The Daily Rumpus
Get Overly Personal Emails
From Stephen Elliott
Gil Scott-Heron died on May 27, at age 62. As I write this, there’s no official cause of death. We’ll know soon enough. This is America, after all. Whatever the medical details suggest, I’m listing his official cause of death as grief.
When I first came to Boston, a thousand years ago, I taught a class for a tiny literary outfit called Grub Street. It was held in a dingy high school room and enrollment was, uh, spotty. Only three students showed up consistently:
When I was about ten years old, I hit my older brother in the mouth with a baseball bat. We were standing around in a field, hitting pebbles with the bat, and I got him on my backswing. There was a lot of blood.
David Sirota writes a weekly column that appears in dozens of newspapers. He has his own radio show. And he’s a frequent guest on cable TV gabfests. These facts should qualify Sirota as a pundit.
But it feels wrong – and slightly dirty – to use that word.
...moreIke Reilly – “Suffer For The Trust”
Rally for Workers’ Rights
Madison, WI
(Yet Another) Rumpus Lamentation:
It’s a sunny winter day in Tucson, Arizona. There’s an event being held in the parking lot of a supermarket called Safeway.
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My wife got upset last night, after she heard about the Rand Paul supporters who tackled a progressive activist named Lauren Valle. One of them stepped on her head. Valle suffered a concussion. The technical term is aggravated battery.
(If you came here looking for porn we recommend Kink.com sites.)
Steve Almond interviews his mom about her new book The Monster Within: The Hidden Side of Motherhood. (That’s right, Steve’s mom wrote a book about a mother’s fear of having a terrible child.)
...moreDear Readers, Citizens, Freaks,
Like a lot of you, I’ve been frustrated the last two years. Despite winning the presidency and overwhelming majorities in both houses of congress, Democrats have failed to act boldly on issues ranging from climate change to immigration.
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“You will have to imagine my confusion when Ms. Nutting’s debut story collection, Unclean Jobs for Women and Girls, appeared on my doorstep. She had chosen to defy all reasonable laws of feminine desire by spurning me as a sexual object.
How I Became a Music Critic:
At age 19, I was assigned to review Bob Dylan in concert, despite the fact that I had very little sense of who Bob Dylan was. I was doing a summer internship at my hometown paper, and the regular critic had fallen ill.
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(Writing wretched verse so you don’t have to since 1995… but this is the end of the line)
With an introduction by Matthew Zapruder **
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A Rumpus Meditation on Editors, Ambition, and Angry Dependence (in 33 loosely jointed parts):
1. On July 30, the managing editor of the Virginia Quarterly Review, Kevin Morrissey, took his life. His note stated that he “just couldn’t bear it anymore.”
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(Writing wretched verse so you don’t have to since 1995)
Graduation Party
It looks, from a distance, like a track and field tourney:
so much avid motion in shorts and T-shirts
the college field house rented for the occasion
(Writing wretched verse so you don’t have to since 1995)
The Math of Betrayal
The math of betrayal my friends will never line up
...more(Writing wretched verse so you don’t have to since 1995)
Cry Timber
I am long tired
of the tyranny
of trees
A special Rumpus lamentation with possible added pep talk.
***
So last week the New Yorker published their once-a-decade Fiction Issue, in which they printed eight stories, along with their list of 20 Writers Under 40.
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Let me introduce my former student Tracey Wigfield, who is now a writer for the television program 30 Rock. I am so happy for Tracey that I am now weeping inconsolably.
(Writing wretched verse so you don’t have to since 1995)
To the Men At Work Outside My Window
See here, fellows: It is me, your skinny-stemmed little daisy faggot boy
Yoo-hoo! Yes, me – the fellow you keep glaring at.
I have a few things to say, if I might.
Have you ever had bad hair?
Let me rephrase that question: When was the last time you had bad hair?
Because it is one of the basic laws of Having Lived Through the 1970s, 80s, or 90s that you had bad hair at some point.
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How Dave Grohl Taught Me to Stop Whining and (Against Every Known Impulse in My Body) Embrace Happiness
“Chuck Prophet Writes the Songs That Make, Well, Not the Whole World, But a Small, Statistically Insignificant Portion of it Sing”
1. Award George Saunders the Nobel Prize in Decency
Have you ever met a single reader or writer who does not worship George Saunders? You have not. You have not because George Saunders represents everything writers should be.
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You’ve all seen this movie before.
You’re humping along in writerly misery, working the adjunct professor racket – because it’s always been your dream to work for an institution of higher education that demonstrates its respect for the pedagogic mission by paying an hourly wage nearly equal to McDonald’s – when you encounter a class that appears entirely devoid of talent.
...more(Writing wretched verse so you don’t have to since 1995)
Sinatra Time
It’s got nothing to do with nothing, pal,
if you wanna know the truth.
Barry Hannah passed away Monday, March 1, 2010. He was 67 and died of natural causes. The precarious state of his health — he’d battled cancer for some years — was a matter of ongoing concern amongst his wide circle of friends and admirers.
