The OF Blog: May 2016

Sunday, May 29, 2016

Received an ARC copy of The Big Book of Science Fiction recently


Because I don't care to give away everything, since it's a flash fiction that I translated for The Big Book of Science Fiction (edited by Ann and Jeff VanderMeer), let's just say that there's something within the introduction that's an added bonus for readers.  The book will be released in the US on July 12th.  This is my third translation to be published.  More on this story and the anthology at a later date.

Monday, May 23, 2016

A brief update

Was busier than expected the past couple of weeks, with some times of frustration mixed in that left me with little time (or mood) to blog.  Going to be busy again this week, as I have my fourth 5K race of the year on Saturday and I have a few long runs to do (going to run a 10K by autumn).  Plus I still am trying to get some things in order to finalize my add-on certification for Special Education (the state changed some of the rules after I had registered for the Praxis tests last September, so there's been a delay in processing everything, but I will have some sort of certification in the next month or two) so I can apply for a multitude of teaching positions, but the delay might mean I'll end up having to wait a few months more before I can work again in the classroom in a full-time capacity.

However, after Memorial Day, I do have hopes of completing a few articles.  Among those will be the long-delayed review of Elizabeth McKenzie's The Portable Veblen; Carla Guelfenbein's 2015 Premio Alfaguara-winning Contigo en la distancia; and an article for another site.  I have been reading a bit more this month and I hope in a month or so to have also written commentaries on the Library of America volumes on Walt Whitman and Harriet Beecher Stowe's works included in those two volumes.  Just started re-reading Mark Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and I am still as amused by it as I was when I first read it nearly 30 years ago in 7th grade.

But as Opus said in this past Sunday's Bloom County strip, things didn't go as planned, but that's okay.  It certainly is a comforting thought after dealing with red tape these past couple of weeks.  Now it's time to sleep, perchance to dream.

Monday, May 09, 2016

Here's some of the music I'm listening to while reading this weekend

I've never really discussed it much here, but music is very important to me.  I listen to it during nearly hour-long commutes, when I go running on the streets or treadmill (but never when trail running, as there is natural music there for me to take in), or when I'm reading late at night.  I listen to a wide variety of 20th/21st century music.  Sometimes I listen to Bob Dylan for weeks on end.  Maybe 70s hard rock another time.  Lately, it's been 80s post-punk/darkwave music.  This music is both familiar and fresh to me, as I was a preteen for much of this time, so I might have at best heard snippets while growing up (I started college in 1992 when a different yet also fascinating form of alt-rock was exploding, so my interests then were in then-current music), but it was never overplayed for me then.

Here are some of these songs, taken from a playlist I created yesterday.  Not all of these are "classics," but the overall mood fits mine and it seems to be driving me to read more than I have in recent months:

Clan of Xymox, "A Day"

Death in June, "The Calling (Mk II)"

Big Black, "Kerosene"

Love and Rockets, "Rain Bird"

Revolting Cocks, "Crackin' Up"

Bauhaus, "The Spy in the Cab"

Siouxsie & The Banshees, "Spellbound"

The Church, "Under the Milky Way"

The Jesus and Mary Chain, "The Living End"

Theatre of Hate, "Do you Believe in the Westerworld"

The Cure, "World in My Eyes"

Front Line Assembly, "Provision"

Bauhaus, "Ziggy Stardust"

Screams for Tina, "Eleven Eleven"

The Sisters of Mercy, "Detonation Boulevard"

The Teardrop Explodes, "Treason"


If there are songs in a similar vein that you think I might enjoy, please list them below.

Friday, May 06, 2016

So it seems the sky has been falling since I last wrote a blog entry

In nearly two months, it would seem for some people, a lot of important things have happened.  Something about some puppies trying to get people mad while ultimately getting pounded in the butt by a butt, I think.  Something else about sites closing after a dozen years or more, leaving some to fret about "independent" book reviewing and the decline and fall of a generation of literary/genre online reviewers.

Yes, things are changing, perhaps not to the liking of many people.  Writing out thoughts takes a lot of time and energy (so says the guy writing at 3 AM on 4.5 hours sleep, 28 hours away from running his third 5K).  So easy to want a steady euphony of thoughts on certain books, so easy to confuse conformity with clarity of insight into literary works.  Does it really matter if I were to write 150 reviews in a year (which I have done before) or if I (using myself only as one minuscule example) were to write none here?  Do people really want to hear my thoughts on matters or is it more a hope or desire that I express something in conformity with their own inclinations?

Before I began training for distance walking (and after January, running) last year, my mind was often a chaotic mix of thoughts on fictions read and opinions inflicted upon me whenever I checked social media.  Sure, there is an excitement involved in coming in contact with new people and unfamiliar ideas, but after a while, it becomes tedious to encounter the same tired opinions expressed in trite fashion.  Running became an escape for me from all of this, or rather it allowed me to clear my thoughts in order to experience things in a different light.

A week ago, I ran a 14km/8.7 mile mountain bike/running trail before going to work.  Hot, humid day (it rained an hour after I finished).  Runs (later, mostly walks as my legs grew tired) along a creek bank, the only human there for a square mile or more.  Hearing a woodpecker hammering at an oak off to my right as I struggled to run up a steep, rock-strewn stretch.  Smelling blooming plants, including the heavy perfume of a honeysuckle out of my sight.  There was a sense of being enveloped here, being a panting, sweaty part of something much greater than me.

And yet words will fail to describe the totality of this.  Sure, I can use the 128 colors in my Crayola box of literary expressions to create a simulacrum, but ultimately experiencing the Sublime defeats all attempts to describe it.  Yet as I slowed down as I encountered 6.5% climbs in rapid succession, as I saw squirrels scurrying around me as I plodded on (my personal exercise trainers?), my mind became increasingly clear and focused.  One more running step forward.  One more sprint up a twisting hilly path before slowing down to brace for the steep descents.  Then it didn't matter how much or how little I had read, what I might encounter at work shortly, what I needed to do in the future.  Right then, right there, I was living within a moment that was more than the sum of myself.

Realizations like that make it hard to sit down at night to jot them down as though they were just impersonal opinions to be shared frequently.  I haven't blogged much recently not so much due to having little to say but rather in feeling that it is almost impossible to share these sorts of experiences without coming across as insincere and garrulous.  But maybe I've been looking at it from a weaker position.  Perhaps through clearing my thoughts via exercise reading itself might become something more enjoyable, as it can be another part of experiential growth.  Later this weekend or early next week, I am going to write a review of Elizabeth McKenzie's The Portable Veblen.  It is an outstanding work of mediation on relationships, between humans and between the animals who live among us.  I took over a month to read it, not because I didn't have time to read it over the course of a night, but rather because I wanted to reflect in piecemeal fashion on some of the things it had to say about how wantonly we live our lives, often at a detriment to other living creatures.  Reflecting on this while running through neighborhoods where the scent of southern pines is strong, while hearing chirps and barks and the occasional hiss, made these scenes come to life for me.

All of this is just a long-winded way of saying that it doesn't matter so much what others are saying about works or whether or not you should be following trends or taking recommendations.  As Saint-Exupéry said in The Little Prince:

"And now here is my secret, a very simple secret: It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye." 
This holds true when it comes to writing commentaries on blogs such as this.  What I have to say may matter little to you, but I try to show that something mattered enough for me to write down thoughts for it, even if none of these pertain at all to you.  Writers and critics come and go, but the earth still abides and we abide within it, creatures mucking our ways around, possibly toward something greater than anything we can fathom. 
 
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