Cynthia Closkey's blog
Not being a dinner-hour TV viewer I’ve missed the controversy surrounding Ken Jennings, the current ‘Jeopardy’ champion, who is on a 26-show winning streak. Jennings, who in last night’s airing admitted that “being a nerd really pays off sometimes,” is the first contestant to go on a long winning streak since the show scrapped its …
Continue reading “I’ll take “Quiz Show Phenoms” for $1000, Alex”
Over on McSweeney’s, a timely and Pittsburgh-originated open letter to an entity that is unlikely to respond: An Open Letter to the Radioactive Spider That Never Bit Me. Dear radioactive spider, I’m already twenty-seven years old, and I still don’t have the abilities of a spider. I know you’re out there, and, for whatever reason, …
Expert parodist The Minor Fall, The Major Lift sees similarities between the writings of
Robert Coover, distinguished author and Brown University professor, is is interviewed in McSweeney’s Internet Tendency: [C]reative-writing workshops have absolutely nothing to do with our nation’s literature, though writers sometimes, more or less by chance, turn up in them, looking for an agent or romance or someone to start a new magazine with them. Creative-writing workshops …
Continue reading “Learn to handle chaw and spit through your teeth”
I apologize for posting so little this week. Workload and other life demands have occupied me, and will continue to do so for a few days more. May I suggest a bit of diverting reading while I’m away? The winners of Bonny Doon Vineyard’s parody contest are available online. Here’s the beginning of the winning …
I commented over at Sticky Notes about the controversy surrounding The Paris Review and its attitudes toward new and “emerging” writers, and Maud Newton’s interview with the magazine’s editor, Bridget Hughes. But I’m still ruffled enough about it to need to mention it again here. I’m interested in hearing viewpoints on this topic: drop me …
How to celebrate Bloomsday (June 16) in Pittsburgh: The James Joyce Society of Pittsburgh is presenting a reading (in three concurrent sessions) of Ulysses: Join us for a reading of James Joyce’s Ulysses the most famous novel of the 20th century, that made a Dublin day – June 16, 1904 – immortal…at FINNIGAN’S WAKE 20 …
Continue reading “…and his heart was going like mad and yes I said yes I will Yes.”
David Sedaris’s reading last night at the Benedum Theater was as entertaining as one could hope. He read two essays — both from his latest book, Dress Your Family in Courduroy and Denim — and selections from hiw diary, then talked up a book by a lesser-known writer and took question from the audience. He …
A call for photographs of toddlers in action (or in inaction) for Stephany Aulenback’s book project, Beckett for Babies: [W]e’re still looking for the perfect photograph (preferably two or three perfect photographs, actually) to go with this text: First baby: That passed the time. Second baby: It would have passed in any case. First baby: …
The winning story has been published online: “Untitled,” by David Kennerly. It is so short and tied together that it seems a shame to excerpt any of it, but I post the first sentence to help draw you in. He had always tried to be a gentleman, courteous, respectful in the most thorough way, and …
Continue reading “McSweeney’s Twenty-Minute Stories Grand-Prize Winner”