Two pieces of writing that caught my eye today were Bridget Potter’s essay “Lucky Girl” in Guernica, and Joshua Cohen’s “Thirty-Six Shades of Prussian Blue” in Triple Canopy.

Potter’s startling essay relays her experience getting an illegal abortion as a nineteen-year-old in 1962 America, and the bevy of options and predicaments that came along with it–the social stigma of being an unwed mother, her humorous if stygian attempts to self-abort, and her final lone and costly trip by which she saved face. The title is sincere and ironic, revealing both Potter’s precarious position and her fortune at having survived a procedure by which, around that time, seventeen percent of women reportedly died yearly in the U.S. …more

This week in New York Keith Gessen and Elif Batuman talk, Guernica has a reading, Joanna Newsom sings and plays harp, Marcel Dzama appears, talks and signs books, The Moth has a Story Slam, Christopher Walken loses a hand and Zoe Kazan gives him one, and Atlas Obscura presents an international celebration of curious and obscure things.

MONDAY 3/15: Elif Batuman and Keith Gessen in conversation. Batuman’s pieces—for n+1, The New Yorker, Harper’s Magazine, and the London Review of Books— have made her one of the most sought-after and admired writers of her generation. In The Possessed, her latest work of non-fiction, Batuman investigates a possible murder at Tolstoy’s ancestral estate, retraces Pushkin’s wanderings in the Caucasus, and shows us why Old Uzbek has one hundred different words for crying. McNally Jackson. 7:00pm. …more

The South by Southwest Conferences and Festivals begin this Friday, 3/12, in Austin, Texas, and continue through 3/21. If you happen to be attending the festival, be sure to make it out to some of the presentations by Monofonus, the Austin-based multimedia organization, which has a full-schedule of film and video screenings, concerts and parties.

The schedule includes a screening of Lovers of Hate, a 2010 Sundance Film Festival Selection, which Monofonus helped produce. (Monofonus also provided the video installation for One Year Later: The Rumpus Anniversary Party).

Following SXSW, on 3/30, Monofonus will host the third installment of its Teleportal series, Teleportal 3: McSweeney’s, featuring Bill Cotter and Annie La Ganga, a Teleportal reading by Dean Young, video from Wholphin, and a special musical guest.

This week in New York Sam Lipsyte reads from The Ask, David Shields reads from Reality Hunger, the Magnetic Fields perform, playwright Suzan-Lori Parks reads, Lore Segal and Tao Lin engage in a panel discussion about the novella, Stephen Elliott holds a writing class, Philip Gourevitch, Francine Prose and Lewis Lapham explore natural and man-made calamities and Light Industry presents the films of Jon Moritsugu.

MONDAY: Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Suzan-Lori Parks, Topdog/Underdog, will be in conversation at 92Y. Her new play, The Book of Grace, premiers at the Public Theater this March. 92Y. Lexington Ave. @92nd St. 8:00pm. …more

This week in New York, it’s Armory Arts Week, Justin Taylor and Porochista Khakpour tell your literary fortune at Canteen Magazine’s Second Annual Benefit Gala, The PooL Art Fair opens, Old Hat performs, Happy Ending Reading Series presents Extreme Situations with Benjamin Anastas, Liev Schreiber talks to Jordan Roth, and Krista Tippett and Andrew Solomon talk science at NYPL.

MONDAY 3/1: Opening reception for Empire State of Mind: A Group Exhibition At The Chelsea Hotel. The Chelsea Hotel, in collaboration with Beez and Honey, presents Exhibitions, Performances, Video Art and Films. Building on the Chelsea Hotel’s historical and artistic significance in NYC, Beez and Honey will create an experience of art that combines all art forms for the entire week. Chelsea Hotel. 222 West 23rd Street. 6:00pm – 9:00pm. …more

The March/April Poets & Writers has a couple of great pieces on some New Yorkers to make note of.

An article on writer Sam Lipsyte, whose third novel, The Ask, is being published this month by FSG; and a conversation between novelists Porochista Khakpour and Danzy Senna on first novels, race, and the East-Coast West-Coast rap. Also in its pages is a fascinating interview with Michael Powell of–one of our favorite bookstores–Powell’s Books in Portland, Oregon by Jeremiah Chamberlin as part of Chamberlin’s “Inside Indie Bookstores” series, the full article of which is available online. …more

Gigantic Issue 2: Gigantic America is hitting stands this week across the country, and the pond.

Issue 2 features dialogues with Lydia Millet, Adrian Tomine and Sam Lipsyte, fiction from Robert Coover, Leni Zumas and Clancy Martin, and artwork by Thomas Doyle and Thomas Allen, among many other great writers and artists. The issue also comes with an insert–a set of collectible cards with biographies of famous Americans written by Deb Olin Unferth and Ken Sparling among others and original artwork by Andre da Loba (who’s been doing a lot of great work for the Rumpus, including his Notable New York illustrations). …more

For one night next week, March 4,  in support of literature, the arts and Canteen’s writing program for Harlem youth, Arnold Lehman and his wife Pam Lehman will open their Brooklyn Heights home for an intimate evening: Canteen Magazine’s Second Annual Benefit Gala.

Lehman, the risk-taking Director of the Brooklyn Museum who famously battled former mayor Rudolph Giuliani in defense of the First Amendment, joins the editors of Canteen and its host committee to invite you to do some or all of the following: …more

This week in New York 2010: Whitney Biennial opens, Gigantic holds a launch party for Issue 2: Gigantic America, Anderbo Reading at KGB, Mary Karr talks with Philip Gourevitch, MOMA premieres documentary about Mikhail Khodorkovsky–Russia’s wealthiest man and one if its most controversial figures, Ted Conover reads, André Aciman talks to Paul Leclerc, and Sam Mendes directs The Tempest at BAM.

MONDAY 2/22: Author Mary Karr talks with Paris Review editor Philip Gourevitch about her process as part of the magazine’s Art of Memoir interview series. Mary Karr is the author of several books, including The Liars’ Club, Cherry and, most recently, Lit, which made The New York Times best books of 2009. Joe’s Pub. 425 Lafayette St. $20. 7:00pm. …more

While it is now one month later, we’d like to thank everyone who came out for ONE YEAR LATER, the Rumpus anniversary party co-presented by The Rumpus and sister-mag HTMLGIANT at Broadway East, a charming place where Chinatown meets the Lower East Side. The party featured readings by Justin Taylor, Tao Lin, Stephen Elliott, Rivka Galchen and Deb Olin Unferth, musical guests Diane Louvel, Alina Simone and Jeffrey Lewis, DJ author Lincoln Michel and Special Guest DJ Khaela Maricich. While this celebration was not an all-out concert like the Rumpus is accustomed to having, it had an intimate, engaging and artful vibe, which I rarely experience. Following is a photographic exhibit of the night. …more

Fashion Week in New York has come to a close. And so therefore must our week-long run of literary fashionables.

We end our series with The Performing Artist and The Humanitarian. Miranda July and Dave Eggers are both noted for being torchbearers of their generation, a generation for the members of which one career, along one well-defined path, is not enough. While both July and Eggers have made strong contributions to the literary community, their talents continuously reach out  into other disciplines and areas of interest. For these reasons, we find them particularly fascinating as literary specimens and a good pair on which to end this series. We hope you’ve enjoyed. …more

This week in New York Howard Bloom interviewed by Richard Foreman, Malcolm Gladwell and Adam Gopnik discuss mankind, John Cale reflects on music and art, Ed Park and Lynne Tillman read at Triple Canopy and Light Industry’s celebration of their new venue, a tribute to Gilbert Sorrentino, Kevin Sampsell and Justin Taylor read, and exhibitions of artwork by Kiki Smith and Dinh Q. Lê.

MONDAY 2/15: In Conversation: An Evening with John Cale. John Cale (Welsh, b. 1942), artist, musician, sonic innovator, and a founding member of the experimental rock band The Velvet Underground, reflects upon the liaison between music and art. MOMA. 11 W. 53rd St. 7-9pm. …more

This week in New York, white tents are set up behind the New York Public Library in Bryant Park. It is called Fashion Week because it is a celebration of fashion of the sartorial kind. While that is happening in the park, we’ll be devoting space in the blog each day this week to two of our best-loved literary fashionables.

The term “fashionable,” here used as a collective noun that seemingly suggests something like “of or pertaining to persons of fashion,” will mean something slightly different this week. This week we’ll explore writers who were not necessarily fashionable in the sense commonly understood, but internally fashionable for having developed distinct literary personas.

We begin our series with two writers with very unique literary personas: Samuel Beckett and Gertrude Stein. …more

Mallards with human heads are not what I expect to see on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. But that’s what I saw. Yesterday. And I wasn’t scared, because I was at the Metropolitan Mausoleum of Art in which chamber I can rely on a warm and fuzzy fear-free look into the past, in this case back into the drawing rooms of aristocratic Victorian women.

Playing with Pictures: The Art of Victorian Photocollage is a dazzling exhibit of over fifty images that artfully mix photography with watercolor drawings including Mixed Pickles by the Countess of Yarborough, and other surreal montages by the Princess of Wales and, the apropos, Lady Filmer. But never mind the often irreverent, subversive and intelligent quality of these images. These women were only “playing.” …more

Over the past couple of weeks, Gelitin, a collective of four Austrian artists—Wolfgang Gantner, Ali Janka, Florian Reither and Tobias Urban—have occupied Chelsea’s Greene Naftali gallery in New York in a happening called “Blind Sculpture.”

Their productions are inspired by the work of Sigmund Freud, the sculpture and performance work of Franz West, and in response to the exhibition methods known generally as Relational Aesthetics, which is an art practice that questions the boundaries of art, is inspired by a desire to conflate life and art and is situation-based. Art that involves people, doing things. My friends Hanne and Jochem had taken me to see it. I asked if there was a common thread to their work. “Usually someone shows his penis,” Hanne said and laughed. It was late January–the first Saturday it had been open. Over the course of ten afternoons in total, Gelitin would use the space to complete their “sculpture.” As of last Saturday, February 6, the sculpture is complete and on view. …more

This week in New York, Harper’s presents “Love: A Rebuke” with Colson Whitehead, Heidi Julavits and Sam Lipsyte, Simon Critchley in bed with Cabinet’s Brian Dillon chatting about hypochondria, Vol. 1 Brooklyn and Gignatic present the Greatest 3-Minute Rock ‘n Roll Story Ever, Adam Haslett reads from his debut novel, The Magnetic Fields perform, Zachary German and Tao Lin celebrate the release of German’s new book, and BOMB Magazine hosts its Winter Issue Launch Party.

MONDAY 2/8: Susan Sontag. PROMISED LANDS (1974). Susan Sontag’s third directorial effort and her only documentary, PROMISED LANDS scrutinizes the ongoing Arab-Israeli conflict and the growing divisions within Jewish thought over the question of Palestinian sovereignty. Shot in Israel during the final days and immediate aftermath of the 1973 Yom Kippur War, it is undoubtedly one of Sontag’s most incisive examinations of contemporary Jewish consciousness, and she considered it her most personal film.With and introduction by artist Paul Chan. Anthology Film Archives. 32 Second Ave. …more

While the second print issue of Gigantic, a magazine of short prose and art, is only days away from its anticipated release, Gigantic has just published new and noteworthy work online.

There’s short fiction and poetry by Saša Stanišić (click here to read the recent Rumpus interview with Stanišić), including “Let’s Go Sleep Japan Soon,” about a couple who “have a soft spot for sleeping where famous people once slept.” Like fellow Bosnian-born writer Aleksandar Hemon, Stanišić emigrated from Bosnia during the Yugoslav Wars. And though Eastern European, his writing feels inspired more by Barthelme and Beckett than by Dostoevsky. …more

This week in New York Unsound, the avant-garde culture festival that began in Eastern Europe, debuts in the city, historian Garry Wills discusses the atomic bomb, a night with filmmaker Ross McElwee at IFC, Jamaica Kincaid and Gary Shteyngart on Becoming Americans, Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen speaks, Hot Chip performs, Projection: A Reading Series presents a multimedia show with David Levithan and Meghan O-Rourke, and Opium Magazine celebrates its 9-year anniversary.

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MONDAY 2/1: Bomb Power: Garry Wills in Conversation with Paul Holdengraber. In BOMB POWER: The Modern Presidency and the National Security State, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian Garry Wills reveals how the atomic bomb transformed or nation down to its deepest constitutional roots by dramatically increasing the power of the modern presidency and redefining the government as a national security state. South Court Auditorium of the New York Public Library. 42nd St. @Fifth Ave. 7:00pm. …more

This week in New York Lydia Davis and Richard Howard read, John Wray, Heidi Julavits and Sarah Manguso discuss ebooks at Melville House, Of Montreal and Damon & Naomi perform, Lapham’s Quarterly celebrates the launch of its Religion Issue, artists recreate the filmography of David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest character James Incandenza, and Selected Shorts presents actors acting out stories from Best European Fiction 2010.

MONDAY 1/25: Nick Flynn reads from The Ticking is the Bomb. Strand Bookstore. 828 Broadway. 7:00pm. …more

The Rumpus and HTMLGIANT present ONE YEAR LATER, a celebration of the first anniversary of The Rumpus, tonight, January 21, 2010.

The night will feature readings by Rivka Galchen, Tao Lin, Deb Olin Unferth, Justin Taylor and Stephen Elliott, musical guests Alina Simone, Diane Louvel, and Jeffrey Lewis. With special guest DJ Khaela Maricich of The Blow and video art installation by Monofonus. …more

In the greatest city in the world there are many ways to honor Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., one of the greatest civil rights leaders. In New York today, a day established as a federal holiday in 1986, and this week, choose your celebration:

Soundtrack for a Revolution:  Soundtrack for a Revolution, executive produced by Danny Glover, tells the story of the American civil rights movement through its powerful music: freedom songs sung on picket lines, in mass meetings, in paddy wagons, and in jail cells by black and white Americans all over the country. Featuring performances by John Legend, Joss Stone, Wyclef Jean, The Roots, Ritchie Havens, and others, along with riveting archival footage, and interviews with civil rights foot soldiers and leaders, including Congressman John Lewis, Harry Belafonte, Julian Bond, and Ambassador Andrew Young, Soundtrack for a Revolution celebrates the vitality of the music of the era. 1:00pm. BAM Rose Cinemas. …more

This week in New York, the Rumpus and HTMLGIANT present ONE YEAR LATER a multimedia event with an allstar lineup of readers and musicians including Rivka Galchen, Tao Lin, Jeffrey Lewis and more in celebration of the Rumpus’s First Anniversary, the Frederick Wiseman retrospective begins at MOMA, the Rumpus’s own Stephen Elliott gives talk “On Creating the Adderall Diaries,” Obediance–a film documenting the infamous “Milgram experiments,” screens, Patti Smith and Sam Shepard reunite to read at 92Y, and Arthur Miller’s A View from the Bridge opens.

MONDAY 1/18: New York Voices of the Civil Rights Movement – In celebration of Martin Luther King Day, NYC Media and the Commission on Human Rights will present a special screening at the Apollo Theater on Thursday, January 14th. The agencies will present a special, advanced screening of FIGHTING FOR JUSTICE: NEW YORK VOICES OF THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT, followed by a panel discussion featuring activists and scholars. The Apollo Theater. 253 W. 125th St. (bet. 7&8 Ave.). Free.
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Between gigs with Dinosaur Jr. on Monday and Lou Reed, Sonic Youth and Philip Glass at the Tuli Kupferberg benefit on Friday, Jeffrey Lewis will be singing solo at The Rumpus anniversary party at Broadway East on Thursday.

Triple Canopy, the revered online magazine, which works collectively with writers, artists, researchers and other collaborators on projects that deal critically with culture and politics, will be commissioning ten projects in five areas: original research, new-media journalism, Web-based artwork, and public programs.

Commissioned works will be published in the magazine and presented to live audiences in the next year. Proposals are due February 15th.

The filmography of the fictional Wild Turkey drinking filmmaker and visionary tennis instructor at Enfield Academy, James Incandenza, the central character of David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest, will make an appearance of sorts at the Gallery at The Leroy Neiman Center for Print Studies.

Beginning January 29th, the Neiman Center at Columbia University will present A Failed Entertainment: Selections from the Filmography of James O. Incandenza. The filmography is made possible by the contributions of artists and filmmakers who have been commissioned to re-create the seminal works of the storied oeuvre of the avant-garde filmmaker, all of which is included as a footnote in Wallace’s novel.

While the exhibition will be up through February 19th, the spirit of Incandenza will be celebrated at an opening reception, with film screening, on Friday, January 29th from 6:00-8:00pm.

The Rumpus and HTMLGIANT present ONE YEAR LATER, a celebration of the first anniversary of The Rumpus, on January 21, 2010.

The night will feature readings by Rivka Galchen, Tao Lin, Deb Olin Unferth, Justin Taylor and Stephen Elliott, musical guests Alina Simone, Diane Louvel, and just added, Jeffrey Lewis. With special guest DJ Khaela Maricich of The Blow and video art installation by Monofonus. …more

In New York this week Richard Price is interviewed by Philip Gourevitch, David Byrne presents Creation in Reverse, Joyce Carol Oates and Elaine Showalter chat over brunch, Tao Lin (who will also be reading at The Rumpus’s first anniversary party) and CAConrad read at The Animal Farm Reading Series, Dave Eggers at the Strand, Women of Antifolk, and the Bruce High Quality Foundation present a re-staging of the first lecture ever dedicated to the art of magic.

MONDAY 1/11: Richard Price, author of Lush Life and Clockers, and writer for The Wire, who has been called “king of American urban fiction,” will be interviewed by The Paris Review’s Philip Gourevitch. Barnes & Noble. 150 E. 86th St. Free. 7:00pm. …more

Poets & Writers has a new series, Inside Indie Bookstores, by Jeremiah Chamberlin, associate editor of Fiction Writers Review.

Each month, according to Chamberlin, the series will feature an interview with a bookseller, one of many “entrepreneurs who represent the last link in the chain that connects writers with their intended audience.” This month, the spotlight’s on Richard Howorth of Square Books in Oxford, Mississippi. In support of the series, until January 15, 2010, Poets & Writers offers a special discounted rate on subscriptions: $12. …more

(via Flavorpill)

In “By George,” Maira Kalman’s final installment of her year-long New York Times series, “And the Pursuit of Happiness,” Kalman ushers in the new decade with a tribute to the man without whom our nation wouldn’t be. …more