We appear to be the happy operators of a menagerie! At a reading in Chicago on Tuesday, January 8th, an elderly gentleman concluded the night’s comments by saying that he had never heard of George Saunders until a few days earlier, but the New York Times’ review*’s claim was too substantial to deny. So, he […]
Bulletpoint’d review of Aleksandar Hemon’s new book, The Book of My Lives, now commencing: —Most of the stories in this book have been previously published in other outlets (the New Yorker, Playboy, McSweeney’s, etc.) over the past few years. But that doesn’t actually make this book this book any less cohesive. In fact, excepting a few […]
Geoffrey Todd Smith is a visual artist living in Chicago. Originally from Cleveland, he graduated from the School of the Art Institute with a BFA in 1995 and headed an hour west to DeKalb to attain his MFA from Northern Illinois University. His work focuses on dense, pattern-based motifs that generate a gravitational pull. The […]
Rhode Island has much to recommend it as a culturally-rich arts destination. In recent years, Providence, the state’s “creative capital,” has been touted as a vibrant hub of artistic endeavor. Among the many knowledgeable curators of the dizzying array of cultural offerings, I find my personal tastes well-served by the Providence Athenaeum and the doyenne […]
First Wave: Vladimir Nabokov—Lolita (1955), Pale Fire (1962), Speak, Memory (1936-66), Ada, or Ardor: A Family Chronicle (1969) Thomas Pynchon—V. (1963) , Crying of Lot 49 (1966), Gravity’s Rainbow (1973), Mason & Dixon (1997), Against The Day (2006) William Gaddis—The Recognitions (1955), JR (1975), a Frolic of His Own (1994) John Barth—Fiction: the Sot-Weed Factor […]
