Dreamers Rise An Open Notebook And for those who choose the twisty road, prefer it to the straight Let joy beat out old misery, as love will conquer hate. Illustration by Henry L. Stephens from The Goblin Snob (ca. 1855) A sort of electronic broadside, composed of rants and reviews, conceits and speculations, and whatever else feels the need to be here. Issued as chance will have it. Spetmeber Yes, it was supposed to be “September,“ but as typos go I rather like it, and so it stays. Would you like some more wiener schnitzel, Herr Spetmeber? Musician and activist John Hall has won the Democratic nomination for Congress in my district (New York 19th). Indications are that John will offer a vigorous challenge to the incumbent Republican, Sue Kelly, who's been given a free ride for way too long. A few weeks before the primary I had the opportunity to hear John Hall and the other Democratic contenders present their views at a candidates' forum, and found him by far the most polished, forthright, and well prepared of the lot. (I also had a chance to chat with him — briefly and unexpectedly — when I ran into him at a restaurant a few days before the primary.) The 19th is considered a fairly tough district for a Democrat, but the fact that this year's primary drew roughly twice as many voters as last time is a good sign. If enough Democrats come out again on Election Day and enough Republicans decide to stay home, who knows? It's been a while since the last time I picked up a new novel by Mario Vargas Llosa. I'm a little past the halfway point in his latest, Travesuras de la niña mala, the title of which translates (not very felicitously, I'm afraid) as something like The Bad Girl's Mischief. Ostensibly, if you believe the publicity materials, it's the story of the narrator's obsession with a woman he first falls in love with as a teenager in Peru around the year 1950, and continues to pursue across several decades, in spite of the fact that she repays his love with betrayals and worse (hence, the travesuras). In fact, though, the niña mala may well be the book's least interesting character, which leads me to suspect that the novel is not really about her at all — it's about exile. The narrator, Ricardo Somocurcio, leaves Peru as soon as he reaches adulthood and settles in Paris, where he makes a living as a translator and interpreter of several languages for UNESCO. He seems, to some extent, a stand-in for the author, though he is not a writer. As the years pass, each reunion with the niña mala corresponds in time with a friendship between the narrator and another person or persons: first, a Peruvian revolutionary; then a former classmate who is making a living painting equine portraits for the cream of British society; then a polyglot colleague who had been born into the Ladino-speaking community of Smyrna. Each is an exile, and — curiously — each dies from unrelated causes before Vargas Llosa moves on to the next section. I haven't read far enough to see if this pattern of fate will befall the narrator's next friendship, with a married couple (Belgian and Venezuelan) and their adopted, mute, Vietnamese-born son. The book has not been translated into English yet, but if you do read some Spanish it's worth seeking out. (Be forewarned though: Vargas Llosa uses a fair number of Peruvianisms that are not in my usually dependable New World Spanish/English English/Spanish Dictionary.) In the pipe: Peter Case, who's been posting some reminiscences of his early years on his blog of late, now says they'll be collected in a chapbook to be published in October by Everthemore Books, which seems to be an imprint of A Capella Books in Atlanta. Peter promises that details will be forthcoming on his site, so keep checking there. He also reports that he'll be recording a new CD later this year. No word yet on the release date of Freedy Johnston's long-promised Rain on the City, but in the meantime there is one “new” Freedy CD out, Live at McCabe's, which presents a performance from several years back at McCabe's Guitar Shop in California. You can preview it at Freedy's website. Andy Irvine's group Mozaik reportedly released a second CD, Changing Trains several months ago, but as far as I can tell there's still no easy way to obtain it (except maybe at gigs). [Update (September 2007): it should be released shortly in the US by Compass Records.] Just published, but also not widely distributed, is Leagues O'Toole's The Humours of Planxty, a chronicle of the Irish trad group of which Andy is a founding member. Elizabeth Hand's new collection of stories, Saffron & Brimstone, is due out in a few weeks from M Press. is due in 2007. Mister Aitch's blog Giornale Nuovo introduced me to the work of Kahn & Selesnick, in particular to their latest project, Eisbergfreistadt, supposedly inspired by “an actual incident in 1923 when a mammoth iceberg ran aground in the Baltic port of Lubeck, towering over the town and terrifying the populace.” According to the artists, a deck of playing cards commemorating the event, with suits of birds, factories, icebergs, and thorns, will be made available to the public later this year. Update: The entire Eisbergfreistadt project is currently (May 4th - June 9th, 2007) on exhibit at the Pepper Gallery in Boston. The playing cards mentioned above are now available, for a reasonable sum, either as a deck of individual cards or as reproduced in the pages of a paperbound book. A more recent posting at Giornale Nuovo has more information and several images. Auf Wiedersehen. September 20, 2006; updated September 2007 [ Permalink ] Previous page Next page Home Index About Email me

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