The truth can now be told.
As noted here, "Dig" will be presented as half of a CurvingRoad program entitled "The Next Curve: Two One-Act Plays" from June 8 to June 23 at The Old Red Lion Theatre in London, which is well known and highly regarded as both a performance venue and a place to raise a pint. In fact, productions at The Old Red Lion Theatre are reviewed in publications such as Time Out London and The Guardian.
As noted in the post immediately below, there will be a fundraiser for the event on Thursday, March 4 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the 1901 Arts Club. Scottish playwright Michael Hart and I will be preparing statements to read at the fundraiser.
If you don't happen to find yourself in London on that point (or even if you do and can't attend), you can also make a tax-deductible donation through the very convenient PayPal button found on this page. Any amount is welcome in these trying times.
Fundraising is something at which I don't have a great deal of experience, but CurvingRoad co-director Sue Guiney tells me that this is something done by everyone in theater who is any kind of player, and now I apparently am one.
I'm always the last to know.
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Monday, February 1, 2010
Dig: Workshop and Fundraiser
The development of my one-act play "Dig" continues. I have completed one round of revisions that have clearly improved the script. It's always a treat when people ask you to add rather than take away.
On Thursday, February 10 CurvingRoad director Ellie Joseph will put the new version through its paces at a workshop reading to see what further changes are needed. Bit by bit the play will reach its final form. Since I have never taken a class in dramatic writing, I am getting a valuable education in how theater is done.
In case you find yourself in or near London shortly, I should also note that CurvingRoad will have a fundraiser for "Dig" and "No More, Salvator" by Scottish playwright Michael Hart on Thursday, March 4 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the 1901 Arts Club, located at 7 Exton Street, London SE1 8UE. Directions, including Tube and bus route information, can be found here.
I don't anticipate being able to make the event myself, but I may prepare a statement or place a trans-Atlantic call during the event.
The reality is setting in.
On Thursday, February 10 CurvingRoad director Ellie Joseph will put the new version through its paces at a workshop reading to see what further changes are needed. Bit by bit the play will reach its final form. Since I have never taken a class in dramatic writing, I am getting a valuable education in how theater is done.
In case you find yourself in or near London shortly, I should also note that CurvingRoad will have a fundraiser for "Dig" and "No More, Salvator" by Scottish playwright Michael Hart on Thursday, March 4 from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the 1901 Arts Club, located at 7 Exton Street, London SE1 8UE. Directions, including Tube and bus route information, can be found here.
I don't anticipate being able to make the event myself, but I may prepare a statement or place a trans-Atlantic call during the event.
The reality is setting in.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Interview at Spanglish Baby
The world of publishing and publicity has begun to stir from its holiday slumber, and I am in my own way involved
Roxana Soto, co-founder and co-editor of the blog Spanglish Baby, interviews me here and reviews The Best Mariachi in the World/El Mejor Mariachi del Mundo. I am delighted to be a small part of this vibrant and increasingly well-known site.
Two things might help persuade you to read the article. First, one copy of the bilingual edition will be given away to one commenter or other reader who expresses interest by 12 midnight Eastern Standard Time on January 17. Second, as promised long ago in the first post of this blog, I finally get around to explaining how a guy named Smith ends up writing about mariachis. I come by the topic honestly, in my own way.
Roxana Soto, co-founder and co-editor of the blog Spanglish Baby, interviews me here and reviews The Best Mariachi in the World/El Mejor Mariachi del Mundo. I am delighted to be a small part of this vibrant and increasingly well-known site.
Two things might help persuade you to read the article. First, one copy of the bilingual edition will be given away to one commenter or other reader who expresses interest by 12 midnight Eastern Standard Time on January 17. Second, as promised long ago in the first post of this blog, I finally get around to explaining how a guy named Smith ends up writing about mariachis. I come by the topic honestly, in my own way.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
New Poem on 14 by 14
I am pleased to report that my sonnet "Botanical Garden" appears online in Issue 11 of 14 by 14, the "lean sonnet zine" that features 14 sonnets by 14 poets in each edition. You may never see goldfish the same way again after reading my short poem.
I am particularly pleased to have my work included in the same venue as a poem by Susan McLean, whose collection The Best Disguise was awarded the Richard Wilbur Prize and has recently been published by the University of Evansville Press.
I am particularly pleased to have my work included in the same venue as a poem by Susan McLean, whose collection The Best Disguise was awarded the Richard Wilbur Prize and has recently been published by the University of Evansville Press.
Wednesday, December 9, 2009
Round-Up
These posts usually mention only one topic at a time, but a lot of news has come in over the past few days.
This post therefore lists several items in a round-up, not to be confused with one of the brand names of the herbicide glyphosate, which looms large in controversies surrounding genetically modified organisms in agriculture.
This round-up should engender less controversy, but perhaps a certain amount of interest.
To wit:
1. Literary agent Robin Mizell interviewed me last Friday on her blog Treated & Released. She graciously gave me a considerable amount of valuable online real estate to discuss The Best Mariachi in the World/El Mejor Mariachi del Mundo as well as work that is very much not for children.
2. My poem "Dachshunds of Buenos Aires" appears in Issue 55 of legendary literary magazine Gargoyle. After many years of trying, I have managed to place a poem there. Still, I have to live the rest of my life knowing that I may never come up with a better title for a poem.
3. My poem "Lullaby for the Bereaved" appears in the Winter Issue of Able Muse. Come for my poem, and stay for work by many fine poets as well as a tribute to the late Turner Cassity.
4. I have begun discussing revisions of my one-act play "Dig" with members and affiliates of CurvingRoad in London as we begin the long journey toward a June engagement at a venue to be named nex month. I am a bit intimidated by the whole thing, but there is no choice but to press on and learn something.
5. I am even now starting preparations for next May's Book Expo America. The time for my signing has not yet been determined, but I have put in for a slot and will make the information known as soon as possible.
The last few days have also included rejections of both prose and poetry, including one of my two circulating book manuscripts, but those are much less enjoyable to discuss.
This post therefore lists several items in a round-up, not to be confused with one of the brand names of the herbicide glyphosate, which looms large in controversies surrounding genetically modified organisms in agriculture.
This round-up should engender less controversy, but perhaps a certain amount of interest.
To wit:
1. Literary agent Robin Mizell interviewed me last Friday on her blog Treated & Released. She graciously gave me a considerable amount of valuable online real estate to discuss The Best Mariachi in the World/El Mejor Mariachi del Mundo as well as work that is very much not for children.
2. My poem "Dachshunds of Buenos Aires" appears in Issue 55 of legendary literary magazine Gargoyle. After many years of trying, I have managed to place a poem there. Still, I have to live the rest of my life knowing that I may never come up with a better title for a poem.
3. My poem "Lullaby for the Bereaved" appears in the Winter Issue of Able Muse. Come for my poem, and stay for work by many fine poets as well as a tribute to the late Turner Cassity.
4. I have begun discussing revisions of my one-act play "Dig" with members and affiliates of CurvingRoad in London as we begin the long journey toward a June engagement at a venue to be named nex month. I am a bit intimidated by the whole thing, but there is no choice but to press on and learn something.
5. I am even now starting preparations for next May's Book Expo America. The time for my signing has not yet been determined, but I have put in for a slot and will make the information known as soon as possible.
The last few days have also included rejections of both prose and poetry, including one of my two circulating book manuscripts, but those are much less enjoyable to discuss.
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
New Poem in Tilt-a-Whirl
I am pleased to note that my new poem "Crepuscule" appears in Issue of 1 of Tilt-a-Whirl: A Poetry Sporadical of Repeating Forms, a venture by poet and editor Kate Bernadette Benedict.
My poem is a triolet, an eight-line form. Other forms in the issue include the ghazal, rondeau, and villanelle. The latter is perhaps best known to readers as the form of the Dylan Thomas poem "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night," which was given a surprisingly tender reading by Rodney Dangerfield in the film Back to School.
Another popular culture note comes to mind. Had I known that paranormal romance (the publishing trade term for things such as vampire crushes) were going to be a big thing, I would have gone ahead and entitled the poem "Twilight" for reasons that are all too obvious these days.
Oh, well.
My poem is a triolet, an eight-line form. Other forms in the issue include the ghazal, rondeau, and villanelle. The latter is perhaps best known to readers as the form of the Dylan Thomas poem "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night," which was given a surprisingly tender reading by Rodney Dangerfield in the film Back to School.
Another popular culture note comes to mind. Had I known that paranormal romance (the publishing trade term for things such as vampire crushes) were going to be a big thing, I would have gone ahead and entitled the poem "Twilight" for reasons that are all too obvious these days.
Oh, well.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Dogs and Poetry
Last week my wife Paula Van Lare and I had the pleasure and the privilege of volunteering for a couple of days at the Best Friends Animal Sanctuary in Kanab, Utah.
More specifically, we worked at Dogtown, as featured on the National Geographic program of the same name.
You may wonder what this has to do with my writing.
Fair enough.
While only a small portion of my writing has involved dogs, last week's experience made me want to share a couple of previously published dog poems. I have another tangentially canine poem coming out shortly (more on this soon), and I am trying to publish a couple of others.
For now I hope you enjoy these two.
Policy
Because Nubians are still enslaved
I walk my dogs twice a day.
Because a child conceived tonight will inherit addiction
I leave my dogs offerings
of fresh water, with ice cubes.
Because envelopes and marketplaces explode
I hug my dogs and even carry them
where no shrapnel flies.
Because a manatee is sliced
by motorboat blades
and the last wild tiger
has been born,
I keep my dogs' tags and shots
up to date.
Now that any fact can be known
in an instant,
the smallest love is news.
Things touch at a near or far remove:
jays pass raspberry seeds
over fresh fields,
armadillos, burrowed into freight,
widen their range.
Word of my program
will ride the jet stream,
and land like a petal,
or it will bounce, devoutly, off a satellite.
Aubade
Dog, and I believe that I can call you that
with a high degree of accuracy,
in a purely denotative sense, though,
unsullied by cultural associations,
please listen,
since I seldom ask that much of you
(the couch is yours no less than mine,
the pillows, past and present, more so):
You would, if you a possessed a consciousness
of cause and effect, self and other
and the mortality that swallows them,
be grateful to know nothing
beyond that which you know right now
because, for me,
it’s seven-thirty on a partly cloudy
Tuesday, forty-five degrees,
with a sixty-percent chance of rain
and the certainty
of a commute and a day’s work
in which I’ll be wagged by—appended to—
devices engineered by men
who get out even less than me.
Really, they exist,
though you might have gathered otherwise
from the long and many evenings that we share—
like tonight, when we’ll
resume this small symposium.
Until then, fellow traveler on the planet,
Don’t scratch that spot behind your ear—
It’s already bare.
A new rawhide bone is on your bed
and, as always, cane mio,
the kibble’s in the bowl.
More specifically, we worked at Dogtown, as featured on the National Geographic program of the same name.
You may wonder what this has to do with my writing.
Fair enough.
While only a small portion of my writing has involved dogs, last week's experience made me want to share a couple of previously published dog poems. I have another tangentially canine poem coming out shortly (more on this soon), and I am trying to publish a couple of others.
For now I hope you enjoy these two.
Policy
Because Nubians are still enslaved
I walk my dogs twice a day.
Because a child conceived tonight will inherit addiction
I leave my dogs offerings
of fresh water, with ice cubes.
Because envelopes and marketplaces explode
I hug my dogs and even carry them
where no shrapnel flies.
Because a manatee is sliced
by motorboat blades
and the last wild tiger
has been born,
I keep my dogs' tags and shots
up to date.
Now that any fact can be known
in an instant,
the smallest love is news.
Things touch at a near or far remove:
jays pass raspberry seeds
over fresh fields,
armadillos, burrowed into freight,
widen their range.
Word of my program
will ride the jet stream,
and land like a petal,
or it will bounce, devoutly, off a satellite.
Aubade
Dog, and I believe that I can call you that
with a high degree of accuracy,
in a purely denotative sense, though,
unsullied by cultural associations,
please listen,
since I seldom ask that much of you
(the couch is yours no less than mine,
the pillows, past and present, more so):
You would, if you a possessed a consciousness
of cause and effect, self and other
and the mortality that swallows them,
be grateful to know nothing
beyond that which you know right now
because, for me,
it’s seven-thirty on a partly cloudy
Tuesday, forty-five degrees,
with a sixty-percent chance of rain
and the certainty
of a commute and a day’s work
in which I’ll be wagged by—appended to—
devices engineered by men
who get out even less than me.
Really, they exist,
though you might have gathered otherwise
from the long and many evenings that we share—
like tonight, when we’ll
resume this small symposium.
Until then, fellow traveler on the planet,
Don’t scratch that spot behind your ear—
It’s already bare.
A new rawhide bone is on your bed
and, as always, cane mio,
the kibble’s in the bowl.
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