July 17, 2006
On Watermelon
The website of the evening is www.watermelon.org– the online home of the National Watermelon Promotion Board. We are now devouring watermelon smoothies. And obviously, we are now quite happy.
I got In Fact: The Best of Creative Nonfiction from the library today. I am approaching it for a few reasons; the first is that Annie Dillard wrote the intro entitled “Notes for Young Writers”. Some of the best advice I’ve ever read, pointed and concise enough to be manageable. I like “Read for pleasure… Push it a little, but don’t read something totally alien to your nature and then say, “I’ll never be able to write like that.” Of course you won’t. Read books you’d like to write. If you want to write literature, read literature. Write books you’d like to read. Follow your own weirdness.” I’d recommend thumbing through this book even just for this. The book itelf I might not even read, but I am going to give it a try. It will be interesting to compare it to the anthology I read last week, wherein my complaint was of the forced nature of the pieces. This anthology, on the other hand, was compiled after the fact, and it will be interesting to see if this makes a difference. I am also interested in Creative Nonfiction, and confess a bit to not really knowing what it is, and so it will be nice to learn.
And yes, the book came from the library; I am absolutely obsessed with the Toronto Public Library. In the town where I grew up, the library was underfunded, seemed to be closed four days a week and only open until 3:30 when it was at all, and was fundamentally unwelcoming. In years since, I’ve revelled in university libraries, which definitely have their good points but are overwhelming in their austerity. And then there is the library around the corner from my house, which has the ugliest carpet known to man and plenty of Catherine Cookson, but some really great works scattered about, is open late, has nice staff and I can request any book from the Toronto Public Library system be delivered there just for me! I was stupified to learn that such a process was even possible. I feel quite lucky to be able to benefit from it.
Via Bookninja, I read Misery Loves a Memoir: “Contemporary memoirists have taught us mostly how to survive. They haven’t begun to teach us how to live.” I am currently listening to a great podcast, Zadie Smith on On Beauty. She is a brilliant speaker, in terms of how she sounds and what she says.
July 16, 2006
Here and There
The Star Short Story Contest First Prize Winner is published here today. My story appears next week. I bought the Toronto Life Summer Fiction Issue yesterday, lured by Joan Barfoot and Margaret Atwood. Unfortunately, it’s the last Fiction Issue- a sad state of affairs discussed here. Prince Edward County profiled here. The List-Loving Observer gives us 50 Albums that changed music.
July 14, 2006
Mountain Top
It has been a week of high points. Because after twelve and a half months and a whole lot of trouble, my husband received his visa, and is therefore eligible to work in Canada. It’s just a temporary work permit until his permanent residency is completed (which might take another year) and he still can’t leave the country, but we won’t quibble. He is now looking for a job.
I was a bit disappointed with the anthology The Friend Who Got Away, but perhaps my problem is more with anthologies in general than this specific book. The high points first- there are a few absolutely wonderful essays here, writing by Katie Roiphe and Ann Hood was particularly good. A few essays made me extraordinarily uncomfortable, but perhaps they were supposed to. But in all, this book did not meet my expectations. I think the problem with a book such as this is that writers respond to the topic, rather than the topic responding to the writing, and consequently, some of the stories seemed forced. There is the problem, as in all anthologies of late (and anthologies are very much of late), of how boring it is to listen to privileged women whine. Further, each piece is so liminal, so brief. Perhaps each of these stories could be a book in itself, but as an essay, they seem to skim a surface; like an “It Happened To Me” section of a women’s magazine. I just didn’t feel like this book taught me anything, and didn’t really give me much to empathize with either.
July 12, 2006
You'd hide in a place that reminded you of hair?
On the obituary writers conference. Here for a library love story. On how technology tests our archives. I especially liked the 1986 BBC Archives contained on laser disc. And perhaps my favourite McSweeneys Pop Song Correspondences ever- Notes on “Sweet Child O’ Mine,” as Delivered to Axl Rose by His Editor. You won’t be sorry.
July 11, 2006
Book News
I reread Joan Didion’s Slouching Towards Bethlehem on the weekend, which I read right before The Radiant Way in 2004 and which similarly became one of my definitively favourite books. I read it on the bullet train to Hiroshima for a weekend break at the beginning of that July, and I fell in love with it. I’ve read it again since, and expect to read it again and again regularly in the future. Because it’s brilliant. The writing is just so purely good, and Didion can write about anything and make it mythic and when I have her cadences and rhythms stuck in my head, I am a better writer. I am not sure if that constitutes cheating, but it works. And so after I read this book, I decided to read Elvis and Me by Priscilla Presley, which I thought was the most brilliant book in the world when I read it fifteen years ago. It was sort of Didionesque subject matter if you really think about it, but the writing was so not Didion, and I got to the fourth or fifth page, and, nauseated by Pris’s burgeoning quivering sexuality in Junior High School, I just couldn’t go on. And so I shut the book, which I rarely do. I think if I ever read it again, it will have to be a day when I’m sick in bed and can’t be bothered to think. And so I moved on to The Bell Jar, which was brilliant. I hadn’t read it for years. The narrative voice is so authentic, and much like The Catcher in the Rye, when I read it the first time, I gave the narrator full credit for the story and took it as presented. It’s strange how willingly I did that once upon a time, and now that I am older, older than these characters especially, the books are entirely different. And following that, still riding an Americana wave (with a focus on neuroses), I took up Nine Stories by JD Salinger, and I am exquisitely happy with it.
July 10, 2006
News
The heights of today were insomnia well into the night and walking to work in a thunderstorm. Better things were to come along, however, in the form of the news that my story “A Big Enough Army” has won second place in the Toronto Star Short Story Contest. The story will be published soon and I’ll link to it online when that happens.
July 10, 2006
A wide selection of cakes
We added another link to our chain of brilliant weekends. On Friday night, we went out for a patio dinner on College Street with Curtis, and capped the evening off with a trip to The Big Chill and a bit of porching. I woke up early Saturday to do some work, and after lunch we set out to see what we could see. And we saw the 25th Anniversary celebrations at The World’s Biggest Bookstore, where we got complimentary snowcones. We checked out the Yonge Street Festival after that, and then ventured over to Nathan Philips Square for the Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition. A particular highlight was wading in the fountain. And then we went to see The City of Beaver Exhibit at The Design Exchange, and we absolutely loved that. And then finally, we caught a showing of Superman, which was everything we wanted it to be. Today was spent in absolute contentment at a pool party with a wide selection of cakes. Perfect, as you might expect.
July 7, 2006
Knot Physics
~One problem in tracing the history of knots is the belief by ancient civilizations that knots had magical powers. Tying any knot is an adventure in space-a single piece of cord or twine is used to create two of three dimensions. It is easy to see why they believed magic was needed~ Donna M. Lightbody in Let’s Knot: A Macrame Book
