

He could not know another tiger
RR

June 25th, 2008

Back

Oh, that was really great. Everyone should take vacations. Who knew?

What can I tell you–I read, I wrote, I walked around, I slept until *eight in the morning* and then ate a breakfast I hadn’t cooked, went for runs on semi-familiar streets, walked on actually probably unfamiliar streets. Talked about the evolution of language and the unknowability of the human race with old friends, ate at Quebecois chain restaurants (I don’t know if they are better or just different than ours; sometimes the two are synonymous for me). I read even more. I got tonnes of work done (you would too if the above were your only responsibilities).

Still, I was running out of clean clothes and all my imported friends were returning to their real lives, so I did too. And now the weather is perfect and I’m going to the ballgame.

What can I tell you?

You’ll be coming down
RR

June 16th, 2008

Help Helps

I am a big fan of the focus group, the consensus, and the communal project. Of course in the public sphere, but also at work, at school, and when picking out clothes–wherever people I respect are willing to offer an opinion, I’m usually willing to work with it, or at least consider it before putting that halter top back on the rack. I like to play life as a team sport; it seems to reduce the margin for error when you have lots of brains on the project, instead of just the one, which can get sort of caught up in itself (well, mine can) either with chutzpah or insecurity. The alleged focus of this blog being what it is, here I’m talking about the role of other people’s opinions in my writing. (but really, if you have a free afternoon, I’d be happy to let you pick out all my clothes).

Team playing doesn’t seem obviously to apply to writing, which at some point has to be a human alone with a pen/pencil/keyboard/tarred stick. But then, eventually, it’s all typed or tarred–it’s either done or it isn’t, and if you don’t know, perhaps someone else can tell you. Well, I know it doesn’t work that way for every writer, but quite often, someone can tell *me*.

I’ve been lucky in the someones in my life, the people who are willing and able to read my work insightfully and give me some of that insight to use in future drafts. I try to avoid showing early-phase stories to non-writers, because they tend to say unhelpful things like, “Wow, this is great!” or “I didn’t really get it…” But in terms of editors, teachers, and fellow writers, I’ve been more than lucky. The two hours a week that I can go sit with fellow-writer Kerry Clare and write in frequently interrupted silence is invaluable, though writers of the quiet garret variety think we’re slightly mad. I however, like solidarity, and sympathy, and that fact that K always calls me on it when I’m not making sense.

I’ve been getting feedback and critiques of my writing for years, but another team-writing aspect–research–always seemed a step too far. Sure I’m always bothering people about what their jobs are like, or their commutes, or what they ate for lunch and where you buy that sort of thing. And, sure, there is a certain joy for me when the job interview or the date goes so irretrievably bad that I’m free to ask question after question of this person I’ll never see again about what it’s like to be an HR manager, a real estate agent, a pompous jerk. And yes, I did talk my dear friend Scott into spending an entire Saturday teaching me to play a game that I needed to fill in a tiny part in the plot of a story.

That game day, last fall, is as far as I’ve gone with the research so far. Yes, laziness is a part of that, I suppose–not wanting to go beyond a quick web search or phone call to a friend before I got to the meat of writing. Weirdly, though, I think there is also a bizarre sort of selfish independence there–not wanting to start doing extensive reading or interviews on a subject, because then that subject would start to take up more of the fabric of the work. Other ideas and voices would being involved, leaving less room for the bits that are truly mine.

Mine?

As if anything’s mine-all-mine after writers, editors and friends have all piped up and said, this bit’s funny don’t cut it, but I don’t understand why he kisses her, and that dog changes colour, and also this symbolism is forced and phony could you do something about that? At that point, showing up in someone’s office with a notebook and a list of factual questions is the only responsible thing to do. If I’m going to enlist so many people’s time and intellects to make the story *good*, I’d better get it *right*, too, and often I can’t do that all alone, with or without search engines.

And so, off I go. To Montreal, on what is mainly a mini-vacation, but will involve a notebook, a map, an appointment with experts. I’m looking forward to putting new people on the team, adding to the playbook, not expanding this metaphor any further. I’ll let you know what I find out. (I’ll experiment with the world of wireless in Montreal, but I may be postless until I return next week)

Stay with me / go places
RR

PS–Help in all forms–I just realized the subject line, something that I say all the time, is not my own; it’s a line from a poem by Judith Viorst. Go, team!

Rumours of my demise have been greatly exaggerated

To my great surprise, this week’s celebration of the short story (at the Festival of the Short Story at Luminato, in conversation and in the press), has contained a great deal of defensiveness and/or (depending on the speaker/writer) mourning for the form, which is apparently/allegedly (depending on the future, as I suppose is everything) dying.

Dying?

I have heard mutterings of this sort before, but in the random, sourpuss way that I never take seriously. However, after this week of hearing so many people I respect sing tragedy for my so-far chosen metier, I do wonder if I ought to be thinking/worrying/defending myself. By which I mean both myself doing some defending, and doing some self-defense.

Self-defense–I do feel implicated/assaulted here, hence the semi-confusing header. Because I spend so much time reading, writing, thinking about this form, I guess I’ve come to believe that we are somewhat synonymous, or at least symbiotic. Not actually; of course the short story will be just fine if *I* go, but how would I do without the short story?

I don’t want to find out.

Short stories have a lot of technical challenges that make them difficult to write, and difficult to read. But if you’ve tried to do either, then you know that, and if you haven’t, I don’t want to discourage you. So let’s talk instead about what’s great about short stories, about how they will never die:

Short stories give the intensity of single moments and incidents–a playground game, a barroom brawl, a cigarette break–that would have to be contextualized into a life in a novel, pared down into pure language in a poem. Sometimes, you just need what happened, right there, right then–he said, she said, the chandelier crashed down and I took the puppy into the street. You need every detail and dialogue tag, but maybe not the how and the why and the what happened next.

Short stories can be read on the bus to work, and thought about all day long.

Short stories can be shared in magazines and journals and newspapers. You can sell them–it’s not easy, and you won’t get rich, but there are dozens and dozens ways to get your stories to readers, and find stories to read.

Short stories are complete, and thus you know (nearly) right away what you are dealing with–whether you like it if not why, and whether you want more. They are self-contained, offering all you ever need know about the given situation. And yet they are by nature constrained and thus spare–non-essentials are left out, leaving space for the reader to slide inside, inserting imagination of whys and wherefores, physical descriptions and psychological profiles. For readers that like that sort of thing.

Short stories be can sent as attachments.

Short stories contain lines like:

“I felt like I was turning into a reptile, an iguana sitting on a rock with a decaying memory and no compassion.” Douglas Coupland, “In the Desert”, Life After God

“Bodies look white in the winter light and now she is cold under his nervous fingers, breath sawing, springs creaking like the poplar branch clawing at the frosted pane and he rolls from her on the cool sheets, tense, held back by something.” Mark Anthony Jarman, “Wintering Partners”, Dancing Nightly at the Tavern

“You struck me as a circus performer. You were fat-thin, your hair long-short, the fingers that held your cigarette swollen like those of a midget (though I know that’s not what they like to be called).” Emily Schultz, “I Love You, Pretty Puppy”, IV Lounge Nights

I remain unconvinced.

Never say die, comrades. Never say die.

The declaration of spring / the next day it starts snowin
RR

June 14th, 2008

Launch date change and Luminato post-mortem

The Toronto launch got moved to September 15, which gives me (and you!) nearly two extra weeks to be excited. The reason it got changed is because the This Is Not a Reading Series fifth anniversary party is on September 2nd. So if you booked that evening clear, you still have something cool to do.

But I do hope you’ll come on September 15th, for some form of non-reading-series awesomeness. It’ll likely be at the The Gladstone, one of the very first cool places I ever went when I moved to Toronto.

Speaking of readings, I didn’t die at the one I did yesterday. In fact, it seemed to go fairly well: good questions were asked, lots of people turned up (THANK YOU FOR TURNING UP!) and my partner-in-reading ‘s nose stopped bleeding in time for him read his story brilliantly.

However, it does seem to be the consensus that I don’t read so well unamplified, something I will surely be mentioning to someone before the September 15th gig. If you know me well, that revelation seems somewhat surprising, because when calm I can yell quite well across a soccer pitch, but in front of an audience, I am never calm: my voice goes up an octave (it’s true!) and recedes into the back of my throat. I am going to work on this, *this* being sounding less like a half-strangled children’s television character at readings.

Also the thing was *filmed*, which I found a bit disconcerting. I don’t know what the video is going to be used for (blackmail?) but in general Luminato does cool stuff, so if they do something cool with the reading, I promise to let you know. On the condition that I don’t have to watch it.

You and me both kid (you and me both kid)
RR

June 12th, 2008

Illuminations

Good news: there are two more events in the Festival of the Short Story. Earlier this week, I missed Elyse Friedman and Pasha Malla moderated by Caroline Adderson, and Anthony DeSa and Caroline Adderson moderated by Russell Smith (dammit, on both counts).

However, tonight, though I’ll get to see Ahmad Saidullah and Sharon English moderated by Jane Urquhart, at the Palmerston Library (560 Palmerston, two blocks west of Bathurst Station). And of course tomorrow it’ll be me and David Whitton, moderated by Lynn Coady at 40 Orchard View Blvd (one block north of Eglinton Station).

No links for all these wonderful names, because I am so so so tired. Life has been exhausting of late, making up, I suppose for the times when I can take the time to blog in great, linkified detail how I came to own a Tupperware egg-separater (a great anecdote, let me tell you). The upside of exhaustion is that it displaces nerves, so though I am less than 24 hours away from a public speaking endeavour, I am relatively calm.

And by calm I of course mean groggy.

Who taught you to live like that?
RR

June 10th, 2008

(Never) Stop the Presses!

THE TORONTO BOOK LAUNCH FOR *ONCE* WILL BE SEPTEMBER 2ND!!!!!!

I wanted to give you all maximum notice, because if there’s any chance of you being in the city then and free from contraint and interested in seeing me accidentally inhale my hair when I try to speak, I want you to be there.

It’ll be part of Pages Books amazing This Is Not a Reading Series. I’m not quite sure where, as of yet, or what time.

When he saw that brown-hair lady
RR

June 9th, 2008

Speaking of September…

I’ve heard various dates for the publication of Oberon Press’s *Best Canadian Stories* 08, either September or October–I think I’ll just put “Fall” in the sidebar list, as that fits better–but when it comes out, it will contain my story, “Fruit Factory.” This is a big honour for me, and I am quite quite thrilled. “Fruit Factory” originally appeared in issue #102 of the always-amazing New Quarterly.

Speaking of TNQ, the stories of mine that will appear there in the summer issue are “Linh Lai”, “The House on Elsbeth” and “Zoom”, plus an interview with Amy King–that also wouldn’t fit in the sidebar, but I wanted to share. Because this is also a huge honour, to appear in such a great journal, and I am (again, still) thrilled.

Come hell or full circle
RR

June 8th, 2008

Predictive Powers

I hate to brag, but my intuitions were all correct about this weekend. The big party was in fact as scary and intimidating as I had thought, and though no one was rude and the appetizers were delicious and the music good and the space beautiful (though I could never quite figure out where in the museum I was, such was the crowd) I left quite early early. I am a wuss, I admit it, but now I know there is a certain number of strangers beyond which I cannot cope. And that shotglasses filled with chilled soups, with shrimp or cheeseballs impaled on the rims, is a good thing to eat, and actually I didn’t know that before.

Then the Small Press Book Fair was lovely, well-organized and entertaining, and not intimidatingly crowded, though well-attended. I would say the surprise there was hearing Christopher Dewdney read from his latest books on time. That *was* a surprise, because you would think, knowing me, that a poetic and scientific exploration of night and day would leave me gasping for air, but Dewdney’s reading was surprisingly warm and accessible. And no small feet, in a noisy space with so much traffic. Very impressive.

Further predictions–it won’t be this hot forever. Soon it will snow again and we’ll be complaining about that, so let’s enjoy at least being able to move freely on the sidewalks. One more prediction: before the snow but towards the end of summer, I’ll be reading at Eden Mills Writers Festival, which is an exciting prospect. No matter how hot it is in September, Eden Mills is by a river and therefore will be slightly cool, and filled with authors and awesomeness. Hooray!

And somebody beside you
RR