Oh, reached into the ol’ thesaurus for that one! Still fighting a cold so let’s be linky today.
According to EarlyWord, sales of Richard Blanco’s poetry books have zoomed up the Amazon ranks. Yesterday Looking for the Gulf Motel went from 1255 to #34. I just checked and it has now slipped to #74. Still, how awesome is that? The number of holds at my public library have also increased from three, when I put in a request for the book a couple weeks ago, to twenty today. Woo! If only things like this were a regular occurrence with poetry titles.
Blanco is forty-four and has been writing since he was a young man. You have to start young, right? Now and then we hear of people past sixty publishing their first book and it somehow seems cute. But seventy-five-year-old Natsuko Kuroda isn’t going to take any guff. She won the Akutagawa Prize for her story “ab Sango.” She is the oldest person to ever win the prize. Upon receiving her award she said, ” ‘Thank you for discovering me while I am still alive.’ ” Using age as an excuse for why I can’t become a writer is no longer valid. I’ll have to try to think up some new and more creative reason.
But then, maybe if I take writing lessons from W.G. Sebald (via) I will zoom onto the bestseller lists. Not likely since I don’t think Sebald was a bestseller. He is highly regarded though (if you have not read him he really is marvelous) and isn’t that what we want more than the money? Who am I kidding, I want the money too! Why does it need to be an either/or proposition?
Maybe it’s because so many children’s books are sexist, portraying females as indoor passive observers that has stinted me. Granted, the study was of Malayasian children’s books but I don’t doubt a similar result would be found in a study of my childhood reading or even current children’s books in the U.S. Then if you are a science fiction or fantasy fan, there are the sexist books covers to contend with. But fantasy writer Jim Hines has started replicating the poses of the sexed up women on book covers to pointed and hilarious effect. Then there is The Hawkeye Initiative which challenges the portrayal of women in comics by swapping male and female characters usually substituting Hawkeye from the Avengers for the female. The idea being that if Hawkeye doesn’t look stupid in the female pose then it probably isn’t sexist. The website will get your blood boiling and make you laugh at the same time.
Ok, that’s should do it for this evening. Hopefully my brain will be up for more coherent thoughts tomorrow. Assuming, that is, my brain had coherent thoughts to begin with.
I think a fair number Sebald’s writing tips are quite useful, also rarely heard.
Richard, I agree, he does make some useful tips. I especially like what he says under “on approach” and “on reading and intertextuality”
Sorry you still feel badly … perhaps you should make yourself a salmagundi (vegetarian style). It’s a very healthy dish!
And now, I’m off to bed to read my book …
whisperinggums, thanks! I feel sure after a restful weekend I will feel much better. I just have to make it to the weekend! A veg style salmagundi sounds delicious. I will have to place an order with Bookman
I’m sure you will … Feel better after a good weekend I mean!
I was kind of disappointed with Blanco’s inauguration effort. Thought it sounded too much like a Carl Sandburg update or something… (c.f. “Chicago”)
Is being a sort of Carl Sandberg (or indeed a modern Whitman) simply almost inevitable for a public, accessible poem that is adressed to millions? Blanco’s poem could easily have been much worse and compares favourably with any recent effort produced by recent poet laureates in the UK- a similarly difficult gig. I am glad that a lot of readers want to follow the inauguration poem up by buying or borrowing Blanco’s books.
Ian, I don’t know about inevitable but maybe it is difficult not to. Blanco could have done much worse, it can’t be easy writing for such an occasion. I am glad so many are interested in his books too. An unforeseen perk.
rhapsody, there are worse things to sound like than Carl Sandburg
There is nothing new or terribly original in the poem nor is it especially complex, but I liked his approach and how he tied the country together.
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I wonder if there would be an “Oprah” effect for poetry if she chose a few poetry books as the perfect read?
I bet there would be!
I love that quote from the 75-year-old poet. Way to rock humility and pride combined! And don’t colds make you feel unnecessarily awful? I do hope you are well on the mend by now. Hugs!
Isn’t she awesome!?
It is never too late to write!
You are right, never too late!