I really wanted something grand to announce my ascension to blog captain for these next couple of weeks, but grandness doesn't come easy in this day and age.

Nate "Honk If You're Horny for Golf" Barberick and I once briefly discussed how terrible a certain movie about a writer was, though I think both of us only saw the trailer.

I know I only saw the trailer.

A certain passage from this movie that was utilized in the trailer grated on me, burned into my memory and always seemed at the tip of my thoughts. This was in the early days of the Internet, when I was a full five inches taller (don't ask) and the sky was full of kicking horses. I thought about sampling the passage and trying out the baby Internet as delivery system for the ridiculousness that had been branded onto my brain--no explanation, just the passage, looped, on/in/within the Internet, a megaphone of hate.

I was under no illusion that the project would exorcise the passage from my being, but it seemed like it could be the next best thing to rebroadcasting my sleeping dreams, image-by-image-feeling-by-feeling (which I had dreamt about as a child and would still if I wasn't so jaded by the ugly realities of existence.).

So, I thought about doing it for a while. I lived in an apartment building that smelled like dogs because it was full of pit bulls. Most of the other occupants of the building seemed unhinged and/or special. Me? I was a fucking genius. I video taped a falling burning mattress thrown by a firefighter from a 6story window in the building next door to mine, then a man picking his nose near the scene. I ate Morningstar fake chicken every night, ladies!

At some point at my desk at work, I believe it was in the A.M. (as if it matters), I received what was then called an email that contained this link. I then realized a bunch of shit about the world and myself.

D. Rolf (Your Captain, Your Stomach, Your Lotion, for two weeks)

I know I will never forget 10/10/08.

I was driving to work at my first cool-sounding job ("oh me? I work at the Arts and Science Center, helping launch the Body Worlds exhibit... yeah, I know, it is...") and listening to the Diane Rehm Show. On this particular day was an interview with two former poets laureate Billy Collins and Donald Hall.

It was one of the most stirring interviews on writing, and poetry, I may have ever heard. Here are some highlights:

1. I learned that the plural for "poet laureate" is "poets laureate."

2. Billy Collins said the argument that no one reads anymore may feel true but it is actually rather thin, considering there are now more MFA and MA and PhD programs in the fields of writing and literature than ever before, more literary magazines than ever before, and more poetry readings than there have ever been. He said we only feel this way because of our audience: the audience for writers tends to be other writers. He likened this to attending a symphony, and everyone in the theatre seats is holding a violin case (or something... listen to it to double check the metaphor).

3. One of them, I think Mr. Collins, said something lovely about death in writing. When we sit down to dinner at a restaurant and there are flowers at the table there's a moment where we reach out to touch them. Why do we do this? he asked, To see if they are real. If they are real, they will die, and are therefore somehow more beautiful. And if they are fake, we aren't as impressed at how that beauty came to us, and that it will be here forever.

And... that's about all I can remember. I hope that link works, and if it doesn't, that you can find one that does. It is very much worth listening to, no matter what you write.

Billy Collins talks about how the central theme of poetry is death in this interview which took place in November of 2005

Another wonderful interview: with fiction writer Antonya Nelson (KU alum!). I delayed my Valentine's Day activities to finish listening to this one.

I was talking with Jameelah over pasta and mentioned this video. I thought I would share it. Why's nobody blog-postin'? (Maybe I'm going nuts with the school-blog.)

The following should be queued up to just before an interview conducted by Charlie Rose between David Foster Wallace, Jonathan Franzen, and Mark Leyner. It's about how they viewed "contemporary" fiction in 1996. It's interesting to hear big-time authors from the past talking about their present. Is fiction dead yet?



Please notice these things:

• DFW's face at Rose's introduction, moving from surprise to elation to anger to stoicism in 1.5 sec.
• Mark Leyner looking, acting, talking, and theorizing much like a man who would sell you a Jeep Cherokee.
• Charlie Rose's complete and total WORSHIP of DFW.
• Jonathan Franzen sounding like the pragmatic uncle I have never had.