Anthologies and Me

If you've received money during the winter holiday of your choice, or if you've saved money by frugality and comparison-shopping, you may now feel the need to treat yourself with a new book or two.

Far be it from me to dissuade you from this impulse.

In fact, I have a few ideas that include my work among that of many other people, some far better known.

First up is The Expeditioner's Guide: Intrepid Tales of Awesomeness from the Open Road. This project by the editors of online travel magazine The Expeditioner includes, in addition to my poems "Andante" and "Travelogue," work on destinations including Copenhagen, Delhi, Kenya, Kosovo, Rome and Rwanda, among others.

Second is a project I should have mentioned about this time last year. Still, a thing of beauty is a joy forever, so I can recommend Chicago photographer Adeline Sides' book The Silver Series, an album of classically composed nudes accompanied by poems from a variety of Chicago-based and farther-flung authors.

Third, I would be remiss if I didn't again mention Dogs Singing: A Tribute Anthology, edited by Jessie Lendenni and published by Salmon Poetry of Ireland. Proceeds will be donated to dog rescue and welfare organizations in Ireland and Thailand.

Finally, I would suggest two anthologies that came into being well before I started this blog in 2008. The first is Northern Music: Poems about and Inspired by Glenn Gould, which I edited and which includes one poem of my own, as well as work by Philip Dacey and Leslie Monsour. The second is In a Fine Frenzy: Poets Respond to Shakespeare. My two poems in the book are a retelling of the Seven Ages of Man and a sonnet that combines elements of Shakespeare's Sonnet 18 and the script of Goodfellas. Seriously. Also appearing among the collection's ninety poets are R.S. Gwynn, Diane Lockward and Leon Stokesbury.

Further updates on anthologies and more will be coming to this space soon.

Late Fall Harvest: Dowsing and Science

As noted in a previous post, the harvest is coming in.

There will be a list of other items later this week, but for now I am pleased to report that my first essay collection, Dowsing and Science, appears on page 49 of the Spring/Summer Catalog of the Texas A&M University Press Consortium.

Published by consortium member Texas Review Press, whose authors include Richard Burgin, George Williams and Eric Miles Williamson, Dowsing and Science consists of essays appearing in publications such as Boulevard, Chelsea, and Pleiades. The topics range from the title essay to a discussion of Romanian history as symbolic condition and the survival value of esthetics. A few personal accounts appear in the collection as well, discussing my first experiences with salt water (a rude shock for a Midwesterner) and how in some circles I came to be known as a king. The bulk of the collection, though, is made up of what could be called the "Impersonal Essay" in a tradition practiced by Montesquieu, eighteenth-century English writers such as Addison, Johnson and Steele, and nineteenth-century American writers like Emerson and Thoreau.

I have been going over page proofs in the last several days and plan to make this collection the best possible experience for a wide range of readers.

Watch this space for a few more announcements in the days ahead.