Recent posts
Rumpus Articles
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Fingers Through Holy Water
Gospel music, like its secular cousin the blues, never wallows in pity, but instead seeks to transcend pain and reach glory. Bashir’s book makes the same trip.
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“Stabilimentum,” a Rumpus Original Poem by Samiya Bashir
Stabilimentum Bend into my mouth before frost ends us.
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Why Books Are Stupid
Elissa Bassist recently wrote a piece extolling the virtues of books. She suggests the good ones “can make life manageable” and turn a bad day into a good one. But here’s the thing: If this were true, librarians would be…
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The Rumpus Interview with Jill Sobule
Her songs are unique. They tell stories about human beings, real and imagined, which allow us to step back from the issue, be it personal or social, and relate to it as we would a friend.
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Morning Coffee
The most beautiful flowermart in the world. “Aldous Huxley vs. George Orwell” (no this isn’t the same link as the other day, thanks for asking.) “Eric,” a story in pictures by Shaun Tan. The best of Wikipedia. A brief illustrated…
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Great Authors’ Syllabi
When I think about good books, I think about this: -Never read a bad book/book you don’t like 50 pages in; it’s wasteful. -You will die someday; read accordingly. -Reading aloud among friends can be [insert the best adjective you…
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The Rumpus Interview with Jonathan Ames
Maybe my work isn’t a cry for help. It may just be a baby’s need to cry or a dog’s need to bark.
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Too Many Inkblots?
In the last few months, Wikipedia has been in debate with psychologists who are upset that Rorschach inkblot plates can be easily found online. Because the Rorschach tests are displayed with common responses to the open-ended questions doctors pose while…
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Movies Briefly: Not Quite Hollywood, 2009
If, as Quentin Tarantino believes, the real core of exploitation cinema is found in images so crazy you cannot believe your eyes, then the new film about the history of Australian exploitation, Not Quite Hollywood, not only documents its subject,…
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Apple’s rumored Tablet: what’s it for?
Rumors of a new device supposedly being prepared by Apple for a release sometime in the next five months are flying this morning after an FT.com story which describes about a flat, rectangular device with which users would interact by…
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Vollmann’s ‘Imperial’ country
William T. Vollmann, the author whose exhaustive research helps to blur the line between fiction and nonfiction, and whose books tend to be measured by the pound, has a new book coming out titled Imperial. The 1300-page tome looks at…
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The Rumpus Interview with Sam Anderson
“An ideal, awesome job,”—that’s how Sam Anderson, at several points in our conversation, describes his position as book critic for New York Magazine.