Monday Notes

Many thanks to Joshua Marie Wilkinson and his colleagues at Loyola University of Chicago who hosted the talks + reading that I was fortunate to participate in last Friday. Joshua, who opened the event by reading one of Barack Obama's poems, invited six of us to speak about poetry and something else we were doing that inflected our work, and my co-speakers offered great remarks. Jennifer Karmin spoke about poetry and activism; Robyn Schiff (I miss her!) spoke about poetry and publishing; Abraham Smith spoke about poetry and performance; Quraysh Ali Lansana (Q!) spoke about poetry and history; and Lisa Fishman spoke about poetry and farming. I read some remarks on collaboration in relation to my work, extending it to my translation projects (another form of collaboration, and one in which this blog has played a great part), and some art stuff. (Dear collaborators...hint, hint....)

After a delicious lunch, we all read briefly, and then I had to go catch a plane, missing what was billed as a "snow storm." I was very glad to see so many local poets and students there (a group from the university came down), and to see them really getting into the poetry as well.

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Rapturous reviews of Roberto Bolaño's final, unfinished magnum opus 2666 (FSG, 2008) have been appearing over the past week. The persnickety Adam Kirsch says that it has the "confident strangeness of a masterpiece." (Francisco Goldman's summer 2007 review of a portion of Bolaño's collective oeuvre, including the Spanish version of 2666, can be found here.) The Spanish version graced my carrel at the library this summer, though I wasn't able to get far in it. Would that there were a parallel vein of time.... But the English translation, by Natasha Wimmer, who deserves an award, is out, and although I have only grazed a few pages, I can say, as I did in an email to Reggie H., that it confirms for me that Bolaño will join that cadre of exception writers since 1900--Rilke, Proust, Tolstoy, Hughes, etc.--who are among the finest in the literary tradition but never received the Nobel Prize. You can get the book in one hardcover volume or a boxed three-volume set; I bought the box. Bolaño originally suggested five volumes, but his heirs and executors wisely, it seems, kept the entire work (mostly) together.

Also receiving rhapsodic treatment is Toni Morrison's new novella, A Mercy (Alfred A. Knopf, 2008). Reviewer after reviewer discusses its exploration of slavery's early form and praises its poetic language, tautness, haunting qualities, and links it to Morrison's masterwork, Beloved (1987). Even the nation's toughest critic, who hasn't spared Morrison harsh criticism in the past, is jumping on the bandwagon. If you missed her reading selections from it on NPR, you can hear it here. It's on my list, for the winter break...

One of the books that recently crossed my desk is Asher Ghaffar's Wasps in a Golden Hum Dream a Strange Music (ECW Press, 2008). It looks gorgeous, from cover to cover, and I've also added it to my list!

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One of the most dismaying bits of recent news was the horrific school collapse in Pétionville, Haiti, just outside the capital, Port-au-Prince. More than 94 children and adults have died, and the international search and rescue effort, which did pull 4 surviving children from the rubble on Saturday, will now likely turn to a recovery of bodies. Up to 250-300 people were thought to be in the building at the time of its collapse. (Above left, a woman in anguish for her missing child is assisted by relatives at the site of the collapsed the church-run school, La Promesse, in Petion-ville, Haiti on November 10, 2008, AFP/Getty Images.)

It now appears that the school's owner, Pastor Fortune (Fortin?) Augustin, who had voluntarily turned himself in, is being charged with involuntary manslaughter; when the building collapsed, workers were adding an additional floor, and the pastor is alleged to have constructed the building without engineering help. Haiti is still trying to recover from the quartet of devastating storms which have battered the Caribbean islands since the late summer. Haiti lost 2/3rds of its crops and entire neighborhoods still remain under water.

If you are able to, you can contribute relief funds here or here.

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I'm not going to speculate on President-Elect Barack Obama's transition team or his putative cabinet picks, though I found this short New York Times piece on Valerie Jarrett quite illuminating. Really, I think we should just wait and watch. Despite the right's claims that he was the second coming of V. I. Lenin (yeah, right!), and the desire among some in Washington for the second coming of Dwight Eisenhower (whom the contemporary Republicans have banished from their roster, along with other decent Republican presidents like Teddy Roosevelt and Calvin Coolidge, who was Ronald Reagan's favorite), he has mostly been a center-left legislator, both in the Illinois State Senate and the US Senate. This maps closely onto what I read as his ideological orientation, which is center-left, with the emphasis on the center. Obama isn't and hasn't ever been a left radical, though he often announces leftist intentions and demonstrates progressive tendencies. But he will likely govern from the center-left, perhaps further to the left, because he received a greater popular vote mandate, than any of his previous three predecessors. He is, nevertheless, going to appoint DLC-prototype folks like Rahm Emanuel and his ilk to high posts, bring in a host of Clintonistas, and draw upon the University of Chicago braintrust he hung with for quite some time, and not just the progressive ones.

Some of the early news we're getting, such as his team's careful review of Bush's executive orders and his plan to reverse many of them and his intention to close the abomination at Guantánamo Bay, more than balance out his accommodating stance towards someone like Connecticut's independent senator, Joe Lieberman. Uggh!

Now, can anyone scare up some inauguration tickets for C, me, and family members? (Former classmates...help!)

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Speaking of Obama, poet John Murillo sent along a link to an article noting the President-Elect was recently spotted carrying a copy of Derek Walcott's Selected Poems (Edward Baugh, ed., FSG, 2007) as he was dropping his daughters off at school. I noted to the CC folks that "So much marvelous work in this collection that I'm sure hits Obama at a very deep level," and posted the poem I'd posted on here a month ago, "As John to Patmos." Given that he's already alluded to Langston, Alice Walker (tell me you knew that!), and others, I thought that we might hear snippets of Walcott and many others from our literature in his speeches, including his inaugural. Get your ears and eyes ready!

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One of the greats to remember and honor: Miriam Makeba. Singer, actress, activist-fighter, visionary, "Mama Africa": beautiful. She was 76.

Nuruddin Farah in Evanston + Rey Andújar's Candela Is Out

Last night, I finally got to meet and hear Nuruddin Farah (1945-, at left), one of the most important African novelists and perhaps Somalia's best known author, read from his work.

I almost had the opportunity to meet him back in 2001, when we happened to be staying at the same guest house, but my schedule didn't fully coincide with his, and so it didn't happen. Then we'd talked about bringing him to the university, and I'd even gotten his email from a former colleague, but things didn't work out. So I was elated when Reg Gibbons sent along an email to say that Farah would be in town to promote his newest novel, Knots (Penguin, 2007).

Knots, Farah's 10th novel overall, is the second book in his third, unnamed trilogy, and follows Links (2004). The previous trilogies are Variations on the Theme of An African Dictatorship, which includes the volumes Sweet and Sour Milk (1979), Sardines (1981), and Close Sesame (1983); and Blood in the Sun, which includes the remarkable Maps (1986), which was the first volume of his I'd read, Gifts (1993), and Secrets (1998). He was visiting from Cape Town, where he now lives, and he made it clear that he didn't want to discuss politics--though he was perfectly willing to--but rather the work, his work, itself.

He read a sliver from Knots, which I haven't yet perused, but I was struck by one of the first things he said, which was that the name of the protagonist, Cambara, was pronounced "Ambara," a name akin to its Arab cognate, and "amber." The C was silent. Not that I know anything about Somali or any other North African language, but a silent initial "c" did make me sit up. The section concerned Cambara's return to her family's house in Mogadishu (which he spells in the Italian fashion, Mogadiscio), which was now occupied by another family. There was enough suspense to make me want to read more, though Farah's voice and intonation had the effect of lulling me, even though the prose itself wasn't really incantatory. It was almost as if I were listening to an elder and what he was saying was less important than that I was listening. I usually don't have this experience at readings, even by elders, so I did jot it down.

In the Q&A session, people did raise questions relating to his work and life. I asked about the trilogies and how he conceptualized them, whether it was as a whole, in advance, or whether--though I didn't put it so adroitly--he produced them in a more exploratory manner. He talked about ambition, compared himself to a sprinter rather than a marathoner--though 10 novels is close to marathon level, no? He added a bit more, but again, I found his net of words casting a little spell, so I was registering less what he said than the fact that he was saying it. Some other points he made during the discussion were that he was a professional novelist, and not at academic (any more), so he was able to produce work fairly quickly; 5 months, I believe he said, for Knots. (I'd take the 5 year plan!) The only thing he needed, he added, was "time and a quiet place." What novelist doesn't? He stated that his novels were in a conversation with readers and other novels, not only from Africa, but across the globe and history. In fact, he suggested that "quietness, time and a newspaper 50 days old" would do the trick.

When asked about inspiration, he returned to the notion that his reading was broad, which led him to criticize the vast majority of American literature, which he claimed was driven by commerce. But then he raised another question, which was what from any era would last; much of what was being acclaimed now, he posited, wouldn't, and he included his own books. He then spoke about Shakespeare in relation to a call years ago for Africans to read African writers, and pointed out that Shakespeare's territory was broad, like Achebe's, Dante's, and some other writers. It went far beyond the little island the size of a "tissue" (was that the metaphor, or was it "napkin"?). True, true. Returning to inspiration, Maps, I believe he said, had been inspired by Camara Laye's The African Child--a novel I haven't read, though I have read the exquisite The Radiance of the Prince--while Links was sparked in part by George H. W. Bush's follies in Somalia, which the former president had characterized under the rubric of "doing good" and "the work of God." Well, we recall where that led...and now the US is back in Somalia, under the guise of the Ethiopian military, battling alleged Islamic militants it claims are allied to Al Qaeda.... Through the Q&QA, he was suitably resinous, or rather, he wasn't giving too much quarter, though he did answer the questions eagerly. Then he concluded the event with the opening chapter from Maps, which famously unfolds in the second person. This time I heard every word he uttered. I was glad I'd been able to make it, and afterwards, like a schoolboy, I got his autograph. I also think that between Reg, me, and several other colleagues, we'll get him to campus this time.

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Young Dominican powerhouse writer Rey Emmanuel Andújar has sent word that his new book, Candela (Alfaguara), is now out. Here's the beautiful ad I received from him; he gave readings in Puerto Rico last week and on Monday.

A writeup of the novel is here. (According to the Cronica Digital article, the cover image below is titled "La Matinée" o "Desnudo con paraguas," by the highly regarded Puerto Rican painter Francisco Rodón. An Listín Diario interview with Andújar can be found here. (Both are in Spanish.)

Reading with Students & Reg Gibbons @ High Risk Gallery

And we keep on sprinting...last night, after a full day of classes and required attendance at day-ending scholarly talk, I read with three students (Steve Jordan, Christine Pacyk, and Nicole Xylouris Osborne, who's currently in my class) and one of my senior colleagues, whom I've mentioned many times here, Reg Gibbons (at left) in one of the university's graduate Masters in Creative Writing program periodic author/student readings. The event took place at High Risk Gallery (Thanksgiving is still at least a week away, but the gallery already had Christmas trees up!) on W. Belmont in the Boystown neighborhood, and just a few blocks from where I lived the first year I stayed in Chicago.

It was exhilarating to see so many of the students I've worked with and their families and friends present, and to see some other Chitown folks in the house as well. And it was a tremendous honor to read (photo of me at left, by author and artist Cornelia Spelman, Reg's wife) with the three students and with Reg, whom I've never read with despite my being at the university for five years. The students repped the three genres we teach (creative nonfiction, poetry, and fiction), and Reg read a few of his stellar translations from Ancient Greek and from his forthcoming collection, while I read (at length!) two linked, still pretty rough early sections--which included dialogue, a forward-moving timeline, and yes, action--I'd never read publicly from my novel in progress, Palimpsests.

Reading new work always terrifies me, but this time my nerves were settled by the time I took the mic. Afterwards I joined writer friend Rone Shavers, who's also taught in the program (and caught the Dessalines reference, which I did not throw in to keep him on his toes, though I was glad he got it), and some former (Michael, Kayte, Adrienne, Andrea!) and current students on a little bar crawl, then skedaddled back north shortly after the (be)witching hour. The word for the evening, despite my exhaustion, was FUN. In fact, I didn't realize till I got home how drained I really was.