“Bad Coffee” by Ben Macnair

(new poetry)

It has no warning, no health and safety, no government advisory notice.
It has no instructions, no recipe, no regular appointment time.
It has no certain way of reacting, no known behaviour when in captivity,
but we know when we see it, when we smell it, when we taste it.
you see it on the television, cop shows with not enough light, and too many donuts,
or when friends meet up, and have take after take in café scenes,
just setting the scene, just chewing the fat,
but Bad Coffee, like a bad boss, a bad memory,
will always taint memories, like that.

Ben Macnair is an award winning poet and playwright from Staffordshire in the United Kingdom. Follow him on Twitter @benmacnair

Ben also has a piece of music, “FAT CHAFFINCH,” at our Open Mic blog.

An Excerpt from “New to Class” by David Stewart

Toronto was the first place I’d lived where political leaders made me feel welcome. When I was growing up in Quebec, governments closed my English school, banned English signs, and expropriated the asbestos mines where my dad worked. From there I went to Calgary, where the mayor at the time, Ralph Klein, called the many eastern Canadians moving there “bums and creeps” and told us to go back where we came from. One way that I coped with my outsider status was to hide parts of myself, such as my Englishness in Quebec, or my eastern-Canadian sympathies in Alberta. Imagine my pleasant surprise when Toronto’s civic leaders merely shrugged at newcomers like me. My days of hiding were over. 

But over time, I learned that Torontonians had their own ways of categorizing people: by where they lived and how much they earned. When Chris and I had been pals back in Calgary, I’d had an inkling that his parents were well-off, but neither of us had given money much thought. That all changed in Toronto. Pricey real estate and my dad’s post-asbestos career troubles pushed my family out to the suburbs of Scarborough, known for its endless rows of tract housing and strip malls. The downtown kids called it Scarberia. 

COMING SOON to New Pop Lit!

Interview: Bud Sturguess

1.)  What sparked the idea for your story “Molasses”?

My conscience. I was L-ing OL at all those Spongebob/Titan submersible memes, like so many people were, and it just struck me – “people died. Why are we laughing? What if it had been someone I know and love in that submarine?” It was the kind of sudden, sobering thought that spoils all the fun.

2.)  Who are a few of your literary role models, past or present?

I was very fortunate to happen upon William Stafford in my junior high literature textbook. The way he crafted poetry to be, as he put it, “just like talk” helped me to see the beauty and abundant possibilities in plain speaking over avant-garde riddles. I also have to cite Miguel Cervantes’ masterpiece “Don Quixote” for blending comedy and heartache, and crime writer Joseph Wambaugh for his unique way of telling a straight story with subtle prose woven throughout. 

3.)  What’s your current or future writing project?

I’m working on a non-fiction book about the Falklands War. Truth be told, it’s not going so well. But that’s writing; I’d be suspicious of myself if I thought everything I write is flawless. I welcome the challenge, and if it beats me, that’s okay. I’ll move on to something else. The possibilities in the human brain are amazing.

NOW READ the story “Molasses” by Bud Sturguess!

Dinosaurs

THE NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS STORY

The trick is finding a way into the body of this publication amid blocks of small print text without invitations or hooks, unwelcoming, insular, clearly written not for the ordinary reader but instead an intellectual elite of proper status, breeding, and income, at least a group of people who like to think of themselves as intellectuals and so any publication they read has to have markers of the intellectual while constructed in such a way to keep out everyone else. . . .

AN ANALYSIS

I WAS GIFTED around Christmas from one of my wife’s relatives the most recent copy of The New York Review of Books (December 21, 2023), the person knowing I have pretenses toward being a writer. The thinking being, I guess, that I’d jump right on it. Instead it sat on my admittedly enormous “To Read” stack for innumerable days, turning into weeks. (Am I sounding literary enough?)

The problem was finding an entrance into this house of prestigious writing. I have to read enough for the New Pop Lit website, as well as necessary reading (the minimum required) for my day job. Stretching myself or at least my eyes for the new arrival was no easy task.

The problem was the Review’s reader-unfriendly layout:

Clearly designed for the leisure class. A quick glance at reader demographics bears this out: those with lavish amounts of time on their hands, not involved in the ongoing fast-paced struggle to survive which afflicts most of us, but who can instead scatter through the wordy pieces at whim, then plunge, here and there, when ready, into them. Or are the issues even read?

The literary establishment dismisses all popular/genre writing as formulaic, which it is. But these intellectual essays are also formulaic. They follow a well-developed pattern in place for decades. If they didn’t, they’d never be published in The New York Review of Books.

When all-new kinds of essays and stories arise, they too will set a pattern and become formulaic. Just as Impressionist art created a formula, and Cubism, Abstract Expressionism, rock music in its various iterations: rockabilly, Motown, prog rock, punk. On to hip hop, metal, techno, EDM: you name it.

IN TRUTH I eventually read several of the articles, and found them mildly interesting, if not striking. Among them, a long dry essay by Colin B. Bailey about 19th-century Impressionist painters titled, “A New Language of Modern Art.” Can we then ask: When will we see a new language of modern literature?

HAS The New York Review of Books changed much if at all during the sixty-one years of its existence– other than offering perhaps a more diverse array of names on its masthead? No. Nor will it change. Nor will any part of the New York-based literary establishment change. Change will come from outside the moldering institutional flagships of the literary art, whether it travels from far away, or explodes directly outside the complacently-staffed high-priced gray-windowed offices. Far below them, in the alleys or streets. And it will come.

-Karl Wenclas

“Encounter” by Ken Kakareka

photo c/o topofstyledotcom

Ken Kakareka’s latest novel is Summer of Irresponsibility (Alien Buddha Press, 2023). His words have appeared or are on their way in numerous rags including Gargoyle Magazine, The Gorko Gazette, and A Thin Slice of Anxiety. A list of selected publications can be found at kenkakareka.com.

An Excerpt from “Molasses” by Bud Sturguess

Of course I laughed at the memes. Just about all of us did. There’s no shame in admitting you had a good chuckle when you saw a meme lampooning the Titan submersible disaster. Especially the ones that were Spongebob themed; those were the best.

I suppose we felt it was okay to laugh because the guys on the submarine were so filthy rich. It was kind of telling, the mood of the average citizens, that we were so disdainful of the wealthy that we didn’t hide our giddiness when they embarked on such a typical “rich guy thing” and imploded. I guess it’s part of that “eat the rich” mentality we’ve harbored so long. We even told ourselves it was okay to laugh despite the fact that among the five dead was a 19-year-old kid, the son of one of the rich guys, who hadn’t done anything harmful to anybody with his wealth (that is, his parents’ wealth). Then again, I don’t know that his parents did anything wrong by anybody with their wealth either. But, just being rich was sinful enough for us.

Coming Soon to NEW POP LIT!

“tear past it” by Ken Kakareka

NEW POETRY

i did
a small mag
interview
where the editor
asked me
what advice
i had
for writers
starting out.
i brewed
for a minute.
when you feel
like you’re at
the finish line,
tear past it.
we’ve all
been there –
that’s when
the good stuff
comes out.

XXX

Ken Kakareka’s latest novel is Summer of Irresponsibility (Alien Buddha Press, 2023). His words have appeared or are on their way in numerous rags including Gargoyle Magazine, The Gorko Gazette, and A Thin Slice of Anxiety. A list of selected publications can be found at kenkakareka.com.

Four Fears of Literary Critics

WHAT’S WRONG WITH AMERICAN LITERATURE PART IV

FIRST FEAR: MIDDLEBROW

Many years ago, ridiculously-overrated English novelist Virginia Woolf wrote a defensive letter over a criticism of her work on a radio show(!) in which she scorned her critics as “middlebrow.” Her husband had her letter published in a collection of her writings after her death. Since then, established literary critics on both sides of the Atlantic have lived in fear of being thought of, or thought to be encouraging, or in any way associated with, “the middlebrow.” An excuse, really, for disconnecting themselves from the general public in order to remain in an artistic bubble.

In practice this has meant not aiming for the center, for a wide audience– and that writers like Ernest Hemingway who attained a wide audience despite their literary skill and intelligence have been downgraded as a result. The outcome for literature as an art form has been disastrous.

The fear is most pronounced among those critics who come from conformist middle-class backgrounds. Which means: all of them.

SECOND FEAR: SENTIMENT

To avoid sentiment and melodrama, authors have eliminated strong passion and emotion from their works. Subtle effects only. In practice: works which are restricted. Constipated. To instead be operatic in scope, expression, and theme? Nope. Can’t have it.

BUT the novels of Charles Dickens thrive on sentiment. Or what does one do with “the best worst movie ever,” 1967’s Valley of the Dolls? The flick has a bad screenplay, bad writing, bad direction, bad acting– its fans know this yet compulsively view it again and again. Why? Because of its over-the-top emotion, which strikes deep chords, despite all else, in we human beings.

No: Avoid sentiment. Play it safe. The result: More disaster.

THIRD FEAR: POP

Pop elements are also forbidden. Any of them. Anything too colorful, dramatic, or entertaining is not wanted. The approved literary reader is not supposed to be entertained. Speed and excitement? No. Action? NOT! “Lit-ya-chur” is serious business, made for committed slogs through densely written tomes while wearing determined frowns.

FOURTH FEAR: POLITICS

Finally, there’s the biggest fear: politics. Unless the politics is strictly in-line with an approved narrative issued by proper mandarins from on high. In practice this has meant an avoidance of ideas. No thrilling verbal exchanges expressing intellectual conflict. “One can’t use characters as mouthpieces for ideas,” I was told more than once by prominent literary personages. Uh, why not? “Fiction must never be polemical” founding Paris Review Editor George Plimpton himself told me in person more than twenty years ago, when we sat at a table at CBGB’s after a literary debate, drinking beer. (Which, brahmin New Englander that he was, he pronounced “be-ah.”) Did ol’ George have an agenda? Perhaps.

The extreme example of polemics and politics in fiction are the novels of Ayn Rand– anything can be pushed too far. But you know what? It worked. Readers for decades have thrilled to her one-sided diatribes and over-the-top plots. Their mistake wasn’t in enjoying the books, but in believing too-well what the characters said.

My own thinking: when you inject ideas, present more than one viewpoint.

As I do in a re-released 2012 ebook novel I’m currently hawking called The Tower. Available here.

(I need more clueless bad reviews of it. Or a few objective ones. Only 99 cents on Kindle. Weigh in!)

XXX

WHY is any of this important? It matters because the fundamental purpose of the New Pop Lit project is to provide a better “UX,” as techies say. A more exciting User Xperience. Literature that’s reader-centric. The only way forward. We’ll examine this further, at this site and elsewhere. Much more to come– in ideas, imagination, and ART.

-K. Wenclas

A Review of Uzodinma Okehi’s House of Hunger

A BOOK REVIEW BY TORI CANNING

I met Uzodinma hosting a reading in Bushwick. He was as charmingly provocative and genuine, as he was at 20, compiling House of Hunger. (If a bit more wise– phew!) I am honored to receive this zine from its writer, with years between us and its conception. 

I’m considering this novella-style zine in the context of youth and growth, from my budding writer vantage. The pertinence and timelessness of early adulthood is reassuring. HoH is an assemblage of moments & memories, cut & pasted, tangible & material. Its format is immediate– even urgent. 

Throughout the cozy, homey, maybe awkward reading, Uzodinma committed to a bit– selling this book, leaning into the salesman, though never lacking realness! An endearing and enduring feat. cha-ching! 

A few weeks passed, as did the books I’d been reading (Twilight and Autoportrait). I grabbed HoH for my subway ride to & fro a dinner date. In my phone notes (a place I often write and am currently writing) I jotted the following–

(excerpts)

photocopy– was it aesthetic choice, or practical way to edit/print? ❤ analogue/digital.

contemporaneous w/ university, or recorded memory?

unconventionally punctuated, yet reads seamlessly. props!!

fave sentence — ‘hands in the air, or not even.’

major takeaway– dichotomy of universality and specificity of youth

anyways, cool book! ttyl. 

he replied generously– 

(excerpts)

No yeah, I started off way back in the early 2000’s making zines, handing them out for free on the subway etc. Had no idea what I was doing… Now that I’m printing my own books, I paste it up, scan the pages and then use indesign to lay it out. Like the best of both worlds.

…I’m almost 50 now, my son is about to turn 17 in a few weeks, so, yeah, it’s interesting watching him, trying to decipher which aspects I can actually remember and identify with, and where’s that separation…

A few years older than young Uzo, a year into luv letters, (my own fragmented blog-style vignettes), I’m encouraged by the undying characteristics of youth-dom. A sense of community in a fleeting time/place. It’s promising and heartbreaking to grow up, flawed & flawless. I feel grateful to be included in the defective, difficult, and developing dynamics of HoH. Thank you Uzo, for your earnestness and humor. 

As I write my own words/worlds, I aspire to be inviting and sincere, documenting time passing, myself growing, my relationships twisting and becoming (and becoming less appealing). Writing is sharing, not upstanding. 

tori canning is obsessed with text and textiles, letters (the shape of) and letters (via mail), books (as object and info), writing, bodies in (and out of) clothing, glue and glitter, music and its movement, labor as dance (dance as labor), sitting at the kitchen table.  She has a silly little BFA from a beautiful Philly art school that she’s admittedly proud of, though has yet to provide fame, glory and riches.

Uzodinma Okehi Your number 10-shirt, your Afrobeat black president, circa 1994. House of Hunger, available now at: bokoye.com

Canonical Conformity

ONE THING I learned during the period of my life I spent teaching in high schools is the educational system weeds out the rebels. Often, the most creative, nonconformist members of a class are the delinquents. Usually the leader of the delinquents.

(This was the case in 1960s to 80s England. See this book):

At every stage, more individuals are filtered out as the most obedient climb the institutional ladder: those raising their hands at the front of the class– not bored sleepers at the back.

THE INSTILLED ATTITUDE becomes that of any bureaucracy: “Go along to get along.” The canon of approved literary models becomes unquestioned– even if those models were daring choices at the time they originally were celebrated and canonically included. (Can’t dare anything today!)

Which led to the creation of the god of gods in the literary realm: High Modernism.

Never mind that most of the High Modernist canonical novels connect with few people and are in fact not very good. (Gregor Samsa waking up as a giant insect? Okay, we get the point. We’re hit over the head with it. Now do we still have to read the entire story?)

Aesthetic satisfaction: nil.

c/o pandoraoutletofficialstore

WHY do approved literary intellectuals (see photo) celebrate– nay, require– vagueness and “difficulty” (a favorite term)? The reason is obvious when you think about it. They’ve climbed to high station after an intensive weeding-out process. Understanding difficult, poorly-constructed novels is part of the process. They’re like government bureaucrats pushed upward according to how well they understand obscure regulations– the more obscure, the better. They need to be few. Justifies their position. “Literature” isn’t for everybody! Not just anybody can appreciate those High Modernist guys.

-KW