TUESDAY
i got the blues, i havent worked on my novel in a week, schoolhouse got me humping
and when im not crunching i just want to veg, just lie there wore out tired
this happens every spring semester, but im going to have to dig deep and maintain my daily 3 hrs no matter how crunched i am at the schoolhouse
promoting promiseland is biittersweet
nice library journal review of promiseland: i like when folk see my mythwork i tried to do w/that:
Flowers, Arthur (text) & Manu Chitrakar & Guglielmo Rossi (illus.). I See the Promised Land: A Life of Martin Luther King Jr. Tara Pr. 2010. 138p. ISBN 9789380340043. $16.95. BIOG
Self-dubbed a “performance poet” fusing the African oral tradition of the griot with Western print culture, Flowers (Another Good Loving Blues; Mojo Rising) weaves Martin Luther King Jr.’s story into the vivid canvas of Chitrakar’s distinctive art. For his part, the West Bengal scroll artist has produced dramatic illustrative visuals bringing to life Flowers’s spare, lyrical prose through a more picture-story approach than traditional comics. (See Eric Nash’s 2009 Manga Kamishibai for the Japanese approach to picture-story theater.) Endnotes provide brief background on the historical context of King’s life.
VERDICT A myth-making take on King’s life that has both emotional and intellectual impact, the Flowers/Chitrakar collaboration supplies fresh color and richness to the oft-told history of this game-changer. The deceptive yet appealing simplicity of the bright, rounded figures turns King’s myth again for a new season. Designed for adults but fine for teens and up; recommended for all libraries. Be sure to display this along with Ho Che Anderson’s King: A Comics Biography of Martin Luther King, Jr. (Fantagraphics, 2005) for Black History Month.—M.C.
SUNDAY
application process, 500 applicants, 6 choices, 2 weeks to get thru initial read
talk about brutal, whats rough is having to say no to so many worthy young aspirants
its that winnowing process, and you like god choosing who gets to go to the next step, who gets their hopes shattered
you read their little writers statements and it breaks your literary heart but we only chosing 6
its difficult to get thru them at the beginning of the process, you want to linger over each story
even the ones that are clearly not competitive, because 1 you wonder if they will pull something off
even if not polished or elegant, perhaps a literary diamond in the rough, perhaps a mentorive find, and 2 the process is like a window on the world, forcereading all those stories
even if they arent good, at least not well executed, they still stories and stories is what got me here
but then as the deadline approach you get ruthless and you just get thru, and when you chosing 6 of 500
merely good doesnt get it, the only ones that get thru are the ones that catch me up so i dont realize ive
read it until all of a sudden im done and its like well, that was refreshing
if im conscious of it as i read it, judging technique, forcing myself to stay with it, its not really in the game
but even then youve got say 50 great stories and at that point it becomes very subjective
one thing id like to tell applicants, dont do anything that makes it harder to read
no halfinch margins, no 10point fonts so you can cram in more than the 30 pages limit
what on earth makes you think that making your work hard to read is in your favor
and no wierd and distractive fonts, some folk send pages printed front and back,
this works against you when we forcemarching thru 500 manuscripts,
dont give us any reason to reject you offhand
its just a big crapshoot, 6 out of 500 are brutal odds, best i get back to it
had to put my novel down, schoolhouse got me, bummer, me and that novel, rewrite going well just slow
sometimes i get glimpses of the masterpiece i want it to be, but its not quite there yet, regret letting folk see
it in shape it was in but that breath of outside air reassured me im on the right track,
and not just wasting my time/life, and gave me insight into what it needs, its all good
have decided, getting to bali in oct for lit conference, might as well detour to lamu
have to prepare for that, whenever i trek i have to have a manuscript ready for long traveltime
airports, airplanes, hotels, its longhand time, i always feel selfconscious being the writer in public like that
but im too desperate to let long stretches of enforced downtime go by without getting some production done
i have to work hard because i work so slow
im out - all my love
rdoc
FRIDAY
so the teaparty freshmen have demanded a 40% cut in gov spending and the gop old guard saying go slow
if will be interesting to see how far they give in to their radical wing, if they do we got a shot in 2012
obama got no problem telling his radical wing to shut up and sit down when he think its called for
thats me and mine im talking about
ran up on this great site of guy doing a daily flash fiction of memphis on prompts from readers
not only readable flash but all revolving around memphis, in particular memphis history
im just a jealous as i can be, wish i had thought of that, hes going to have a sweet little product when thats
done, im the meantime ima monitor it everyday, for the pleasure of the read, and to see what it generates
in my little memphis literary head, about time i was able to steal from somebody else like folk steal from me
stuff i put online i consider it a give away, thats why i dont do fiction online
this the one he did for 1/18, the riots of 1866 a major thread in my new novel
i like the way he played with time on this one, i like the one about ' the blues is dead, son
i really like this idea:
1/18 prompt: rain smells like piss:
“It smells terrible. I thought rain was supposed to wash things clean?” I squinted out the window into the driving rain, watching it turn the streets into a swamp. Off in the distance, I could see the red glow of burning buildings. The riots were still going strong.
“Rain’s made of what’s beneath it. When you’re living in a giant toilet, I’ll leave it to you to decide the exact nature of what’s falling out of the sky.” Came a voice from the group sitting behind me. They were playing cards, and doing their best to ignore their compatriot by the window.
“We should be out there. Doing something to stop this.”
“General’s orders. All Union men are confined to quarters until things calm down.” Came another voice from the table.
I turned back to look at them. “The men out there getting lynched and beaten were Union men a few short days ago.”
“The negroes?” said the first voice. “They got mustered out and paid well for their service. They should’ve known better than to stay. Flush with cash, full of pride. ‘Course they’re going to roil the whites.”
“This isn’t how it was supposed to be.”
“Never is.”
Memphis Note
The riot in question is the Memphis Riot of 1866, which was the result of Memphis’s black population going from around three thousand before the Civil War, to over twenty thousand soon after it. The white police, mostly poor Irish who were being pushed out by the influx, didn’t look favorably on their new neighbors. The blood shed lasted three days before the Union troops finally declared martial law and took the city back.
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o im just too envious, got to figure out how best to use this to
generate my own memphis lit product, maybe do my own riffs off his prompts/material
the key here is to generate product, daily memphis based flash, only diff is i wouldnt put
mine up raw, ima professional, i cant do that, but if i riff off each one of his riff, that will generate
memphisbased literary product, makes my little delta mack soul salivate
the key is always raw product, once you got raw manuscript you can clean it up later
this would force me to do raw text, 365 flashfictions, i had a student doing it onetime on a daily blog
came up with powerful stuff, my temptation is to edit him, he could use some polish, but still, great idea
hard to polish when you hitting one a day, this just raw material, i wish i could find that students blog
she was doing some powerful stuff
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1/1/11 prompt: the blues is dead, son
Typhus Boyd scratched the scruff of his neck and squinted at the two record executives.
“Hit it again, Tommie.”
“‘Aight.” Said the engineer and jabbed the play button on the deck.
The room filled with the sound of whiskey soaked vocals, twelve bar guitar and wheezing harmonica. The executives closed their eyes and bobbed their heads in time. Tommie watched the sound board’s lights move up and down, occasionally fiddling with a nob here or there.
After a few minutes, the song ended and the sounds subsided. For the eighth time today, the record executives looked expectantly at him. The female one, Kitty, spoke up first.
“Well? You can’t argue that’s anything but technical perfection.”
Typhus shrugged.
Then the other one, Bradley, piped up.
“All we need is an endorsement from you. Something we can put out as the unvarnished proof that this is the real deal.”
Typhus stood up, looked in at the tangled mess of metal, cable and instrument inside of the recoding booth. He shook his head.
“I’m sorry, sir. I won’t say it. Jus’ ain’t no robot that can play the blues.”
And with that Typhus Boyd, the last of the great Delta bluesmen, walked out.
Memphis Note
The Blues. The Delta Blues. That particular sound that sprung from Memphis and the Delta around us that went on to define the musical tsunami of the 20th century that was Rock & Roll. It all started right here.
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wonder if i can do something like this
with human destiny as my thread
ima do something w/this
swear i am
rdoc
MUST HAVE BEEN MLK BDAY I POSTED THIS
hello world
computer crashed and had to struggle to maintain production
no way ima make deadline and now school has started
least im back online now, the literary life, got to love it
tara books asked me to do a blog post for them on promiseland
did my 1st reading from it in memphis thurs and it went well
folk from all the phases of my life,
the magic came down on us,
once had an interviewer ask me how does it feel being part of the mythopoetic tradition of the delta, thats what i felt thurs
memphis was in the house, nothing but love
this what i sent tara press:
Hello Tara Bookworld,
So. Ive been working on my presentation for Ive Seen The Promised Land readings, and I realized as I was doing it that I was not only telling the story of Martin Luther King, but of African American struggle. I am also trying to sing it like the Patua folk do. Its taking me to a new ground as a writer and performer.
Which is kinda fitting, this project grew of performance. Couple of years ago I did this state dept tour of India, I was at the Jaipur Literary Festival doing my delta hoodoo performance thing and it went over well, folk treating me like I was some kind of literary guru, it was a most amazing experience. I was like well this whats it like to be a winner.
When Gita of Tara Books approached me with idea of doing a collaborative work with Patu artist, Manu, on King, well I knew nothing of Patua Art at the time but King was my boy, me being from Memphis and all, me being a product of the Civilrights Movement, considering myself as I do a part of Kings legacy, being asked to do a work on King was like fulfilling a sacred obligation. Little did I realize just how much a blessing it would be. This also gave me a chance to play the multimedia games I think literature will have to play to retain primacy in a media world.
So, Tara sent me the initial graphics, and by now I got a rough idea of the tradition and Tara Books mission, and Im thinking if he can do his traditional storytelling thing I can do mine; I come from the Griotic school of Afroam lit, black writers who consider themselves heirs to two literary traditions, the western written and the African oral, and hope in the fusion to take them both to higher ground. So I got loose with my delta storyteller voice, I had a ball writing that book.
It was like I was freed up to do some things that were very dear to my literary heart, and Gita let me do whatever I wanted. Every once in awhile I would check with her, uh Gita, did I step over the line here, language a little too down home maybe, what about all this hoodoology, all this destinywork Im doing up in here, should I dial it back a notch. But Gita didnt play that, she encourage my wild side, talking about thats what we like, Art, go for it, Art, do your thing. We got your back.
So I was able to step on out there, tried some narrative licks I have wanted to try for years, I got loose on this one. Then when I got the product it was like, well, look at this. Isnt this satisfying. After all the creative theorizing, the marketing considerations and everything that goes into a book, you want the final product to be a true work of art. Whatever that is. I just love the international flavor of it, the cosmopolitan quality it append to my body of work.
And all along it was assumed I would perform this, so Gita, little publishers mind still percolating, asked me Art, what about we send you a scroll version for performances. I was like no thank you, Ima do my thing, not Patuas thing, but she kept insisting and finally I realize she is trying to give me a traditional scroll version of the novel, and I say why sure, and sure enough, she sends it and its so beautiful Im afraid to take it out of the case, much less tote it around, and she says Arthur, its for use, the Patua schlep it around, use it like you the artist of the road you claim to be.
Then she send me these links of how its done, so now, in honor of Gitas vision, Ima try to sing it like they do, which is a whole new thing for me. So Im thinking of all these ways I can work the scroll into the act, and how I will have to condense the story depending on the timeslot, and I realize that for the tighter timeframes of book signings Im going to concentrate on Kings death in Memphis, and on his legacy.
Cause I claim Martin Luther King was the most influential force in African American destiny in my lifetime, I grew up in the world that King challenged, the quasislavery of the pre-Civilrights South. Martin Luther King rocked our world. I say in Promiseland that the Civilwar may have freed the Blacks from slavery but it was Martin Luther King freed them from bondage. In doing so he become one of the great voices of humanitys struggle to be. With this work I claim a role in shaping that legacy.
In that spirit, I want the folk who come to the performances to understand what Martin Luther King meant to us then and what he means us now. What he means to the world and all its generations. I want folk to leave my performances, or to get from reading/experiencing this book, that sense of being renewed, refreshed and regenerated in struggle. The struggle of life and achievement. The enhancement of the human condition. Confident in the victory of all that is good
I want this work to be rest for the weary.
I once again thank Gita, Manu and Tara Books for the opportunity to be part of a collaborative work of which I am unduly proud.
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