Archive for the 'Readings' Category

BookExpo America — or as we insiders like to shorten it, BEA — is like “The Convention” episode of The Office. Just like Michael Scott, publishers go to BEA to schmooze with industry bigwigs to get the cheapest paper stock and discover The Next Big Thing — please something other than The Secret — but really it’s all about the SWAG.

For the definition of SWAG, go here. It basically refers to the free promotion junk publishers give away in order to entice potential retailers to their booths. Hundreds of booths are set up in Jacob Javits Convention Center, and attendees run around like mice in a maze looking for the proverbial cheese.

Almost all publishers offered catalogues of their products and cheap candy — boring – but many also had full-length books, buttons, and notesbooks. Some publishers got creative, though. Among the highlights:

Apart from the SWAG and catching up with other book nerds, there were some costumed characters cloying for attention but not much else worth mentioning to anyone who wasn’t there with a specific agenda. BEA is a madhouse, and it’s best to have a strong game plan if you want to make any business deals.

Being “uncool” is kinda cool these days. Page through The Hipster Handbook, and you’ll embrace the fact that you suck at sports, read books, and wear glasses. We at Uncool Kids try to take back the word “uncool,” embracing our dorky tendencies to watch Broadway shows, promote cartoons as art, watch vampire movies, walk around with art on our head, actually enjoy taking quizzes, stalk cheesy sitcom stars, watch polo, and obsess over comic books. As a runty underdog myself, I can tell you it’s taken quite a few years to get past all the scar tissue of youth and embrace my nerdiness. I have stacks of diaries to prove it—and so do the self-derogating people at Cringe.

The first Wednesday of every month, young adults flock to Freddy’s Bar and Backroom over in New York’s safe haven for the coolest of the uncool—Brooklyn. At around 9 PM, Cringe begins as “brave souls come forward and read aloud from their teenage diaries, journals, notes, letters, poems, abandoned rock operas, and other general representations of the crushing misery of their humiliating adolescence.”

“It’s better and cheaper than therapy,” boasts the Cringe website. After all, it makes you feel better to know that you weren’t the only kid to have a “Kick Me” sign taped to your back. And that maybe—just maybe—some people even had it worse than you did. Avenue Q—I told you we like Broadway plays—has a whole song about that.

Most of the crowd at Cringe look like they aren’t all that far removed from their years of dorkdom. And, actually, quite a few of them look like the Plastics that accentuated the fact that you weren’t cool. Their idea of a cringe-worthy diary entry would be gushing over some boy who their friends later deemed as lame. The backroom of Freddy’s was crammed full of apple-faced blondes and stylishly nerdy brunettes that looked like they came to Cringe as a study break from Lit 101.

The room was so full that I was relegated to cower in the stairwell with the other unfortunate losers. It was so unbearably hot down there, I started sweating like it was down to me and one other kid waiting to see who would get picked last in gym class. The pretty girl in front of me had some sort of oriental fan. I figured she probably had been here before. The room was probably full of regulars, and here I was—by myself, in the corner.

It makes sense that there’d be a lot of regulars. Cringe has been held at Freddy’s since April 2005. Everyone from “ABC Nightline” (see the video here) and “Newsweek” to “Time Out New York” and “Spin” has covered Cringe. (“This American Life” covered a similar show called Mortified.) Next month, Cringe will be held in London.

May 9th’s reading featuring a hysterical story—slurpily told in character as her younger self with braces—about a girl who in trying to achieve her “goal to masturbate and squirt tonight” almost catches her house on fire. She waxes philosophical when her parents get her priest involved

Like it’s a sin to touch yourself. What shit is that? Catholics are crazy. Mary had a baby, and you’re going to tell me she never masturbated.

Another reader was John Sellers, author of the recently released book Perfect from Now On: How Indie Rock Saved My Life. …Apparently, Sellers didn’t always have good taste in music. In his 1983 journal, “document of my geekness,” he writes a whole section on how is favorite rock group is Journey. He also write about how he loves the Wizardry videogame, how inflation has affected prices at Showbizz Pizza, and how he wishes Abraham Lincoln had never lived because then he wouldn’t have to memorize the Gettysburg Address.

So yeah, it’s worth going to Cringe even if you have to stand in the back by the aquarium of frogs.

In my opinion, sex, literature, and laughter are all very good things. So, in an attempt to titillate my brain, I stopped by the In the Flesh Erotic Reading Series hosted by the erotic writer/editor and BJ afficionado, Rachel Kramer Bussel (who is also a lovely individual). I’m pleased to report that it surpassed all of my expectations.

All the writers who read were good or great. From stories of accidentally winding up in a porn with Annie Sprinkles, to “the time I banged a clown,” nearly everything had me either crying with laughter or honestly touched. Stories of sloppy sex elicited goofy grins, while hearfelt examinations of ones own sluttiness had me sighing with sympathy. Rachel really does a fabulous job of bringing together a solid group of erotic readers without ever dipping into the seediness or fakey cheese-factor I tend to associate with all things porn.

The crowd was packed into the space, seemed fixated on the speakers the entire time, and were obviously having a good time. If you’re cruising for swingers or someone to give you a different sort of happy ending, you might find a few freaks (I mean that in the nicest possible way) in the crowd, but most people just seemed like highly-literate, normal, geeky people who happen to enjoy sex and fun.

The series is hosted every 3rd Wednesday of the month (so check your calendar) in the upstairs bar section of Happy Ending (at Forsythe and Broome), the vibe of which–like high school sex on a summer night in the back of your Dad’s Buick–was dark, hot, sweaty, cramped, and hilariously awkward. While a more comfortable space would have been nice, I’d hate to see the vibe ruined by a less intimate space, so as long as it stays there suck it up and go early for a good seat.

Pretty people: there will be ugly people there, and they probably have more and better sex than you. It’s true. If this bothers you, please don’t go. As for the rest of you, I’ll probably see you there next time.

Thanks for the photo Viviane. For more pics check out http://www.flickr.com/photos/brianvan/sets/72157600109296432/

If the name of the place doesn’t give it away, maybe the interior will clue you in. A Soviet flag hangs over the bar. If I was able to get a closer look at the black and white photos and yellowed articles nailed to the blood-red walls, I’m sure I would’ve seen Lenin or Stalin.

But aside from being a Commie bar, KGB is a writer’s hang, which is why Soft Skull Press was holding a reading there. I kind of dug it. It was warm, but not soupy. Candles flickered behind stained glass cabinets. The hum of conversation was low enough for the writers to write. You could single them out with a sickle and hammer, because they either scrawled in their notebooks or leafed what looked like manuscripts. A group of guys sat in the middle of the bar having deep discussions, wearing torn sweaters because they hadn’t graduated to tweed and elbow patches yet.

The bar is cash-only. So as I walked down the steps of the second floor establishment, searching for an ATM, wondering whether there might be a bar somewhere in Russia named “CIA”, I nearly tripped over a pint-sized red headed girl talking to people on the sidewalk.

This I later learned was Jillian Weise, the featured author of the evening. But first two other poets were invited to read their works. The themes of Brenda Shaughnessy’s poems were seasons, relationships (”like having a bad boyfriend in a good band” was a notable line, and “But I refuse to say poor me, poor me/because I am not poor, and I am not me”), and of all things, sugar. Except for when she dropped a C-bomb, her lyrical poems flowed nicely. Priscilla Becker read a group of poems she’d resurrected after tossing them in the trash, and she referred to them as her “Death by” series (”Death by appleseed…Death by clarinet…”). They would have been a little more enjoyable to hear if she did not stop mid-verse to muse aloud that this particular group of poems was terrible.

Then Richard Eoin Nash, the publisher of Soft Skull Press, introduced Weise, the author of “The Amputee’s Guide to Sex.” The first poem was instructional, a list of steps to take if you ever find yourself in a fore-play situation without clothes and without a limb: how to divert your partner’s attention so you can remove your prosthetic, how to stash your prosthetic, how to stay mobile. Really, things that two legged people don’t ever have to think about, but what probably seems like a natural thought process for Weise (”I met a guy/he has two legs”). One of the poems, about a relationship (”We have affairs/we are in love”) makes you consider not only sexual activity for an amputee but also the dating scene, which I like to complain about with all my arms, legs, and appendages intact. The next two poems were also from the “Amputee’s Guide” and Weise concluded the reading with a few newer works.

If Weise’s tinny voice was an octave higher, or her tone ebullient, as if to suggest that despite her prosthetic and any possible rejection or dejection she’s just so cheeky about the whole darn thing, she would’ve fallen into the rabbit hole of self-deprecation that many authors feel pushed into with chick lit. But she read clearly and dispassionately, while showing a sense of humor, and was likeable.

You can learn more about Weise’s book on Soft Skull Press’s website, and if you’re a writer, or want to be, KGB is worth checking out. One last note about the bar: they charge $7-$8 dollars for a drink, which is to be expected, but it seems more capitalistic than socialist if you ask me.

There is no single artist I admire more than Mr. John Patrick Shanley, the prolific playwright who has won the Tony award two years ago for his play, “Doubt”. I have read much of Mr. Shanley’s cannon of exception work, and have always felt particuarly inspired by the way he speaks about art and his life. Therefore, when I saw that Symphony Space had asked him to be a guest host of their ongoing “Selected Shorts” project, I jumped at the chance too see him speak in person.

“Selected Shorts: A Celebration of the Short Story” is a literary goldmine. Symphony Space invited different actors to read eclectic selections of short stories aloud to an excited audience. Sometimes, a guest host comes in and picks their own favorite short stories to have performed by actors. In this case, Mr. Shanley picked three short stories, two of them by Hemmingway, that all explored his basic thoughts on the meaning of life, which boil down to “Life is a boat and life is a dream”.

Mr. Shanley gave speeches in between the readings of these three stories. His speeches were beyond inspiring. His thick New York accent brings an “everyman” quality to this gifted artist, and as Mr. Shanley speaks on the meaning of life he is wise and witty. He throws each page of his speeches onto the stage after he has read them, his eyes twinkle with irony and knowledge. The stories were succinct and beautiful, read expertly by Ron Cephas Jones, Dana Ivey, and John Tuturro. Hearing these haunting stories read was a gift in and of itself. Mr. Shanley’s presence, guiding the audience’s understanding of these great works was almost too wonderful to handle.

“Selected Shorts” is a necessary event for anyone with a passionate love of literature. And John Patrick Shanley’s work is a must read for anyone at all.

Last night I went to The Bitter End in the West Village to attend the Moth StorySLAM. I have never attended a story slam before, but the concept lies somewhere in between a poetry slam and stand up comedy. Contestants each tell a five minute story (the time limit is strictly enforced) and then three judging teams score the story on a scale of one to ten. At the end of the night a story slam winner is picked.

The basic concept is simple but the product is rather amazing. The crowd is supportive, the contestants are refreshingly diverse, and the night is full of energry, reflection and laughter. Each story slam has a theme and last night’s theme was “Meltdowns”. Each contestant interpretted this theme in a comepletely different way, and the night was therefore surprising and thrilling. One man told of his high school principal committing suicide years after his graduation. Another man described the worst imaginable blind date, and the clear highlight of the night was a middle aged attractive Jewish woman telling of her breakdown in Paris and the kindness of a stranger saving her life. Somehow, each of these stories were told comically, the audience laughing along with the story tellers. No one bombed, no one was judged too harshly and everyone gained insight and compassion.

The Moth Story Slam is a night that gives you hope for New Yorkers connecting to each other on an intimate level, and I personally walked away feeling fantastic and excited for the next slam. I went alone to the event and would recommend the same for anyone who is bored with no one to hang out with on a Monday night. The Bitter End is a great location with good drinks and friendly waitstaff. I was content people watching, (the audience had a huge age range and a low key vibe) listening to stories, and becoming part of an impromptu community for a few hours.

Science geeks of the world rejoice! We have a new, sexy leader to rally behind. He has the jivin’ -jiggly hips of James Brown, the pimped out pompadour of Prince and a trimmed up 80’s Daddy-O mustache not unlike a Nubian Cap’n Crunch.

His name is Neil DeGrasse Tyson and he’s the closest thing to a rock star astrophysicist the world has seen since Sir Iaasic Newton. Tyson is the director of the Rose Science Center (formerly the Hayden Planetarium, the old home of Laser Floyd).

He is a lively, wonderfully laid back, genuinely likeable genius. In the words of Ben Oppenheimer, the man who introduced him at a lecture the other night, Tyson is, “dynamic, but kind of a slacker”.

He was at the Museum of Natural History speaking about his new book “Death by Black Hole”. The book is a series of essays he wrote dating back to 1995 when he was a columnist for Natural History Magazine. Here’s what he had to say about the experience:

“Writing an essay every month is like giving birth. I can see the women in the audience are giving me a dirty look, but still…it was like my flesh was being hewn from my body each month. But it was one of the greatest experiences of my life.”

For over an hour Tyson wrapped us all around his pinky finger spinning anecdotes, history, astrophysics and cocktail party stories into a monologue worthy of Johnny Carson or P.T. Barnum. At one point he was explaining how as humans our five senses are completely inadequate for truly “making sense” of the universe around us, when out of nowhere he interrupted himself…

“Oh, if we have time later, remind me to tell you of the asteroid coming our way that will make the western part of the U.S. unlivable. But only if we have time.”

Spoiler alert: He never got around to it again, so I guess we’re pretty much fucked.

The man has done his math and is smart enough to know he knows nothing! He offers no answers but points out that the human condition brings with it constant discovery and accumulated knowledge over the generations and that there is salvation in knowing what we don’t know. “We are participants in the cosmos, vulnerable,” to its whims.

He implored us all to lose our intellectual egos. “We are not the top of anything!” Quite the opposite, we are merely a step in the evolutionary process of the cosmos. Consider this: The most common elements in the universe: hydrogen, oxygen, carbon, are also the most common elements in the human body. With Yoda like wiseness he summed it up: “Not only are we in the universe, the universe is in us.”

Lessons Learned:

• Genetically speaking chimpanzees are 99.99% identical to you
• Spacettification: verb- meaning- to die while going through a black hole
• Words O Wisdom: “Black holes, we really want to avoid them”
• Buy “Death by Black Hole”- it’s the best book by an astrophysicist with a Cap’n Crunch mustache that you will ever read!

Again, left by Travelistic as a comment, but we think it’s so cool we’re sharing it with you:

I don’t know when Jenni Wolfson is planning to do her solo show again, but you need to be there when it happens. There was a line of people waiting in the cold outside the Upright Citizens Brigade Theater to see RASH, which is a pretty amazing feat for a Monday night.

Honestly, I’ve never really cared for the space at UCB. I hate the pole that divides the audience into two sections; I always end up missing something because I sat on the wrong side of it. Also, the seating is kind of broken down and it’s cold and well, a basement. But Jenni Wolfson used the space well and made it somehow feel cozy like I was sitting in her apartment having a cup of tea with her and I could not take my eyes off her the entire 60 minutes. I have to say I’m a little speechless and entirely inspired by her story.

I think one of the reasons I loved it so much was because she tells it with so much humanity and humor. She’s a gifted writer and storyteller. The show wasn’t just about her experiences in Rwanda as a UN humanitarian aid worker in the 90’s. It was about her relationship with her family, her on the job love affair with a man she both feared and admired, and her struggle with wanting a personal life but at the same time having a world view that wouldn’t let her sit idly by. Oh and she’s not perfect (yay!) and this isn’t a lecture. This just might be the best one person show I’ve ever seen. Jenni seems like such an amazing, brave, intelligent, warm, and funny woman. I’d like to have a cup of tea with her.

Young and old, hipsters and UNCOOLKIDS all gathered in the basement of Union Hall on Wednesday September 6th for the first meeting of the Secret Science Club. Eugene Kaplan read from his book Sensuous Seas: Tales of a Marine Biologist about the mating habits of nurse sharks, Octopussy and her pets, and the use of stingray spines in the Mayan practice of penile bloodletting.

This was not your average science lecture.

Union Hall may be best known for it’s bocce ball court upstairs, but what often goes unmentioned is the unusual decor of the bar. Walking in feels like you’ve stumbled upon the library in an old mansion; dark wood paneling lines the entire place and behind the bar downstairs is a stuffed pheasant and monkey skull. Although it’s usually a music venue, it is the perfect location for a Science Club; you feel that Darwin and Huxley could possibly be behind the next corner discussing evolution.

The forty chairs downstairs filled up fast and the rest of the crowd was left standing around the walls, leaning in the catch a glimpse. I would definitely recommend going early to the next one, just to make sure you get a seat. It only lasted about an hour, although many of the attendees stuck around afterward to discuss what they had just learned. It wasn’t ‘funny’ or ‘ironic’ in any way. This was a collection of people who think science is awesome and wanted to learn more about it.

The Secret Science Club will meet on the first Wednesday of every month, and is always free. In October Lee Silver, author of Remaking Eden: How Genetic Engineering and Cloning Will Transform the American Family will be discussing Stem Cell research, and future events will have ’science-themed’ bands and even experiments.