Literature
What the Mayor of Hamsterdam Loves to Read
by Minister Faust on September 23, 2011
As a radio host, I’ve had the outstanding opportunity to ask a lot of people a lot of different questions. But absolutely one of my favourite things to do is to ask a lot of different people the same question. It’s fascinating to compare their answers and find out what emerges.
One question I’ve been asking many guests over the years is, “Regardless of which country of origin on the …
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Puddle Caught by Surprise
by Nick Glossop on September 21, 2011
This is rather as if you imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking, ‘This is an interesting world I find myself in – an interesting hole I find myself in – fits me rather neatly, doesn’t it? In fact it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!’ This is such a powerful idea that as the sun rises in the sky and
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Missing Misanthrope
by Malcolm Parker on September 14, 2011
French novelist and occasional filmmaker Michel Houellebecq is missing. As Bloomberg reports here, Houellebecq was scheduled to appear in the Netherlands and Belgium to read from ‘The Map and the Territory’, his novel which won France’s Prix Goncourt in 2010.
Those who decry him as a fraud and publicity hound will claim he staged his disappearance and will reappear, probably in a ping pong bar in Pattaya. If he doesn’t reappear, they will …
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Heliotropes
by Nick Glossop on September 14, 2011
A film by Michael Langan from a poem by Brian Christian.
Heliotropes (2010) from Michael Langan on Vimeo.
Flights to the American east coast from the west coast often depart at nightfall; travelers lose three hours, resulting in a shortened night. Flights westward tend to be in the morning, with travelers experiencing the three-hour gain as an extended afternoon. Likewise, many “heliotropic” plants—notably sunflowers—”track” the sun through the sky
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At the Wall: Memory and Underworld
by Malcolm Parker on September 11, 2011
Strange parallels and intersections impel us to interpret them as signs of fate because they seem so strongly connected. ‘How can it be otherwise that these things happened?’ we ask ourselves.
I was reading somewhere on the internet a writer’s reading of many of Don Delillo’s books over the summer. I thought about Delillo’s books I had read, all sparked by a short story I had read in Harpers decades …
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Dept of Your Poor Mom’s Douchebag
by Andrew Loewen on August 28, 2011
Sharon Olds reads “Douche Bag Ode.”
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Don’t You Want To Celebrate Chris Ware?
by Craig Elliott on August 20, 2011
Is it Chris Ware’s birthday today? No, it’s not.
Omigod! Chris Ware didn’t DIE, did he? This isn’t some kind of memorial, is it? Mmm, no, he’s still alive, as far as I know.
Well, did Chris Ware recently publish something new and groundbreaking, for which you’re merely giving credit where it’s due? Not exactly, though he did just publish Acme Novelty Library #20 in the springtime, and there’s …
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Why Are Public Libraries Important?: first the personal
by Michelle Lovegrove Thomson on July 28, 2011
Whether Public libraries are–in the words of Rob Ford–“must have” or “nice to have” services is currently a hot topic being debated in Toronto . The Toronto Public Library, Toronto Transit Commission, and a number of other essential services are on the chopping block as Ford and BrotherFord attempt to trim expenses by hacking at fluffy add-ons such as “child care” and “HIV Prevention”. I will be tackling the proposed cuts …
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Bulshytt And Its Purveyors
by Nick Glossop on July 7, 2011
Pursuant to the recent efforts of our own Matt Payne to isolate, decrypt and otherwise plumb the truthy bottom of bullshit as it is employed and practiced by Randroids, trickle-downers and economic voodoo doll-heads, I give you bulshytt as a term of art from the novel Anathem by Neal Stephenson.
As the story takes place in an isolated monastery on a far off planet in a time unknown, many of …
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The History Of English In Ten Clicks
by Nick Glossop on July 6, 2011
Drag, ransack, thrust and die – the Vikings, it seems, brought us many of the best words. Here is an informative and funny series of animations depicting a brief history of the English language from the Open University. Spoiler alert – the question Whatever happened to the Jutes? is not answered.
Episodes 3 to 10 after the break.…
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Bradbury’s Firemen Will Use Water
by Malcolm Parker on July 2, 2011
On my last trip back to Canada I did what I usually do: I ordered books from Amazon and had them shipped to my parents. I also ordered a Kindle so that I could stop having books shipped for me to pick up or for friends or family to bring over to me, something that saves me the shipping cost and my books the indignity of being mishandled by whatever …
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A Smooth Gil Scott Heron Eulogy
by Nick Glossop on June 28, 2011
Jay Smooth gives another demonstration of what can be achieved through the deft and skillful application of reasonableness, good humor and affable wit. First, some observations on public mourning, private grief and social media occasioned by the recent passing of black power icon, beat poet and Hip Hop progenitor Gil Scott Heron.
Second, a ranting psycho-sociological dissection of the sports fan-dom thrall, recently violated by Lebron James (and violated in …
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