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We are in the bookfair at Calvin College’s excellent event, hanging out with lots of other great Christian publishers and journals. If you’re in Grand Rapids, please come see us soon, we’re running out of swag! So far, we’ve been visited by a number of our contributors, including Jessie van Eerden, Paul Willis, Amy McCann, Tania Runyan, and Sarah Wells. Describing what we mean by “a journal of witness” is much easier here than AWP. Still, most discussion focuses on what we at R&S call Bed Sheet Jesus, a great wall-hanging done by one of our editorial assistants, Blaine Eldredge. Is Jesus fighting the bear, or is the bear fighting Jesus? You decide.
Editor Thom with 6.1 contributor Jessie van Eerden.
We’ll be hosting a poetry salon with Laurie Lamon and Nance Van Winckel at the Community Building in downtown Spokane at the end of April. All ticket sales will go toward the continued publication of the journal (which we’d really like!), and you get a free subscription out of the bargain. Please see the menu button above for more information.
Jeremiah Webster
In 1858, Heinrich Schliemann (retired at thirty-six after success as a military contractor) set out to discover the walls of Troy that he had read about in Homer’s Iliad. This would be like saying, “I will find the Black Gate of Mordor,” after reading Tolkien’s TheLord of the Rings. Critical consensus during Schliemann’s day assumed the historicity of Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey to be on par with Ovid’s Metamorphosisor the Tooth Fairy. But Schliemann, unmoved by scientific dogma, packed his bags and headed for modern day Turkey. He read passages from the Iliad that described Troy’s fortifications and surrounding landscape. He postulated where the Achaeans had moored their black ships. When he came to locations that mirrored the wine-dark specificity of Homer’s song, he started digging. Implausibly, Schliemann found an ancient civilization now believed to be the actual site of Ilium, nested between the Aegean and Black seas. It garnered Schliemann international (i.e. notorious) fame and secured his status as the “Father of Modern Archeology.”
Notorious, you see, because Schliemann’s methods were hardly scrupulous. He failed to notice that he had found not one, but seven versions of Troy, one on top of another: a kind of anthropological layer cake. He unearthed masks, urns, weapons, and helmets, believing everything he found must necessarily be attributed to the Trojan War. Schliemann cast elaborate names upon these objects as they were retrieved slipshod from the soil. Sophia, his wife, wore the jewels he found. His techniques (which included dynamite) elicit the gag reflex among contemporary archeologists. It was Troy beneath a colonial jackhammer, shock and awe treasure hunting, a Troy whose sole purpose was to be discovered by an affluent recreational class. His legacy suggests that however progressive we may feel, human nature has a knack for pillage.
* * * *
I thought of Heinrich a few months ago as I toured Seattle’s Underground. Like Troy, the Emerald City was built on top of a previous version of itself after the Great Fire of 1889. The tour was geared around the disposable souvenirs one usually finds at Disneyland or local Star Trek conventions, but I was resolved to transcend the sing-song monologue of bad jokes and inevitable exit through the gift shop. I would be as wide-eyed as the young German of ’58, minus the explosives and archeological theft. There was plenty to admire beneath the streets housing Pike Place Market, Jeff Bezos, and the Cannabis Dispensary, plenty to leave one humbled by how transitory the human drama truly is.
The guide led us down a staircase and into a room that was once a storefront looking out over what is now Yesler Way. A Pre-Prohibition bar stood like Nosferatu’s coffin in the center of the room. Baroque patterned wallpaper curled along the seams of the entrance. Two windows were now empty frames spanning the height of the northern wall. Aside from an occasional hiss from the city’s waterworks, the place was a silent tomb. Our guide played up the fact that this part of town was haunted. I was inclined to agree. Beneath the forte clamor of Seattle’s modern streets, there was an underground haunted by silence, by serenity, by the last witch to face tribunal in the loudest of all eras.
* * * *
George Steiner once remarked that modernity was, “a systematic suppression of silence.” That our society has embraced cacophony so readily (I’m looking at you smartphones), that individuals become alarmed by even a moment’s pause from their digital bombardiers, confirms the fears of Morris Berman when he writes, “…the use of the phone…enables us to dominate public space, to violate it, in effect, and thus demonstrate to others (now rendered invisible) that there is absolutely nothing they can do about it.” While the early twentieth century was a landscape of failed communal utopias (militant nationalism, eugenics, and the myth of Marx), we now worship the progress of iEgo. Narcissus masquerades as a social network.
Touring Seattle’s Underground forced me to come to terms with how displaced I feel in this age of sound and fury. The silence I encountered in those subterranean rooms made me want to set up shop, roll out the sleeping bag, and listen until the stillness consumed me. I used to reminisce about the past, for the good old days of plague and cholera, Visigoth and Vandal. My nostalgia was gilded, biased towards what my students call “old school,” that is, life before 1985. But the problem with this paradigm is self-evident. Like a forgetful Lotus Eater, I had cultivated a selective memory, a narrative minus what Aristotle called hamartia (a.k.a. “the fatal flaw”). As obnoxious as 2012 might be, every age is horror show. The cries for death in the Colosseum were equally immoral.
Seeing that bar with its floral wallpaper, the abandoned gear shaft rusted into obsolescence, recast my vision of history. Rather than gaze back for consolation (my standard default), I began to look forward, to a time when Seattle replaces Ilium as the antiquated city, and Starbuck’s siren eclipses Agamemnon’s mask. This exercise was actually quite redemptive. Recognizing the denouement of places and objects made them more meaningful, not less. The telos of the human narrative became less about attaining some kind of utopia here on earth, and more about the extravagance of where we find ourselves. As a Christian, my sense of grace and providence was reinforced. The music of all times and places mattered.
One day every iPhone in America will lose its charge and luster. Centuries from now, the hollow fuselage of a Boeing Dreamliner will wait beneath the prairie for a contemporary Schliemann to find. And at the end of history, all who came before that last generation will appear barbarous and backward, Vlad the Impaler and Steve Jobs alike. The 2048×1536 Retina Display will fade like all the others. Despite the claims of strict empiricism, evolution, progress, Kubrick’s Star Child, a sci-fi “Singularity” was never the point. “For us there is only the trying,” T.S. Eliot writes, “the rest is not our business.”
“What has been is what will be,
and what has been done is what
will be done;
there is nothing new under
the sun.”
Ecclesiastes 1:9
Jacquelyn Wheeler
V.
Blaine Eldredge
IV.
AWP has vindicated my use of superlatives. And it has made the abstract world of language concrete. It was, in short, fantastic. Reflecting on the experience, I was impressed by the ways that AWP made the realm of English post-graduation seem tangible. Seem possible. Here are writers working for the niche of literature in the world, and everywhere there seemed to be a “go and try” mentality. In one conversation with a chapbook publisher, our man responded to our questions: “Just go for it, man.”
The world of writing is a veritable Wild West. In one session, I listened as cyborg-meliorists waxed poetic on the possibilities of video-poetry. Ten minutes later I was in a room with DIY artists advocating handmade works of art, preferably produced in the living room, as an antidote for an increasingly de-physicalized, and therefore de-humanized, world. Because I am not a graphic designer, and because I hold a strong aversion to what was termed “the digital morass,” I was especially encouraged by those writers working for personal human connections and local exchanges of literature. What a remarkable idea, that a small community can have a publisher! This is tremendous! We can fight for the age of local bards again, close communities, and meaningful exchanges of local art.
The bookfair. Window-shopping in stained-glass hipster kaleidoscope, and as exciting as that sounds. I was especially excited by the small journals, those journals that did not disdain the work of young writers if it was of literary merit. I think here of Cave Wall, of Map
An observation: in sixteen hours in a big city, I begin a transformation into a nihilist. This is a very important piece of self-understanding to have. This is not to say that I am entirely averse to cities. No, the falafel is too good for that. But so many people, such a constructed world cannot help but make the bustling actions of its inhabitants seem a game everyone has agreed not to acknowledge as such, and I long for the dank smell of aspen leaves transforming into soil.
David James Duncan. Kevin Goodan. Norman Maclean. Elzéard Bouffier. And now Jessie Van Eerden. The journal 6×6. Writers can live in the wild and still affect great change.
And now, some instruction for panhandlers.
1. Assume the total depravity of man.
2. Maintain the straps on your luggage.
3. Stop for lunch.
4. Appear intentional.
5. Appear shiftless.
6. Have no uncles.
7. Have a real uncle, and have him with you.
8. Take a taxi.
9. Speak only a language foreign to the place you are in.
10. Have a beard and run in zigzags.
Cherise Hensley
III.
The Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference, or AWP, is a game-changer for any student even remotely interested in publishing. I went into the conference with the mindset that I would simply be helping with the Rock & Sling booth at the book fair and possibly starting to network with some important people in book publishing. How wrong I was. I completely underestimated the AWP Conference. Although I did help at the Rock & Sling table and I did network, AWP was so much more than that. I’ve come away from AWP feeling much more accomplished than I expected. During my short time at AWP, I met with knowledgeable editors, asked pressing questions and received intelligent answers, learned about hundreds of different publishers, and attended interesting panels, all while exploring the exciting city of Chicago.
I didn’t expect the conference to be as big as it was. Between the two Hilton locations, there had to be hundreds, if not a thousand people or so. Even though the locations were fairly large, it was still hard not to feel a bit overwhelmed, much like a small bee in a busy hive. Large groups of AWP members could be seen roaming throughout the city of Chicago, touting their red AWP canvas bags. The best part is that all of these people had one thing in common: a passion for the English language.
My main goal for AWP was to introduce myself to some of the 400+ book publishers. It was nerve-wracking at first, but an entirely different side of me took over, and I found myself chatting easily with publishing giants like the Harvard Review, Paris Press, and Penguin. AWP created a welcoming environment for writers, publishers, and students alike. It was great to have the chance to simply talk to a publishing representative about my questions and goals. AWP brought this chance to me in a way unlike any other. With three entire exhibition halls dedicated to the book fair, I was never at a loss for publishers to speak with. As a result, I’ve come back with a number of business cards and some realistic contacts in the publishing industry.
Karina Basso
II.
AWP was a whirlwind of literature, pins, postcards, and coffee. I was so overwhelmed by the hundreds of tables of MFA programs, journals, and publishers at the book fair, that I had to get out of the conference area and onto the streets of Chicago. Wandering downtown on my own allowed me get away from the excitement and reflect on the sights, events, and experiences on the trip thus far. Sitting at Corner’s Bakery while eating a steak chili bread bowl and sipping my third cup of Columbian coffee, I could not help overhear the conversation at the table next to me: “Have you seen all the people with the red bags? I wonder what they’re here for?”
Unobservant high school girls aside, it is interesting that I immediately felt a bond with so many people in Chicago as soon as I identified them as AWP attendants. I spoke with writers, publishers, and scholars from various cities about the different vocations within the writing community, such as being an editor, contributing writer, translator, professor. It was an affirming experience for me in that this whole convention contradicts the stereotypical view of English majors, that the only thing we can hope to do with the degree is to teach or work as a barista. I felt as if I had become indoctrinated into a community of possibilities.
I better stop myself before I go waxing poetic about how great it is to be a literary person. As far as actual concrete experiences go, I really enjoyed the variety of panels offered at the conference. The most memorable was the panel on Villains and Villainy. As a writer, I have become obsessed with the villain figure (in fact, I think I might like my villains more than I like my heroes). During the conference discussion, we boiled down the reasons why villains fascinate us so much and what characteristics make a memorable villain. There were many different opinions, but at the end I walked away with this thought: villains are interesting because they shamelessly embody the faults that most of us try to hide or repress. Essentially, we all have the potential to be villainous if certain personality traits are left unchecked. Or by one villainous act, a person is vilified by a community, like the babysitter who feel asleep on the job, and as a result two little girls drowned.
These and other panels reminded me how writing, reading and analyzing literature aren’t just recreational, or fluff jobs. Through this medium, we can address the aspects of life that most people would rather keep hidden. It reminded me of the importance of the English field as a whole, and despite the crap we get from the science, math and business majors, we are not studying literature and writing because it is ‘easy’. We do it because someone has to deal with the hard issues, and I guess that’s going to be me.
Initially, I thought I had fallen in love with Chicago. This is true to some extent; I love the idea of living in a big city with a large publishing and writing community. Retrospectively, I think I enjoyed it because of the wider literary community that invaded downtown Chicago for the week.
I’ve heard that AWP will be in Boston next year. If you decide to go, there is a high chance you’ll see me there too.
Matt Comi
I.
It place things into a new frame. I think that was of particular importance. I had a whole set of presuppositions about the publishing world and the world of small journals that was totally changed by this trip. So, with that said, here are some thoughts that I have now, that I didn’t necessarily have before.
ONE. It turns out most individuals in the Lit world don’t have crazy standards of elitism and exclusivity, at least not at first. Most people at least feign a lack of pretension.
TWO. The people who are pretentious and/or assholes usually weren’t the people doing particularly cool things with their writing (though there are exceptions).
THREE. Chicago is beautiful.
FOUR. Rock & Sling is pretty much akin to many other literary journals. It’s of a little higher caliber than I may have once thought.
FIVE. Talking to journals was weird. Just be interested, don’t worry about being interesting.
SIX. Got to know, or hear about a huge number of lit presses and journals. Which was cool and resulted and free stuff. But also gave me a real sense of journals I might submit subscribe to.
SEVEN. There are panhandlers on the loose. Don’t trust anyone named Uncle D.
EIGHT. It was humbling. There are important people out there.
NINE. It was motivating. Important people really aren’t different.
TEN. Getting to know people in the major also excited about writing is cool.
That’s about it. In a nutshell at least. the trip was an awesome way to grow friendships with other students, experience a city, and a huge secret-lit-club called AWP. Also, we did work for R&S.
That was cool, too.
Joshua Robbins
For Week 1 of the Extreme Writing Makeover, the key is to select a piece from your back catalog that needs to be gutted, demolished, torn apart, or otherwise razed to make way for the “new thing.” Once you’ve found your piece, state what it is in the comments section. This will help us hold each other accountable. If you’re willing, post your poem or your prose excerpt, too.
Mine is a poem I’ve had sitting around for nearly four years. I’ve sent it out to journals a few times as extra padding for the poems I really believed in, but that’s about it. And it’s also been included in a chapbook project called Suburban Hymnal which has since evolved into my first book manuscript, Praise Nothing. This poem has not made it into the book manuscript, and I’d like to change that, to give it a fighting chance for inclusion.
It’s a poem that came fairly quickly and easily but, as you know, “quickly and easily” don’t always mean “good,” am I right? Sure, the poem might have its moments. For example, I quite like the sounds of the first half of line 1, and I like the bridge in the second stanza as well as that stanza’s last line: “Dull as a penny—your listless face”—I think there’s maybe something worth pursuing there. The third stanza is lyrical enough, I guess. The poem on the whole follows a Greek lyric structure and it is, you know, a competent enough poem. But then again….
It’s not a poem that I really care about. I look at it and think, “Don’t just lie there saying nothing. Do something!” And that’s my goal for the next two weeks: to get in there and reanimate this poem, make it a whole new beast and one I can believe in.
What are your goals for the next two? What do you think will be the biggest impediments you’ll need to overcome during this process? What are your plans and where will you start?
In one week, on February 19, we’ll meet back here again to talk about how it’s going.
Good luck! Here comes the wrecking ball!
Looking Across Half-Moon Bay, Thinking of the Missouri
Shall We Gather at the River?, Robert Lowry, 1864
Tidewash skitters the plovers as though something
I could say might reach you in that place
where nothing can stand in for the waves.
I remember, once, standing fifteen hundred miles
from here on a bridge in Kansas City.
Dull as a penny—your listless face drifting beneath me.
How you pitied me then, said all meaning
disappears like a river into the grave
of the sea. Listen. Even now I cannot say your name.
