"the electricity goes on and off"

From: Haiku Poetry Project

“As literary coincidences go, it might not carry quite the same cosmic portent as Halley’s Comet appearing in the month of Mark Twain’s birth. But Monday [March 21, 2011] happen[ed] to be both World Poetry Day and the fifth anniversary of the moment when a young American software designer named Jack Dorsey sent out to the world the first message using the service that soon became known as Twitter.
     The ambrosial stuff of poesy it was not, except maybe to Dilbert fans: 'inviting coworkers.'
     But the confluence of these two events — both having to do with humanity’s deep and sometimes uncontrollable need to communicate — is occasioning a fresh outpouring of opinion about the future of Twitter as a vehicle for real creativity, not just for entertaining train wrecks like Charlie Sheen’s.
     For much of Twitter’s life, the idea that its 140-character stricture could be a crucible for a new kind of ambitious writing has been, more than anything else, a punch line.
     The 2009 publication of ‘Twitterature’ — a book in which 80 works of Western literature are boiled down into Twitter messages (“Laertes is unhappy that I killed his father and sister. What a drama queen! Oh well, fight this evening.”) — didn’t help matters.
     But there’s evidence that the literary flowering of Twitter may actually be taking place. The Twitter haiku movement — ‘twaiku’ to its initiates — is well under way. Science fiction and mystery enthusiasts especially have gravitated to its communal immediacy. And even litterateurs, with a capital L, seem to be warming to it.”
— Randy Kennedy, The New York Times
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“The fact that the smallest literary form - haiku - has the most rules never ceases to amaze and astound. The only real comfort one can find in this situation is the concept that this affords a wider range of rules from which a writer can pick and choose. You cannot follow all of the rules and several of them are so contradictory that there is no way to honor them both at once. You must always choose.

     In order to make a choice, you have to understand the reasons and methods. To write about one or two 'rules' as if these are the 'real rules' could (and should!) easily offend those of the society membership who have chosen to follow opposite or other guidelines. So let me make the disclaimer that in discussing these rules I am only discussing some of the current disciplines I am following in my own haiku writing and which are currently shared by a majority of writers.

     First and foremost, and certainly the guideline which I have consciously or unconsciously followed the longest, is the one that a haiku must be divided into two parts. This is the positive side of the rule that haiku should not be a run-on sentence.

From: SomeEcards

     There needs to be a syntactical break dividing the ku into two parts. From the Japanese language examples this meant that one line (5 onji) was separated from the rest by either grammar or punctuation (in the Japanese an accepted sound-word - kireji - was as if we said or wrote out 'dash' or 'comma').

     For purposes of this discussion, I would like to call the shorter portion, the fragment and the longer portion, or rest of the poem, the phrase.The need for distinguishing between the two parts of the ku takes on importance when one begins to discuss the use of articles (a, an, & the) because it is possible to have different rules concerning the different parts. Before getting into that, let me state that the fragment can be (or usually is) either line # one or line # three. A clear example of the first is;

rain gusts

the electricity goes

on and off

     Even without punctuation the reader can hear and feel the break between the fragment (rain gusts) and the phrase (the electricity goes on and off). Also one instinctively feels that the second line break would go after goes. Yet, another author may find merit in continuing the line to read 'the electricity goes on' and then let the final line bring in the dropped shoe - 'and off'. I chose to have 'on and off' as the third line because my goal was to establish an association between 'rain gusts' and 'on and off.'

     One can write of many qualities of 'rain gusts,' but in this ku, the 'on and off' aspect is brought forward and then reinforced by bringing in the power of electricity.”

— Jane Reichhold, AHApoetry

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"[...] a tool to show possible buyers"

From: Futility Closet

“Huckleberry Finn was already in press in 1884 when publisher Charles L. Webster received an alarmed letter from an advance salesman: A mischievous engraver had altered the illustration above to give it a rather darker character (NSFW).
     It certainly puts a new spin on the caption.
     Despite a reward of $500, the prankster was never identified. Webster had to call back all published copies of the novel, cut out the plate, and tip in a new one, delaying publication past the Christmas season. But it’s fortunate they caught it when they did — it could have ruined Mark Twain’s career."
— Futility Closet
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“[…] It was too easy. Someone took the opportunity handed to him by the gods (most likely Loki or Hermes, depending on one’s cultural preference) and went for it. As with Twain’s other books, salesmen flooded American cities attempting to sell the book [Huckleberry Finn] through subscription before it was published. In lieu of showing a copy of the book that hadn’t yet been completed, the salesmen were given a prospectus as a tool to show possible buyers what the finished product would look like. The prospectus mimicked the binding of the book (including samples of the more expensive leather options), portions of the text, and examples of the illustrations. It was one of these traveling salesmen who first discovered the problem.
     The Uncle Silas plate had been defaced. A couple of minor strokes onto the engraved plate had given Uncle Silas a penis, sticking out obscenely in Huck’s direction. Uncle Silas was exposing himself to the boy.
     Suddenly Mrs. Phelps’s odd smile and the caption took on a new meaning.”
— Aldine by Rebecca Romney
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no jacket

Mark Twain sans shirt
(from: The Daily Beast)

“When Amanda Leduc and Allegra Young first joked on Twitter about a calendar full of naked authors, they didn’t think that they’d soon be tastefully positioning Angie Abdou‘s skis during a nude photo shoot. That’s how the idea behind Bare if For Books came about. Nearly $6000 was raised through an Indiegogo campaign (featuring a video starring Gordon Pinsent) and the calendar now available for sale with all proceeds going to Pen Canada.
     The 2014 calendar features twelve Canadian authors in all their barely-or-not-at-all clad glory.”
— Readerly
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Blood, "Globules of Liquid Lava" and Tears

From: Amazon

"Amanda McKittrick Ros predicted she would achieve lasting fame as a novelist. Unfortunately, she did.

     There has never been a shortage of bad writers. Almost anyone can bang out an atrocious book, but to achieve fame and adulation for it takes a certain kind of genius.
     In this literary sub-genre, Irish writer Amanda McKittrick Ros reigns supreme. 'Uniquely dreadful,' proclaims the Oxford Companion to Irish Literature. 'The greatest bad writer who ever lived,' says author Nick Page.
     Ros, who died in 1939, abused (some would say, tortured) the English language in three novels and dozens of poems. She refers to eyes as 'globes of glare,' legs as 'bony supports,' pants as a 'southern necessary,' sweat as 'globules of liquid lava' and alcohol as the 'powerful monster of mangled might.' The Oxford literary group 'The Inklings,' which included C. S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien, held competitions to see who could read her work aloud longest while keeping a straight face."
— Miles Corwin, The Smithsonian
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"[...] a rather unusual way to write books"

Len Deighton: the first author to "pen" a novel on a word
processor (from: The Guardian).

"[...] A few weeks later, [Len] Deighton stood outside his Georgian terrace home and watched as workers removed a window so that a 200-pound unit could be hoisted inside with a crane. The machine was IBM’s MTST (Magnetic Tape Selectric Typewriter), sold in the European market as the MT72. 'Standing in the leafy square in which I lived, watching all this activity, I had a moment of doubt,' the author, now 84, told me in a recent email. 'I was beginning to think that I had chosen a rather unusual way to write books.'

     Today, of course, many—surely most—fiction writers work with computers, laptops, and word processors just like the rest of us. Literary scholarship generally credits Mark Twain’s Life on the Mississippi with being the first manuscript submitted to a publisher in typewritten form. Would it be possible, I wondered when I began my research into the literary history of word processing a year and a half ago, to locate a corresponding first for the digital age? The answer turns out to be the book Deighton published in 1970 with the aid of the MTST: a curiously apropos novel about World War II, titled Bomber. […]

     Deighton’s biographer and longtime friend, Edward Milward-Oliver, points out that this early adoption of word processing was consistent with Deighton’s long-standing interest in technology. And he remained a computer pioneer. Mortally afraid of losing text to power outages, Deighton had one of the first uninterrupted power supplies custom-made for the Olivetti word processor he moved on to next. (Today he favours Windows laptops.)"
— Matthew Kirschenbaum, Slate
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Illuminated

Source image from: oilpaintingsframes.com

"It’s curious how much of literature we are conditioned to consider unliterary. Few would contest the canonization of Bleak House, Vanity Fair, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, but these classics have something in common we may be prone to disregard: each was published with profuse illustrations, and in each case the author relied on the artwork not only to enhance the aesthetic appeal of the book but to add meaningfully to the story. […]

     I suspect that most fiction writers would instinctively agree that interacting with visual representations of a book in draft can help give shape to evanescent impressions or inspire new ideas. (In the most famous instance, F. Scott Fitzgerald 'wrote in' the image of T. J. Eckleburg’s haunting optometry billboard after seeing Francis Cugat’s dust-jacket design for The Great Gatsby) […]

Then there is the future of digital readers, which erode that largely theoretical firewall writers have installed to keep their work from the corrupting influence of film. E-readers allow you to read text, look at pictures, and watch videos on the same device; already, 'transmedia' books such as 2012’s The Silent History have appeared that combine all three elements into the reading experience. (E-readers will also relieve the strain of printing costs, one of the factors that have led publishing houses to discourage illustrations.)"
— Sam Sacks, The New Yorker
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Writers digest...

"To Mark Twain, San Francisco was coffee with fresh cream at the Ocean House, a hotel and restaurant overlooking the Pacific. He also had a decided fondness for steamed mussels and champagne. But most of all, San Francisco was oysters—oysters by the bushel at the Occidental Hotel, where the day might begin with salmon and fried oysters and reach its culinary climax at 9 p.m., when, Twain wrote in 1864, he felt compelled 'to move upon the supper works and destroy oysters done up in all kinds of seductive styles' until midnight, lest he offend the landlord. Every indication is that his relationship with the landlord was excellent."
— Andrew Beahrs, Smithsonian
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"Eudora Welty’s fiction includes some of the richest food imagery in Southern literature, as well as some of the richest female characters. Not coincidently, the two are often served together. By constantly placing her female characters in the kitchen and associating them with cooking or baking, Welty’s fiction suggests that women 'belong' in the kitchen. But this is not misogyny, as anyone who really takes the time to think about Welty’s fiction will realize: rather, Welty seems to be suggesting that women—like food—are not only nurturing and central aspects of life, but often the pillars of the family, that which sustains a family unit and community. A woman’s place in the kitchen, along with her 'kitchen rights' so to speak, represents the feminine powers of healing, nourishment, and strength."
— Gabrielle Stanton, OKRA
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"The beer was very cold and wonderful to drink. The pommes à l'huile were firm and marinated and the olive oil delicious. I ground black pepper over the potatoes and moistened the bread in the olive oil. After the first heavy draft of been I drank and ate very slowly. When the pommes à l'huile were gone I ordered another serving and a cervelas. This was a sausage like a heavy, wide frankfurter split in two and covered with a special mustard sauce."
— Ernest Hemingway, A Moveable Feast (pg.73, via Apples and Ice Cream)
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What Child Is This?

"[Beverly Lyon] Clark [in her book Kiddie Lit: The Cultural Construction of Children’s Literature in America (2003)] argues, and demonstrates, that our [...] fairly firm distinction between adult literature and children’s literature did not exist in 19th century America (probably not in the UK either). Writers would write for both children and adults, the reviewers would review (what we now think of as) children’s books as well as (what we now think of as) adult books. And magazines such as The Atlantic Monthly assumed their audience included children as well as adults. As one case study, Clark considers Mark Twain, in particular, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. These days we think of Huckleberry Finn as an adult book and Tom Sawyer as a boy’s book. But that distinction was not a firm one for Twain and his contemporaries. In his own statements on both books Twain vacillated in his sense of his audience and so did his reviewers. Similarly, Louisa May Alcott and her audience did not think of Little Women as a specifically girl’s book. It was a book that could be read with pleasure and edification by both children and adults. In fact, at the time, some considered it a mark of excellence that a book was accessible to children as well as to adults.
    The move to differentiate the adult from the children’s audience came in the first and second quarters of the 20th century and succeeded so well that we now assume it without question. And children’s literature has been, for the most part, marginalized.
     Clark devotes her final chapter to Disney. She makes the point that prior to the 40s Disney and his work was quite highly regarded in intellectual circles. Some even thought his cartoons were more aesthetically significant than contemporary live-action films. She also points out that anyone going to the movies assumed they would see cartoons before the feature. It didn’t make any difference whether the feature was a light-hearted comedy or a serious drama, you’d see cartoons first. Cartoons became children’s fare, she argues, after WWII and as a side-effect of TV, which made it easier to develop niche audiences."
— Bill Benzon, The Valve
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"[...] Now, if you look at some of our most famous cartoon characters--such as Bugs Bunny and Mickey Mouse--you'll see that they have characteristics that the minstrel had: white gloves, wide eyes and a huge painted-on mouth, and a complete lack of respect for authority. (This was truer of early Mickey of the late 1920s and early 1930s than it was of later Mickey.)"
— Nicholas Sammond, author of Babes in Tomorrowland, in conversation with Henry Jenkins, Confessions of an Aca-Fan
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"Who made the normal American child? In Babes in Tomorrowland [: Walt Disney and the Making of the American Child, 1930-1960 (2005)] Nicholas Sammond traces a path back to the sources of that child—one that links Margaret Mead to the Mickey Mouse Club and behaviorism to Bambi—to demonstrate that the production of a generically normal American child in the early twentieth century was as much the work of popular media as it was of developmental science. To locate that child, Sammond draws on popular child-rearing manuals and periodicals, mainstream sociological texts, and advertisements that targeted a burgeoning youth market. He also examines the films, TV programs, and ancillary products—everything from milk bottles, to school supplies, to wristwatches—of Walt Disney Productions, and the publicity Disney used to pitch its products. Sammond delineates the institutional and discursive ties that bound industry to science to the home, revealing a child that was as much the creature of popular media as the victim of its excesses."
— University of Toronto Faculty Bookshelf
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"This morning I took out a comma, and this afternoon I put it back again." — Oscar Wilde

Autobiography of Mark Twain: Volume 1

By Mark Twain
Edited by Harriet Elinor Smith 
(University of California Press, 736 pp., $34.95)
Reviewed by Michael Lewis in The New Republic

"Great writers are not meant to care more about money than art. Twain cared so much about money that what little he writes about his art in his autobiography is almost entirely, and obsessively, about the business end of things: his paychecks, his promotional tours, his financial disputes with publishers, his venture capital investments in publishing and printing technology. He stops and starts Huckleberry Finn over and again to devote vast amounts of his time and energy to losing $190,000 (roughly $4 million today) in a doomed typesetting machine, and nearly bankrupts himself. [...]
     Writing with one eye on the audience is certainly a handicap; but the worry that the audience might rise and leave the auditorium at any moment pushes the writer to be clear, and brief, and obviously worth listening to. He is forced to pay special attention to the sound of his words. A distinctive literary voice is a bit like a talent for wiggling your ears, or for holding your breath underwater for two straight minutes. It’s not fair that some people simply sound particularly themselves and others do not, and it’s really not fair just how particularly himself Twain sounded, even when he lay in bed and rambled to a stenographer. But Twain’s voice is the reason people still read him. His voice is the reason you feel as if he is talking to you. And the crowds he played to in his lust for fame and fortune helped him to create that voice. [...]
     On the other hand, it takes a lot of effort to sustain a voice without becoming trapped by it. Not long before he committed suicide, I met Hunter S. Thompson at his home, late one night. He sat in a kitchen pulling on a half gallon of tequila straight from the bottle, surrounded by giant placards inscribed with various outrageous things that he had said or written. He had become less a writer than an actor trying not to forget the character he was meant to be playing."
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