"Irrationality has a great role in American life"
— Peter Straub
Need we say more? As far as I can tell, irrationality has the primary role in American life. America seems possessed by magical thinking, and our understanding of how that affects our literary life is only now beginning to catch up. For almost a century, we were convinced that serious literature must by definition exclude our dreams and nightmares.
Need we say more? As far as I can tell, irrationality has the primary role in American life. America seems possessed by magical thinking, and our understanding of how that affects our literary life is only now beginning to catch up. For almost a century, we were convinced that serious literature must by definition exclude our dreams and nightmares.
Peter Straub has managed to do something about that, something very concrete. As editor of the Library of America's 'American Fantastic Tales,' and their edition Lovecraft, he has lead the way in the effort to canonize the fantastic. Yes, we can blame the pulps for this. Before the pulps, there was no genre divide. After the pulps, there were stories for boys and stories for men and women. I talked to Straub at the recent World Fantasy Convention in San Jose about his work for the Library of America and his two recent books, 'The Skylark' and 'A Dark Matter,' as well as his work on some new graphic novels. (And, I never knew this, his occasional role in the soap opera, One Life to Live.) Straub's one of America's great writers; obviously somewhere down the road, some lucky kid who is now geeking out while reading Straub's work in junior high, will have the honor of assembling his Library of America volumes. Here's a link to the MP3 audio file of our conversation.
Scott "SG" Browne
11-24-09: Scott "SG" Browne Interviewed at SF in SF
"It gives me the opportunity to meet some of my influences"
— Scott "SG" Browne
Here's the deal; I saw Scott Browne a lot at the World Fantasy Convention, and it struck me, when I was talking to him at SF in SF, that he might have been kind of new to the scene. But I should have remembered that he'd written and published horror fiction in the 90's. In fact, I probably saw him, without know who he was, at the last World Horror Convention in San Francisco. That said, we did have a nice chat at SF in SF, and you can hear what he has to say about conventions and the current short-fiction publishing landscape by following this link to the MP3 audio file.
New to the Agony Column
03-19-10: Commentary : Adam Nevill Inherits 'Apartment 16' : Home is Where the Hell Is
03-18-10: Commentary : Stephen Kessler Follows 'The Mental Traveler' : Bad Trips and Good Reading
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with Alta Ifland and Stephen Kessler : "I had to do it; it was a way of both coming to terms with the experience, of documenting the experience, of commemorating it..."
03-17-10: Commentary : Ted Chiang Charts 'The Lifecycle of Software Objects' : Joshua Blue, Digital Chimps and Lives in Flux
03-15-10: Commentary : Elif Shafak Reveals 'The Forty Rules of Love' : Intimacy and Centuries
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with Elif Shafak : "I know that culture that exists in my country, that is carried on by women, generations of women."
03-12-10: Commentary : Karl Marlantes Scales the 'Matterhorn' : World-Building in the Past
03-09-10: Commentary : Paul McHugh Meets 'Deadlines' : Murdering the California Coast
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with Paul McHugh : "..the strengths of good writing go all the way, across all the genres..."
03-08-10: Commentary : Joe Hill Grows 'Horns' : Devil and Detail
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with Joe Hill : "Eventually, the wicked and the unworthy will get their just desserts on the business end of the Devil's pitchfork."
03-05-10: Commentary : Henry Porter Calls 'The Bell Ringers' : It Takes The Village
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Four Books With Alan Cheuse : Thrillers! : Henry Porter, The Bell Ringers; Keith Thomson, Once a Spy; Jo Nesbo, The Devil's Star; Hennig Mankel, The Man From Beijing
03-04-10: Commentary : Jo NesbØ Earns 'The Devil's Star' : Rewind
03-01-10: Commentary : Adam Haslett Invests With 'Union Atlantic' : Abstract Power Abstracts Absolutely
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview With Adam Haslett : "With her, and with each character, how does the rhythm create a kind of musical argument?"
02-26-10: Commentary : Dan Simmons Heads for the 'Black Hills' : Unstuck in Life
02-23-10: Commentary : Adam Haslett Knows 'You Are No Stranger Here' : Stories from Strangers' Shoes
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Jedediah Berry Interviewed at SF in SF, February 13, 2010 : "...being at Small Beer has actually introduced whole worlds to me ..."
02-22-10: Commentary : Graeme Gibson's 'The Bedside Book of Birds' and 'The Bedside Book of Beasts' : A Feast for Your Mind, Your Eyes and Your Mind's Eye
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2009 Interview with Graeme Gibson : "Our common humanity, our common culture, will help make the connections."
02-19-10: Commentary : Ralph Waldo Ellison 'Three Days Before the Shooting ...' : One Book, Many Stories
Agony Column Podcast News Report : John Callahan and Adam Bradley and 'Three Days before the Shooting' : "I've moved through the phases of my own life, and I find those phases mirrored in the characters of this novel." — John Callahan "...capable of brilliance, eloquence and power; that's how I understand the second novel, as we see it in Three Days Before the Shooting, and that's certainly how I understand, and I think how Ellison understood, America." — Adam Bradley
02-18-10: Commentary : George Mann Scares Up 'The Ghosts of Manhattan' : Hard Core Pulp Action
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Speaking Frankly With Thomas Frank : From Tea to Shining Tea : "When I think about what I'm saying, it's so depressing..."
02-17-10: Commentary : Thomas More, Clarence Miller and 'Utopia' : Politics, Satire, Fantasy
02-15-10: Commentary : 'Your Hate Mail Will Be Graded' by John Scalzi : A Decade of Whatever
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview with Chitra Bannerjee Divakaruni : "I have to work through the novel and then it comes to me, how it's going to end."
02-12-10: Commentary : Stephanie Merritt Becomes S. J. Parris : 'Heresy'
02-11-10: Commentary : Max Watman 'Chasing the White Dog' : Home-Made Hooch and Rebellion
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2010 Interview With Sam Farr : : "The money came from Washington, but the uses for that money came from the local community."
02-10-10: Commentary : Anne Lamott Spots 'Imperfect Birds' : The Ties That Unbind
Agony Column Podcast News Report : Speaking Frankly: Thomas Frank on Re-Populism and Re-Launching The Baffler : "I have never seen 'populist backlash in a headline before."
02-09-10: Commentary : Douglas Clegg Returns to 'Neverland' : Is 1980's Horror Returning from the Grave?
Agony Column Podcast News Report : A 2009 Interview with David Drake, Part 2 / Complete : "I didn't have governor ... that is ... anything, endgame, was me killing somebody.""
02-08-10: Commentary : David Louis Edelman Completes Jump 225 : 'Geosynchron'
