Creative Nonfiction – with Google Maps
I mean, come on, this is genius!
From The Rumpus:
Author Dinty W. Moore has an interesting tale about chance run-ins with George Plimpton that starts when Moore was an undergrad at the University of Pittsburgh and ends, decades later, in Baltimore, Maryland.
What makes the story more than just barroom conversation fodder is the way in which Moore delivers it; setting it out, piece by piece, using Google Maps.
Yes. Google Maps.
This is how art and technology come together. Forget Twitter. Love it.
It’s like deja vu all over again!
My boyfriend Joe and I watched an awesome new TV show last night called Spartacus: Blood and Sand. And by “awesome,” I mean, “terrible.” And by “new,” I mean, “basically a rip-off of every other like-minded TV show or movie that’s come before it.”
Don’t get me wrong: this happens all the time and I’m sure it wasn’t intentional. I wrote a story that I thought was awesome and original and it turns out Jhumpa Lahiri beat me to it. She wrote almost the exact same story, years before I did, and won a whole bunch of prizes for the collection it appeared in. Like that one, you know, the big one? Oh yeah. The Pulitzer. Whatever.
So, OK, I’m certainly not going to go up against a Pulitzer prize winning literary superstar now that I know my story is just like hers, but the guys behind Spartacus: Ass and Titties probably didn’t realize they were so blatantly copying other sources. I mean, honestly, who actually saw 300? Barely a blip in the collective consciousness. And Gladiator? Short-lived arthouse flick! HBO’s Rome? Least popular TV show ever.
If they were even aware of the similarities, I’m sure they figured only a handful of fanatical movie-lovers like myself would have seen them all and be capable of putting the pieces together and recognizing the guiding forces behind Spartacus: Hairy and Greasy.
(Perhaps the most horrifying postscript to my annoyance is that Spartacus: Been There and Done That has already been renewed for a Season 2 based on how “ground-breaking” and “original” it is. Yikes.)
This isn’t to say that certain tried-and-true plots can’t work again and again. I love to tell the story of the bus driver who told me to rethink my life as a writer because “all the stories have been told,” both because it’s funny and because it’s sort of true. You’d be hard-pressed to find a story (or movie, or TV show) that wasn’t some kind of variant of any other. But that doesn’t mean there’s a lack of entirely watchable/readable stuff out there; it’s the way the story is told that separates it from the next, makes it new and exciting.
In the case of Spartacus: Long Togas and Man Bikinis, however, there’s little to nothing that sets it apart from its predecessors. Instead, it takes what Rome did (period costumes and sets, political intrigue, living history), what 300 did (slow-mo blood spatter, comic book styling) and what Gladiator did (uh…gladiators) and does it worse. Much worse. Much, much worse. Even the supposedly on-location filming (in New Zealand, of course) looks shoddy and fake, like the trees and rocks are just painted on a sheet and strung in front of a camera.
Even the copious amount of cunnilingus – if two instances can be called “copious” – fails to thrill me. Look, Spartacus: Shits and Giggles, I know you’re only doing it so the ladiez will think you’re pushing boundaries of TV sexuality (yaaaaaaawn), but let’s be real. Nobody’s fooled. Besides, porn has cornered that market – with better writing and more authentic sets.
I didn’t expect cinematic genius from this show, but I thought it would at least be terrible in a fun way. Instead it’s terrible in a way that makes me wish I’d chosen to spend that hour doing something else, like watching Gladiator. Or writing a TV script, since it looks like any hack with a DVD player can pull it off.
The Fiction Project
I’m very, very excited about this. (Fiction! Moleskine! Illustration!)
via TheRumpus:
When the Art House Co-op talks about making art accessible, they’re not just talking about viewing and consuming. They’re all about generating inspiration for artists of every kind by creating projects that will get people making, creating and writing.
The Fiction Project is one of those. And it’s easy: send $18 bucks to Art House by February 10, and they’ll send you a spanking new Moleskine journal and a randomly selected theme. Then you get crackin’ on a narrative of any kind, with at least 51 percent writing. Illustration is encouraged. You can collaborate with anyone you like and take the project wherever your mind goes, as long as it meets the simple criteria of the project. Check out samples from past fiction projects. All books sent back to Art House by April 14th will be included in the project exhibit and then become part of the permanent collection of the new Brooklyn Art Library.
Frickin’ sweet! I’m definitely signing up. Will you?
Merry Christmas, indeed!
Exciting news – I duped a magazine into publishing one of my stories. What a bunch of suckers!
Kidding, of course, but I am being published and I’m pretty excited. It’s a young mag called The Wanderlust Review. I actually stumbled on their call for submissions while I was looking at Seattle real estate and dreaming about getting the hell out of Pittsburgh. Wanderlust, indeed!
The piece is short fiction titled “Follow the Signs,” about a woman who gets married and then runs away, not sure if she’s made a good decision or not. I think it’s a good fit for the Wanderlust Review and I’m happy they agreed with me.
Pretty snappy response time, too – only 39 days. I know that because I used Duotrope’s submission tracker for the first time ever. So far my acceptance rate is 100% and Duotrope thinks I’m a big fat liar. No doubt the coming weeks will pull that down to something suitably low for an amateur like me…
Feeling very puffed up about this “after” business now. A little positive reinforcement never hurts!
After is looming…
This whole experience is getting a lot more real now!
Last night was my thesis defense. I sat down with three of my professors, three people whose opinions and work I deeply respect, and tried not to sound like a blubbering idiot as I fielded questions about my project. It started out pretty rough, I forgot everything I wanted to say, couldn’t remember anything about my stories. Bit by bit I warmed up. By the end of the meeting I felt like a rock star.
And I passed.
Sorry, let me rephrase: I PASSED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I chose my board because I knew they’d be hard on me and and demand excellence, so I was anxious about the defense. They ended up having a lot of very complimentary things to say about my writing. Some great ideas about where to go next, too. Plus they all encouraged me to keep writing and working and pushing myself. As if I could stop!!
It’s been a long and stressful process, but I’m so proud of my collection and so excited to have been deemed worthy by three people whose opinions matter on a personal level. Now I just have to finish up my kid’s lit class and Life After MFA will really be in the “after” stage.
Yikes.
DONE DONE DONE.
Bringing us one step closer to the “after” part:
My thesis is DONE and has been turned over to my board. I defend on December 1.
Holy. CRAP.
Author Photos
A post over at The Rumpus led me to a post over at The Millions led me to Marion Ettlinger’s online gallery. OK, so there’s my paper trail.
Anyway. I’m something of a naughty reader, I suppose, because except for the few authors I’ve met or really, really adore, I just don’t know what writers look like. I think I could pick Hemingway out of a crowd (James Patterson for sure!), but could I point to David Mitchell? Or Annie Proulx? Or, jeez, Alice Munro? Nope. In the highly unlikely event I ever walked by somebody on the street, I’d miss my chance to grovel for an autograph!
(I’m like this with singers, too. I think it’s because I don’t care about the band/artist/writer as a “person” so much as a producer of that art I like. Who cares what the singer looks like as long as the song is good, right? Or is that terrible?)
Imagine my surprise, then, to go flipping through Ettlinger’s gallery and stumble across photos of authors I’ve widely read…and find that they look exactly like I’d subconsciously assumed they would, based on their writing.
Cormac McCarthy, for example. I mean, what else could he look like? Am I right? Or am I right?
See also: Charles Frazier; Raymond Carver; Joyce Carol Oates; Alice Munro (actually, I just love the mischievous twinkle in her eye). And basically everyone else there, except Jhumpa Lahiri and Truman Capote.
OED lite…
This may be the coolest thing I’ve ever seen on the interwebs: Online Etymology Dictionary.
Which word would you sponsor?
