The Mercy Papers: A Memoir of Three Weeks
It’s a tricky thing, a memoir of a death: you know how it’s going to end. The challenge for the writer (not only with regard to the conclusion) is making…
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Rumpus Articles
Words Before the Doors Close
For a certain segment of the American Mennonite population, a segment whose ancestors passed through and lived in Germany, the language of the old country was low German. Low German’s…
The Best Show You Aren’t Watching
The Internet is the new Television. But way better! Childrens’ Hospital is a Web series written, directed, and starred in by Rob Corddry. David Wain (Wet Hot American Summer, The State, Stella,…
Paul Rudd in a Deleted Scene from The Ten
“$3.50 for a cappuccino? Do I get a bowl of soup with that too?”
And Now, A Year of Recognition
After a lifetime of extreme, little-known performances, 58-year-old Tehching Hsieh is suddenly in the spotlight.
Is the Internet Ruining Our Lives?
We’re distracted, our attention is shot, we are under surveillance, and we don’t care! We like being linked and friended by strangers who may or may not be who they say they are.
The Sweet Buy and Buy
The Author of Candy Freak Meets America’s First Chronicler of the Candy Bar
But What Do We Really Want?
If you haven’t read Daniel Bergner’s recent article in The New York Times Magazine, “What Do Women Want?” or better yet, his book, The Other Side of Desire, you should,…
The Rumpus Interview with Paul Yoon
One time I was reading Haruki Murakami and I thought: if I had the chance, would I ever ask him why his characters always vanish? I’m not sure I’d want to. Maybe he doesn’t know either.
Eliza Doolittle in the White House
In her essay “Speaking in Tongues” in The New York Review of Books, February 26, 2009, Zadie Smith examines Barack Obama’s doubleness, not just his biracial genetic history but how…
THE EYEBALL: Brazil
Yesterday I got laid off from my day job at a tech company. This got me thinking about an unpublished essay I wrote a couple years ago about my relationship…
Poetic Lives Online: Links by Brian Spears
I guess it just took a little time for the poetry blogs to realize that David Orr had been in the NYTBR smack-talking about the lack of greatness in poetry…