Dave Eggers/McSweeney's

Every time someone asks me what my career/life goals are, I generally direct them to Dave Eggers. He's accomplished basically everything I would ever want to accomplish. He was a writer for Salon.com (an amazing magazine), wrote the phenomenal best-seller Heartbreaking Work of a Staggering Genius, founded and edits the playful and profound McSweeney's, founded the now nationwide nonprofit writing and tutoring centers of 826 National, and co-wrote a script (Where the Wild Things Are) for director Spike Jonze. Writer, editor, generous goofy human being.

I was reminded of this because of two things:
1. Going home after a long time (8 months, more or less), you end up being asked the aforementioned question quite a lot.
2. Two of the recent McSweeney's Internet Tendency articles had me in stitches.

"If you're like most workers today, you've probably been running yourself ragged working overtime, trying to show your boss that you're a team player. But, let's be honest, is it getting you anywhere? No. So quit doing it, girlfriend. Instead, apply the following rules, taken from dating tome The Rules, to your job-related conduct. And remember: you are an employee unlike any other."

"Daguerreotypes Will One Day Be in Color; Will Feature Cats in Humorous Poses With Misspelled Captions" (January 1870)

On the SXSW "New Think for Old Publishers"

My friend Peter Miller was on the "New Think for Old Publishers" panel at SXSW--long story short, it did not go well. The crowd pretty much revolted. Funny part? Most of this "revolting" was in the form of twitter exchanges--way to be, guys. Anyways. Here's an email exchange that summarizes the event and my (humble) opinions on the relevance of the whole debate.

Anon:
"Richard Nash is no longer at Soft Skull. He quit and I don't know what he's doing now. And on a sort of related note, Peter was on a panel yesterday at SXSW on technology and book publishing and it did not go well at all. I feel so bad for Peter. I bring this up because Richard was in the audience and twittered the event and apparently did not come to Peter's aide while all the bloggers in the crowd piled on. Going only by the twitter account, I'd say that the panel was ill-conceived and unprepared, but that the audience was comprised largely of clueless and self-serving jerks. Traditional publishing is insular, but I think the technoshere is just as insular but they don't know it because they confuse the dynamism of technology and their ability to stay on the forefront of it with an actual connection to people and a knowledge of what everyone wants; they assume that they speak for everyone who ever uses the internet. Sorry for going on. I did think you might be interested in this because of your interest in publishing - plus, didn't you also take a course on new media?"

Me (don't mind the errors):
"I read up about it--followed the twitter thread, read some blogs. I think you're completely right. It just reminds me so much of the whole fiasco of PDA books and the like at Elsevier you were telling me about. People get excited about technology who don't really know about it, or people that are huge proponents and users of that technology forget to look outside themselves and their community to see how others use that technology. What I love about looking at this debate is being a part of my younger generation, that's eventually going to take over the market. The funny thing? My generation HATES ebooks, kindle, reading blogs and books on our iphones. We're the first generation that's been raised on technology, and much to everyone's surprise, we're much more strict about what we use that technology for. The generation above us, the ones that created this technology, idealized it as taking over all the roles of our lives, or at least being incorporated into all the aspects of our lives. But my generation doesn't see it that way: technology is for work and rapid fire, unsubstantial entertainment only--video games, youtube videos, SHORT blog posts, facebook, etc. We spend a lot of time on the internet, but in short bursts and our attention span wanes. We don't have the patience to read entire reviews--if they do, they have to be short and entertaining. Blogs do have respect, and I think publishers should consider them, but there's still a huge (and important and respected) hierarchy. This whole insulated blogosphere voice is basically proposing a Marxist system of evaluation for publishing, but as we all know (or should know) that simply is neither a viable nor sustainable system. People WANT hierarchy. They want a publisher's perspective, then a second opinion (New York Times), then a third (BookSlut), then a fourth (blogger), and a fifth (friend). Or in whatever other order. Publishers need to recognize the place that bloggers have, and recognize that hierarchy accordingly, but bloggers need to do that do. They have their place--but for whatever reason they think they're at the top with no one underneath."

Translation of Daft Punk's Harder Better Faster Stronger

(Notes: http://www.najle.com/idaft/)

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Tumblr > blogger

www.awhellyeah.tumblr.com

So, I realized that the reason why I hate poetry blogging is that blogging gives people the opportunity to say a lot on the internet, and when people feel like they have something important to say, they're going to say...a lot.

And in the sad world of poetry, the last thing we need is more bickering, right? We should be supporting each other. But all that seems to be happening is arguing over pointless theory, definitions, and whatever, instead of really supporting each other.

That's not always true, of course! There are some great exceptions.

However, I also have a very short attention span, as do more people of my generation. Seeing as we're mostly on the same page, I'm taking their side on this one. Sorry people with maturity and real jobs. It's not you, it's us.

Which is why I'm starting a tumblr. Tumblr is pretty awesome, and it doesn't seem to foster the need to write huge essays on flarf versus conceptualism (can I just say I'm glad that debate has died down?). I will be posting many more things now that I'm not too worried about layout too. Let's face it: this thing is fugly.

www.awhellyeah.tumblr.com

Haiku by Brittany and Sol

BenQ MP Quietness Series Projectors

Kick back and enjoy

Hear the music of silence

Listen carefully

Poem I found in downtown Seattle

On David Foster Wallace

I went to the David Foster Wallace remembrance reading at the Hugo House last week. I'm not going to talk about his suicide too much because it still makes me emotional, and I still am having trouble coming up with answers to the whole why-are-so-many-great-people-so-sad thing (although I also acknowledge the fact that no one has been able to answer that question, I would still like to find my own small fallible conclusion, just for some peace of mind). He was a real hero of mine; studied philosophy, was down to earth yet brilliant and detailed, a great observer with sympathy. I remember distinctly calling my dad (also familiar with DFW), very upset, needing to talk about it. We wondered, how could it have actually happened? And why? We thought about his family.

The reading was spectacular. The two real highlights for me were Veronica D'Orazio's reading an excerpt from "Forever Overhead" in Brief Interviews With Hideous Men, which was done with such delicateness and whisper that I never thought one could appropriately and stunningly channel from DFW, and Brian McGuigan's excerpt from the same work, which was a little uncomfortably believable (he read from the section with the guy who loves women). I was suprised that Paul Constant was the only one who read non-fiction (he read from A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again). But, it was a nice change of pace and I liked the selections overall.

As my own (belated tribute), I'll post this little reflection I wrote for Cody Walker November of 2007:

"I’ve decided to divorce Dorothy Parker so that I can marry David Foster Wallace. I think she’ll be ok; she’s been expecting it since we got together, anyway. After I read Big Red Son, I recommended [Consider the Lobster] to everyone I engaged in conversation with. I’ve been interested in knowing more about the underbelly of the porn industry ever since my boyfriend told me that his childhood babysitter was Asia Carrera*. I do believe that it’s writers like Wallace who are going to reinvent--for the better--the writing of our time. He has this incredible talent for capturing the essence of my generation (apathy, our relationship with the media, our love for sea creatures, our detached observation and fascination with pop culture, etc.) and translating it with an avant-garde organization and style into an essay that is funny because how little humor is injected into it; Wallace does such an excellent job capturing the humor that already exists in the world that he doesn’t need to add any of his own. Wallace is a sort of conductor of humor. Which leads me into my question: How would one define Wallace’s type of humor? It’s not exactly irony, wit, slapstick, satire, Whitman-esque joy humor, etc. Has he truly succeeded in venturing into undiscovered comedic territory? Because I can’t think of any other comic writer like him."

And I still can't. Although I'm open to suggestions.

*True story.

Two notes for the day

1) Noriko Ambe does some really interesting stuff to books by essentially carving them. This reminded me a lot of my recent conversation with Prof. Brian Reed about artists working with literature and vice versa--this being his specialty and all. I'm not going to delve into any of that because my opinions haven't fully formed or been informed; what I will say is that it seems dangerous for artists to be working in a field they haven't fully studied and vice versa, because they're not fully aware of the implications, extentions, cliches, etc., of whatever field they're borrowing. That being said, greatness can be made on accident too*. Without thinking too much about these works, I have to say I like them. Aesthetically interesting while also pleasing, playful. Personally, this is a meditation on books as physical objects, something that's becoming more and more vital in today's world of publishing as paper books have to make their claim against ebooks. So, more of this please...

*Maybe?

2) I had a great conversation with someone at a party (an English PhD canidate) about his disseration on poetry and ethics--both of which happen to be my specialities in literature and philosophy, so as you can probably guess, I was a little...ahem, excited. Which would probably explain why he was gone after I came back from the bathroom. Anyway, I really want to hunt this guy down and peck his brain, but I can't remember his name (it's nothing personal; sometimes I forget the names of my family members--seriously). If anyone knows who this is, please let me know.

Yes, I admit this is slightly creepy. No, I will not apologize for it.

The Sunday New York Times waxes poetic

From this Sunday New York Times:

"Climate experts added that the United States did not need to have in place national legislation to limit greenhouse gasses, a process that could take months, to negotiate in Copenhagen. 'It's not just about analyzing a piece of legislation,' Mr. Ashton said. 'It's about the feeling you get if you're a leader sitting in Beijing. It's like love; you know it when you feel it.'"

- Elizabeth Rosenthal