What are you reading?

[Hugh]

Just finished the biography of Tennessee Williams. It was fairly typical of what you see with these drinking writers, pathetic whining, checking into hospitals/rehab, etc. But he was on fire to make it as a playwright and there are some very poignant scenes in the book. I actually copied down a couple of passages from the book into my diary. He once mentioned that when he feels like writing down a little poem he instead gets to work on a play, believing that poems, while fun, are a waste of time as far as trying to be a playwright. My goal has always been to be a novelist, but I too waste a lot of time writing poems. However, I think what I'd like to do is just allow myself to have fun and play around with them on weekends. Here's the passage from the book I copied into my diary:

[Hugh]

Williams and Elia Kazan were at one time the hottest writer/director combo on Broadway and this book had a lot about Kazan in it. There were a lot of excerpts from Kazan's memoir in this book and I copied one of them into my diary too.

[oettinger]

Your dedication to everything about writing, reading etc is impressive Hugh. I would give up halfway reading all the books you do

[Thompson]

I know nobody believes me because I story so much. But my first real job was at the Maison de Ville Hotel. There was the Tennessee Williams room, room #9. Oh, he stayed there all right, before my time, but some people claimed he stayed in room #6, that was back when room #6 and room #7 were connected, and were one room, well two rooms but they were together. They still make a big deal out of the Tennessee Williams festival in New Orleans. The festival people would come as a group and view the grounds of the hotel and take pictures. I was concierge, I opened the door.

[Hugh]

I know nobody believes me because I story so much. But my first real job was at the Maison de Ville Hotel. There was the Tennessee Williams room, room #9. Oh, he stayed there all right, before my time, but some people claimed he stayed in room #6, that was back when room #6 and room #7 were connected, and were one room, well two rooms but they were together. They still make a big deal out of the Tennessee Williams festival in New Orleans. The festival people would come as a group and view the grounds of the hotel and take pictures. I was concierge, I opened the door.

I just looked up the festival, it goes on for a week it says. They also have one in St. Louis it looks like. New Orleans also has a Bukowski Birthday Bash.

[Thompson]

Yes, I went (drunk, with a half pint stuck in my sock) to the Bukowski bash. It was kind of stuffy, but interesting and fun. Somebody said something about dancing girls later on, and after a good pull from the half pint, I yelled out (more than once) Where are the dancing girls?

What do you think of Faulkner, Hugh? I can’t read him, me. I can read Capote just fine, but I can’t read Faulkner. He has a book store in New Orleans, he hung in New Orleans, but I can’t follow him. Lots of boys I can’t follow. Joyce for one. Beckett is a bit easier, but still hard.

[Thompson]

Now there is this gal, Barb Johnson, from New Orleans who wrote this book of short stories , called More of This World or Maybe Another. Several years ago. She hasn’t written anything since, I don’t think. But Good God that book of stories is good. The stories are all connected up, so it reads like a novel sort of. Her book is in the Faulkner book store. I need to get down to the Quarter and buy another copy because of course I’ve lost or given away the other one. I’ll send you the book. It floored me. Knocked me down. Read it seven times, or maybe four, but each time was better than the last.

[Thompson]

I took Kentucky Outlaw to the craft beer place, the light was sort of low, my hands were shaking so bad I spilled a considerable amount of rather expensive dark beer on the table. I thought about licking the beer off the table but didn’t. My reputation at this place is still okay. I did however save Kentucky Outlaw from the spillage.

[Thompson]

Now I wouldn’t if I were you give my address out over the board. Jesus, what if Thompson shows up at the door drunk? But I can send the book to a P.O. Box or a General delivery address to Hugh in San Diego California. It’s a bit of a walk, but I think I can make it, to the postal joint to mail it.

[Hugh]

Yes, I went (drunk, with a half pint stuck in my sock) to the Bukowski bash. It was kind of stuffy, but interesting and fun. Somebody said something about dancing girls later on, and after a good pull from the half pint, I yelled out (more than once) Where are the dancing girls?

What do you think of Faulkner, Hugh? I can’t read him, me. I can read Capote just fine, but I can’t read Faulkner. He has a book store in New Orleans, he hung in New Orleans, but I can’t follow him. Lots of boys I can’t follow. Joyce for one. Beckett is a bit easier, but still hard.

I've never read a Faulkner novel. I remember some short story about a reclusive woman who kept a dead guy in her bedroom. That was pretty good.

[Rev. Dead Corpse]

Larry Correia's Sons of the Black Sword.

Currently Writing - The Neverling. My first novel.

I also have a two kids books, two trilogies, and two more stand-alone scifi/fantasy novels I've been working on.

Maybe one day, I will actually finish them... Doubtful... but who knows...

[Thompson]

Larry Correia's Sons of the Black Sword.

Currently Writing - The Neverling. My first novel.

I also have a two kids books, two trilogies, and two more stand-alone scifi/fantasy novels I've been working on.

Maybe one day, I will actually finish them... Doubtful... but who knows...

Yeah, you keep working on them, you don’t give up, you Can’t give up, what else you got? You don’t play guitar and you don’t ice skate. When I thought I was blacklisted I went into a terrible funk. Who am I going to say all these things without sound to now?

[oettinger]

I've never read a Faulkner novel. I remember some short story about a reclusive woman who kept a dead guy in her bedroom. That was pretty good.

Yuck, usuallý it`s freakshows of a son that can`t let go of mother.
Oh well, now I`m prepared when my sister tells me she saw mom last week again

[Hugh]

Kafka Was All the Rage by Anatole Broyard. I was fascinated when I found out the Broyard wrote 300 reviews in a three year period for the NYT so I wanted to read as much about him as I can. It turns out that this really isn't a memoir, as it purports to be, it's a series of essays he'd written over a period of years. His wife gathered them up after his death and had them published. The title comes from some advice he got from someone when he was getting ready to open up a bookstore. They told Broyard to get all the Kafka that he can because everybody wants to read him. This was in 1947 in Greenwich Village. The collection was kind of a disappointment because I didn't really learn much about him or his work habits. But he had a very interesting essay in there on the difference in attitudes about sex in America from 1947 to the 1960's. And one other thing - either by accident or on purpose they left the typos in the essays. I imagine it was an accident. His wife just probably mailed them off to the publisher and the publisher didn't bother to check them. I'm always embarrassed when I see typos in my published work, especially after I've proofread it specifically looking for typos. Plus I type everything on a computer that should catch the typos. Broyard was banging along on a typewriter with no spell check. One of the typos was "hugh" for huge. That one always catches my eye.

[Hugh]

Just finished the Kafka Diaries, the one that we've been waiting on to replace the expurgated version by Max Brod. The translator, Russ Benjamin, gave a long introduction explaining how he went about it, telling us the difference in German and High German and the difficulties of translation in general. The English here reads so clunky I have to believe he simply blew it. It's seems like he probably tried to do a linear translation, going word for word in sequence. At any rate, there were a couple of passages I really connected with, that's why I love diaries and letters so much, it's a delight to find something you have in common with a historical genius. Kafka hated conversation, talk. Oftentimes I hear one of my neighbors out in the courtyard yapping. She's a bored and lonely person and her talk is especially annoying. Sometimes when I hear her yapping I sit here in my apartment saying under my breath, "shut up, shut up, shut up." Well, one night it wasn't so under my breath. I'm sure she heard me. She had been out there talking to her cat, and the next day when she was out there she didn't talk to her cat. That's been a while now, and she's back to talking to her cat and anybody else who passes by while she's sitting there bored and lonely. Kafka hated hearing people in his house talk. A couple of times he mentions right after he'd rented a room that all the tenants who lived there talked nearly all the time and it drove him crazy, kept him from writing. His attitude about having to listen to other people's noise pollution was so much like mine is I copied down his diary passages into my own diary.