In the Age of Spite: The Proliferation of ‘Dumb Rage’ in Internet Literature

Ralph Waldo Emerson's comments on Jane Austen's work in the style of image macros, popularized by internet communities like Internet Poetry. Source image courtesy of the University of Texas Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin via Wikimedia Commons.

There has never been a historical period/art movement without its shit talkers.

My alt lit award picks, post award ceremony (+bonus dance of the alt lit prom king and queen)

Bellow are my nominations for the Alt Lit Awards which happened last night while I was in transit from ruralish Eastern Washington to Seattle. I did not nominate an Alt Lit Prom King and Queen because I was not aware that was a category when Frank sent me the ballot a couple weeks ago. I am more than flattered to share the title with Richard Chiem. Richard texted me about the award while I was eating dinner with my family before they took me to the airport. Following the announcement, my mom tried to explain internet lit to my grandparents.

All the people/journals/poems/stories/books that were recognized last night deserve that recognition, but I wanted to give a shout out to some of my favorite pieces/entities/people from this year. Also, I will admit that my list blatantly favors the Pacific Northwest.

When All Your Friends Are Writers

I read a post on Trick With a Knife (it has since been removed by the author) awhile back that, among other things, made a disparaging comment about another writer’s remark about the number of writers she considers to be friends. The comment was something to the affect of, “I feel sorry for you because all your friends are writers,” as if it was a bad thing. This was the primary thing that stuck with me from the piece.

Mostly, it stuck with me because all* of my friends are writers and this has never seemed like a bad thing.

I Wish Frank Hinton Was a Six-Armed Bear: A review of ‘I Don’t Respect Female Expression’

When they first hear of Frank Hinton, many people immediately assume she is a man. My mother, who recently joined Facebook and apparently occasionally views the profiles of my friends, said to me over the phone, “I had no idea Frank Hinton was a girl.” I once read Frank’s piece “How to be Me, an Instructional Video narrated by Frank Hinton,” at Pilot Books’ Other People’s Prose or Poetry night and was met with somewhat confused stares when I introduced Frank as a “woman living in Nova Scotia.”

This element of presumption is one of the reasons why I think Frank’s debut chapbook I Don’t Respect Female Expression works so well. The title likely sounds entirely offensive to anyone unfamiliar with Frank’s work. The chapbook doesn’t actively disprove its title, but instead almost seems to be championing a kind of genderless experience. Often, the gender of narrators is not specified, and when the gender of characters is specific, Frank is fair to both men and women, avoiding cliches of misogyny or whiney and disillusioned women. This is all achieved without being didactic.

Karen, the Most Well Endowed Among Us

Richard recorded his reading of one of my new short stories, making some edits of his own as he went along. The text of this is forthcoming in Smalldoggies Magazine.

Richard and Ana C. released their ebook OH NO, EVERYTHING IS WET NOW this week on Magic Helicopter Press. Read it here!

a sort of late april round up

I already posted about the first of the Mixtape Reading series (which will likely continue, limited edition chapbooks included) but that wasn’t the only reading in April. April 14, I also had the pleasure of performing as part of the Smalldoggies Magazine reading series with a number of other talented writers including Rob Noble, who gave a lecture on why Elvis was a pioneer in cosplay counter-culture; poet and editor of Write Bloody Publishing, Derrick Brown; Mindy Nettifee made a brief appearance to preview the Portland Review reading that happened the night after; and Rob Gray provided some sweet musical stylings to open the evening. The night was hosted by Matty Byloos and Carrie Seitzinger, who were also sweet enough to make me dinner and let me play with their cats the following night.

Other cool things that happened in April:

-I met Riley Michael Parker of Metazen and Housefire in person for the first time.
-I read Weather Stations by Ryan Call, which was published March 1 on Caketrain. Buy it and read it. I will be posting a review soon.
-There is No Year by Blake Butler came out on Harper Perennial. It is surreal, disjointed (though, less so than Scorch Atlas) and much similar to House of Leaves but less showy. Highly recommended.
- Small Press Festival 2011 hosted a Small Press Expo in partnership with the Hugo House and Rogue Scholar.
-Tara Atkinson, Willie Fitzgerald, Summer Robinson and crew brought SPF2011 to a close with a sweet closing party, “Dancing with Pomeranians,” which was filmed by Rogue Scholar.

Photos of both the Smalldoggies and Portland Review reading as well as a video of my performance (awkward stage banter included!) taken by my lovely cousin Kerri Anne are below.

Wiley Coyote

Luna Miguel translated my poem “Wiley Coyote” into Spanish. Luna is talented and sweet and I can’t wait for an English translation of her poetry. My poem in Spanish can be found here on Luna’s blog. Thank you, Luna! Read her work here.

I unfortunately do not speak Spanish and I’m sure some of you are in that boat as well. The original English text can be found after the jump.

for the love of small press

I haven’t made a mix tape since 6th grade, and even then I don’t think I really got it. I would record songs I liked off the radio so I didn’t have to buy the CDs. They never had themes and were not made with other people in mind.  You’re supposed to make mix tapes for people you like, right? It’s a courting ritual or something. To be entirely saccharine, on April 3rd, nine readers made a mixtape for the love of literature in the form of a reading at Seattle’s Cairo Gallery as part of the second annual Small Press Festival hosted by Pilot Books.

The event was organized by new-to-Seattle writer Tara Atkinson and included Ben Blum, myself, Tom De Beauchamp, Brandon Scott Gorrell, Pilot Books owner/founder Summer Robinson and others.

Last Sunday’s track list and photos after the jump!

this is a round up (march edition)

 

Richard visited for six days.

March was a lamb or something. In March:

-I interviewed the talented and kind Mike Young during his spring break, which was during my finals.

-I was visited by Richard Chiem for six full days.

-There was much rejoicing and also a Ustream. In parts of the video I look like a boy. We tried to record our reading of James Yeh’s story ‘I Am, I Admit, at Times, a Lazy Lover,’ but there was an error and it did not record. Sorry, James.

-I guess I got some Twitter followers?

Things read in March:
Light Boxes by Shane Jones
Blankets by Craig Thompson
most of Orange Eats Creeps by Grace Krilanovich
Common Carnage by Stephen Dobyns

Images v. Rhetoric: An interview with Mike Young

This is part five of an interview series focusing on how the Internet is changing/improving/destroying the “indie lit” world. Interviews will feature writers, editors, designers and other artists with a web presence. I recently spoke with Mike Young over gmail chat. Some spelling has been corrected and time stamps have been removed but abbreviations and line breaks have been preserved to give an ~accurate account of what conducting an interview online looks like.

Other interviews in this series include conversations with xTx, DJ Berndt, Frank Hinton and Stephen Tully Dierks.

Mike Young is the author of the short story collection Look! Look! Feathers and the poetry collection We Are All Good if They Try Hard Enough. Young edits Magic Helicopter Press and is one of the founding editors of NOÖ Journal.

Mike Young: hey Frances

Frances Dinger: hi Mike

How are you? How was the rest of the tour?

Mike: I am doing pretty well, back in Massachusetts, trying to catch up on work.

The rest of the tour was great.

Lots of amazing people, great drives, I-5 was very kind to us, there was briefly a beach motel evacuation but no tsunami in our neck of the woods.

Frances: Well, I’m glad you and Jamie [Iredell] didn’t get washed away.

Mike: Haha yeah, we got woken up at 7 in the morning but all we did was sit on a cliff and watch normal sized waves on a beautiful day.

Frances: Seems like a good reason to get up early.