Titles Read in 1989

January

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance by Robert M. Pirsig

The Mysteries of Pittsburgh by Michael Chabon

Green Fuse vol. 9

Sonoma Mandala 1988 the Sonoma State University literary annual

OUT/LOOK: The National Lesbian and Gay Quarterly Fall 1988

X-Factor #39, by Chris Claremont

Arrowsmith by Sinclair Lewis

Black Mondays: worst decisions of the Supreme Court by Joel D. Joseph

Our Time Has Come: a delegate’s diary of Jesse Jackson’s 1984 presidential campaign by Lucius J. Barker

A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh

We Are Your Sons: the legacy of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg by Robert and Michael Meeropol

February

The Monkey Wrench Gang by Edward Abbey

An Almost Perfect Person a play by Judith Ross

On Golden Pond a play by Ernest Thompson

Discos and Democracy: China in the throes of reform by Orville Schell

A World Treasury of Oral Poetry edited by Ruth Finnegan

March

Good Night, Willie Lee, I’ll See You in the Morning by Alice Walker

Necessities by Richard Speakes

Hannah’s Travel by Richard Speakes

The Answering Voice: one hundred love lyrics by women edited by Sara Teasdale

Other Men’s Flowers edited by A. P. Wavell

Invitation to an Inquest by Walter and Miriam Schneir

Bent a play by Martin Sherman

A Walk in the Woods a play by Lee Blessing

April

Breaking the Code a play by Hugh Whitemore

Elquest: Siege at Blue Mountain by Wendy and Richard Pini

Haiku Poetry vol. 1, by James Hackett

New Directions 52 edited by James Laughlin

Loon #10/11. The Japan Issue. edited by D. L. Emblen, Richard Speakes, Richard Welin

The Hand That Cradles the Rock by Rita Mae Brown

May - September

Zuni Fairy Tales by Frank Hamilton Cushing

Deaf in America: voices from a culture by Carol Padden and Tom Humphries

Legends, Lies, and Cherished Myths of American History by Richard Shenkman

Liberty Under Siege: American politics, 1976 - 1988 by Walter Karp

Ground Zero by Andrew Holleran

Selected Poems by William Carlos Williams

Nature of Australia by John Vandenbeld

Blue Unicorn October 1988

Antioch Review Winter 1989

Paper Boy by David Huddle

Our Ground Time Here Will Be Brief: new and selected poems by Maxine Kumin

The Acrobat Is Nervous What If They Want Her to Sing: Mendocino County poets-in-the-Schools

Tracks in the Widest Orbit by James H. Montrose

Children of War by Roger Rosenblatt

Where the Spirits Dwell: an odyssey in the jungle of New Guinea by Tobias Schneebaum

Rich Rewards by Alice Adams

Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Dogsong by Gary Paulsen

The Dreadful Future of Blossom Culp by Richard Peck

The Red Pony by John Steinbeck

The Hoboken Chicken Emergency by D. Manus Pinkwater

Where You’ll Find Me stories by Ann Beattie

Another Country by James Baldwin

Forced Entries: the downtown diaries, 1971 - 1973 by Jim Carroll

The Yellow Wind by David Grossman

Guns Don’t Die — People Do by Pete Shields

Daughters of the Country: the women of the fur traders and mountain men by Walter O’Meara

Vampires, Burial, and Death: folklore and reality by Paul Barber

Tell Me How Long the Train’s Been Gone by James Baldwin

Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson

First Leaves 1989, the SRJC literary annual, edited by Richard Speakes, Glenn Ingersoll, et al

The Male Muse: a gay anthology edited by Ian Young

And Still I Rise by Maya Angelou

Poetry May, June, and July 1989

Paris Review #112, Fall 1989

Personae non Gratae by Paul Mariah

This Light Will Spread: selected poems, 1960 - 1975 by Paul Mariah

October - December

The Zombie Pit stories by Sam D’Allesandro

The Indispensable Writer’s Guide: how to succesfully build your writing career for maximum financial reward and satisfaction by Scott Edelstein

Love Stories for the Time Being edited by Genie D. Chipps and Bill Henderson

On Bended Knee: the press and the Regan presidency by Mark Hertsgaard

Soul in Exile: lives of a Palestinian revolutionary by Fawav Turki

Nothing to Declare: memoirs of a woman travelling alone by Mary Morris

The Enchanted Castle by E. Nesbit

Traveling Through the Dark by William Stafford

Poems, 1946 - 1983 by Werner Aspenstrom, translations by Don Emblen

The Stone no. 14, 1985, edited by Rich Jorgensen

Through the Forest: new and selected poems by David Wagoner

Selected Poems by Frank O’Hara

Selected Poems by Louis Simpson

The New Yorker October 23, 1989

Compulsive Killers: the story of multiple murder by Elliott Leyton

Selected Poems, 1928 - 1958 by Stanley Kunitz

Headlands Rising by Robert Krieger

An Experiment in Criticism by C. S. Lewis

Poetry September 1989

Green Fuse vol. 11, 1989

Loon #6, June 1976

The Red Book edited by Gerrye Payne

The Music of What Happens: poems that tell stories edited by Paul B. Janeczko

Selected Poems by Mark Strand

The Complete Poems, 1927 - 1979 by Elizabeth Bishop

The Poet’s Story edited by Howard Moss

Sudden Fiction: American short short stories edited by Robert Shapard and James Thomas

Antioch Review Summer 1989

The Haiku Anthology edited by Cor Van den Heuvel

Merchants of Death: the American tobacco industry by Larry C. White



[corrections made 12 July 2017]

Titles Read in 2009

January

King Lear by William Shakespeare, a verse translation by Kent Richmond

New European Poets edited by Wayne Miller and Kevin Prufer, et al

A Wife for My Son by Ali Ghalem, translated by G. Kazolias

The Wisdom Anthology of North American Buddhist Poetry edited by Andrew Schelling

Tilt, Literary Notes: a chapbook anthology edited by Rachel Mallino

Son of a Witch by Gregory Maguire

Musicophilia: tales of music and the brain by Oliver Sacks

Dreams from the Monster Factory: a tale of prison, redemption, and one woman’s fight to restore justice to all by Sunny Schwartz with David Boodell

The Canon: a whirligig tour of the beautiful basics of science by Natalie Angier

February - April

Amazon Poetry: an anthology of lesbian poetry edited by Joan Larkin and Elly Bulkin

King-Cat Comics and Stories #69, Sept 2008 by John Porcellino

Monkey Girl by Beth Lisick

Going Solo by Roald Dahl

Real Stuff by Dennis Eichhorn, et al

The Jam Jar Lifeboat and other novelties exposed by Kay Ryan

Obedience by Joseph Hansen

Alex and Me: how a scientist and a parrot discovered a hidden world of animal intelligence — and formed a deep bond in the process by Irene M. Pepperberg

The Boy Who Was Buried This Morning by Joseph Hansen

A Country of Old Men by Joseph Hansen

House by Josh Simmons

Jessica Farm vol. 1 by Josh Simmons

Naked Lunch by William S. Burroughs

Deflowered: my life in Pansy Division by Jon Ginoli

All Passion Spent By Vita Sackville-West

Just So You Know #1, by Joey Alison Sayers

May - August

This Too Can Be Yours by Beth Lisick

Robot Dreams by Sara Varon

Breathers #0, #1, #2, by Justin Madson

The Nine Emotional Lives of Cats: a journey into the feline heart by Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson

Lazy Tongue by Terri Carrion

Free Lunch #41, Spring 2009, edited by Ron Offen

The Rest of Life: three novellas by Mary Gordon

My War with Brian by Ted Rall

Twentysomething: poems by Dinyar Godrej, Pat O’Brien, and Tim Neaves edited by Martin Humphries

Ocho #22, an online magazine edited by Miguel Murphy

Best of the Net 2008 judges: Dorianne Laux and Andy Mozina

The Primal Feast: food, sex, foraging, and love by Susan Allport

Omega the Unknown by Jonathan Lethem with Karl Rusnak and Farel Dalrymple

Planet Hulk by Greg Pak, et al

Invincible, vol. 1: Family Matters by Robert Kirkman and Cory Walker

Invincible, vol. 2: Eight Is Enough by Robert Kirkman and Cory Walker

Invincible, vol. 3: Perfect Strangers by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

Invincible, vol. 4: Head of the Class by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

Invincible, vol. 5: The Facts of Life by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

We Love Glenda So Much and A Change of Light by Julio Cortazar

Astro City: The Dark Age, vol. 1: Brothers and Other Strangers by Kurt Busiek and Brent Eric Anderson

Astro City: The Dark Age, vol. 2: Brothers in Arms by Kurt Busiek, and Brent Eric Anderson

Invincible, vol. 6: A Different World by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

Invincible, vol. 7: Three’s Company by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

Invincible, vol. 8: My Favorite Martian by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

Invincible, vol. 9: Out of This World by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

Invincible, vol. 10: Who’s the Boss? by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome

How Sex Works: why we look, smell, taste, feel, and act the way we do by Sharon Moalem

Born Standing Up: a comic’s life by Steve Martin

Dreams from My Father: a story of race and inheritance by Barack Obama

Invincible, vol. 11: Happy Days by Robert Kirkman and Rya Ottley

Invincible, vol. 12: Still Standing by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

Swallowdale by Arthur Ransome

Invincible, vol. 13: Growing Pains by Robert Kirkman and Cory Walker and Ryan Ottley

Invincible, vol. 14: The Viltrumite War by Robert Kirkman and Ryan Ottley

Painter in a Savage Land: the strange saga of the first European artist in North America by Miles Harvey

Pictures and Passions: a history of homosexuality in the visual arts by James M. Saslow

The Moonball by Ursula Moray Williams

Enduring Seeds: Native American agriculture and plant preservation by Gary Paul Nabhan

My Mortal Enemy by Willa Cather

Scientific American June 2009, v. 300 no. 6

End Times / Tiempos Finales: tripas sangrientas de los demonios vol. 1 by Samuel Hiti

Tunnel Through Time by Lester del Rey

Random Family: love, drugs, trouble, and coming of age in the Bronx by Adrian Nicole LeBlanc

Poetry 180: a turning back to poetry edited by Billy Collins

Verses That Hurt: pleasure and pain from the PoemFone poets edited by Jordan and Amy Trachtenberg

All-Star Superman by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely

All-Star Superman vol. 2, by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely

Titan Unveiled: Saturn’s mysterious moon explored by Ralph Lorenz and Jacqueline Mitton

The Nine: inside the secret world of the Supreme Court by Jeffrey Toobin

The Source of Magic by Piers Anthony

Mao Zedong by Jonathan Spence

Luck by Marc Elihu Hofstadter

The Echo of Greece by Edith Hamilton

Greek Lyric Poetry: a new translation by Sherod Santos

Billi 99 by Sarah E. Byam and Tim Sale

A History of Reading by Alberto Manguel

$tud by Phil Andros

City Come A Walkin’ by John Shirley

The Unthinkable: who survives when disaster strikes — and why by Amanda Ripley

Catching Tigers in Red Weather by Andrew Demcak

Rabbit-Proof Fence by Doris Pilkington-Nugi Garimara

Life with My Sister Madonna by Christopher Ciccone with Wendy Leigh

September

The Plot: the secret story of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion by Will Eisner

The Unsinkable Bambi Lake: a fairy tale containing the dish on Cockettes, punks, and angels by Bambi Lake with Alvin Orloff

Stardeath by E. C. Tubb

Time and Materials: poems 1997 - 2005 by Robert Hass

Flight vol. 1, edited by Kazu Kibuishi

Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

The Virgin and the Gipsy by D. H. Lawrence

Mindwalking 1937 - 2007 by Edward Mycue

Cahokia: ancient America’s great city on the Mississippi by Timothy R. Pauketat

You Ain’t No Dancer vol. 1, September 2005

Naked Came the Manatee a round robin novel by Carl Hiaasen, Dave Barry, Elmore Leonard, Edna Buchanan, et al

Monkey Food: the complete “I Was Seven in ’75” collection by Ellen Forney

October - December

The American Reader: words that moved a nation Diane Ravitch, editor

Dark Banquet: blood and the curious lives of blood-feeding creatures by William A. Schutt Jr

Neighbor by Rachel Levitsky

Tristes Tropiques by Claude Levi-Strauss, translated by John and Doreen Weightman

Cosmic Engineers by Clifford D. Simak

The Boys and Their Baby by Larry Wolff

Everybody into the Pool: true tales by Beth Lisick

Angkor: the hidden glories by Michael Freeman and Roger Warner

Monsters by Ken Dahl

The Good Conscience by Carlos Fuentes

The River’s Tale: a year on the Mekong by Edward A. Gargun

Remembering the Walker and the Wheelchair: poems of grief and healing by Eva M. Schlesinger

The Mooring of Starting Out: the first five books of poetry by John Ashbery

Luv Ya Bunches by Lauren Myracle

My Vocabulary Did This to Me: the collected poetry of Jack Spicer edited by Peter Gizzi and Kevin Killian

The Hidden Life of Deer: lessons from the natural world by Elizabeth Marshall Thomas

Preacher, vol. 1: Gone to Texas by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon

Preacher, vol. 2: Until the End of the World by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon

Preacher, vol. 3: Proud Americans by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon

City Boy: my life in New York during the 1960s and ‘70s by Edmund White

Preacher, vol. 4: Ancient History by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon

The Night My Mother Met Bruce Lee: observations on not fitting in by Paisley Rekdal

Preacher, vol. 5: Dixie Fried by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon

Preacher, vol. 6: War in the Sun by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon

Preacher, vol. 7: Salvation by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon

Preacher, vol. 8: All Hell’s A-Coming by Garth Ennis and
Steve Dillon

Preacher, vol. 9: Alamo by Garth Ennis, Steve Dillon

Old Shirts and New Skins by Sherman Alexie

Berkeley Poetry Review #39, 2008; Rhae Lynn Barnes, editor-in-chief

A Taste of Daring by Mariana Ruybalid

Daring to Write by Mariana Ruybalid

Dolphin Mysteries: unlocking the secrets of communication by Kathleen M. Dudzinski and Toni Frohoff

Poet Be Like God: Jack Spicer and the San Francisco Renaissance by Lewis Ellingham and Kevin Killian

Columbine by Dave Cullen

Bread and Circuses #1 by Andy Hartzell

Too Small Comics by Bobby Madness

I Want Barbie by Katina Douveas

Free Lunch #42, Autumn 2009 edited by Ron Offen

Free Lunch #40, Autumn 2008 edited by Ron Offen

6 X 6 #16, Fall 2008

Erewhon by Samuel Butler

Juicy Mother 2: how they met edited by Jennifer Camper

Medatrocity: stories from the Caffe Med a zine edited by Bird

Screaming with Joy: the life of Allen Ginsberg by Graham Caveney

Arkansas: three novellas by David Leavitt

In the Grip of Strange Thoughts: Russian poetry in a new era edited by J. Kates

The Hot Zone by Richard Preston

Thoreau at Walden by John Porcellino from the writings of Henry David Thoreau

Again: poems 1989 - 2000 by Joanne Kyger

The Sirens of Titan by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr

Zauberlinda the Wise Witch by Eva Katharine Gibson (as an ebook)

In America by Susan Sontag

Four Letter Worlds edited by Eric Stephenson

Gutter Boys by Alvin Orloff

Smiling Bears: a zookeeper explores the behavior and emotional life of bears by Else Poulsen

A History of the Devil by Gerald Messadie, translated by Mare Romano

The Eyes of the Dragon by Stephen King

Father Goose, His Book verse by L. Frank Baum, pictures by W. W. Denslow

Titles Read in 2010

January - February

The Complete Peanuts, vol. 3: 1955 - 1956 by Charles M. Schulz

Tamawaca Folks: a summer comedy by L. Frank Baum writing as John Este Cooke

Tokyo Days: three short tales of an American in Japan by Chris Juricich

The Complete Peanuts, vol. 4: 1957 - 1958 by Charles M. Schulz

The Eternal Smile: three stories by Gene Luen Yang and Derek Kirk Kim

The Trouble with Harry Hay by Stuart Timmons

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C. S. Lewis

Prince Caspian: the return to Narnia by C. S. Lewis

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C. S. Lewis

The Silver Chair by C. S. Lewis

The Horse and His Boy by C. S. Lewis

The Magician’s Nephew by C. S. Lewis

The Last Battle by C. S. Lewis

Growing Up Absurd: problems of youth in the organized society by Paul Goodman

White By Law: the legal construction of race by Ian F. Haney Lopez

One Teacher in Ten: LGBT educators share their stories edited by Kevin Jennings

Rats: observations on the history and habitat of the city’s most unwanted inhabitants by Robert Sullivan

March

Young Avengers, vol. 2: Family Matters by Alan Heinberg

Taking on the System by Markos Moulitsas Zuniga

The Greeks and Greek Love by James Davidson

Wishful Drinking by Carrie Fisher

The New Thing, vol. 1: Identity by Jim Higgins

Out of the Silent Planet by C. S. Lewis

April

One Minute Movies by Summer Brenner

A Fine Excess: 50 years of Beloit Poetry Journal

Exit Wounds a graphic novel by Rutu Modan

The Oldest Gay Couple in America by Gean Harwood

Cherry-Blossoms Japanese Haiku, series III. Peter Pauper Press

Crossing Centuries: the new generation in Russian poetry edited by John High

Perelandra by C. S. Lewis

Open Veins of Latin America by Eduardo Galeano

Sister and Brother: lesbians and gay men edited by Joan Nestle & John Preston

Outlands and Inlands by Lindy Hough

May

The Book of Bunny Suicides by Andy Riley

Beyond Bogota: diary of a drug war journalist in Colombia by Garry Leech

King-Cat Comics #70 by John Porcellino

Man and Microbes: disease and plague in history and modern times by Arno Karlen

Among the Great Apes by Paul Raffaele

In Silence: growing up hearing in a deaf world by Ruth Sidransky

The Vicar of Wakefield by Oliver Goldsmith

June

Blood Strangers by Katherine A. Briccetti

That Hideous Strength by C. S. Lewis

The Royal Historian of Oz #1; a comic by Tommy Kovac and Andy Hirsch

The King Must Die by Mary Renault

Language for a New Century edited by Chang, Handal, Shankar

Boy Meets Boy by David Levithan

Assembly Required: notes from a deaf gay life by Raymond Luczak

July - August

Newave! the underground mini comix of the 1980s edited by Michael Dowers

A Single Hurt Color by Andrew Demcak

Shortcomings by Adrian Tomine

American Hunks by David L. Chapman & Brett Josef Grubisic

Almost Human: a journey into the world of baboons by Shirley C. Strum

A Garden of Peonies: Chinese poems in English by Henry H. Hart

Rituals by Cees Nooteboom

Ex Machina by Brian Vaughn and Tony Harris

Caminante by John Oliver Simon

Cocktails by D. A. Powell

By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept by Elizabeth Smart

Chasing the Sea: lost among the ghosts of empire in Central Asia by Tom Bissell

Postmodern American Poetry edited by Paul Hoover

Just So You Know #2, mini comic by Joey Alison Sayers

September

King-Cat Comics #71 by John Porcellino

Just Kids by Patti Smith

The Curvature of Blue by Lucille Lang Day

Cliterally Speaking mini comic by April Thompson, et al

Notes on Conflict mini comic by Susie Cagle

We’ll Never Have Paris Spring 2010, vol. 6

The Frog Prince a comic by Lauren Skinner

Hello, My Name is Mary #1 and #2 by Mary Van Note

Retail Whore #1 and #2 by Amara Rinne

Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar by Cathcart & Klein

Pass the Butterworms: remote journeys oddly rendered by Tim Cahill

The Garden Thrives: twentieth century African American poetry edited by Clarence Major

The Golden Ass by Apuleius, translated by Robert Graves

October - December

Culture Is Our Weapon by Patrick Neate and Damian Platt

Poetry Sept 2010

Berlin, Book Two: City of Smoke by Jason Lutes

Waterland by Graham Swift

From the Closet to the Courtroom by Carlos A. Ball

War Is Boring by David Axe and Matt Bors

Kafka Was the Rage by Anatole Broyard

In the Company of Crows and Ravens by Marzluff, Angell

My Alaskan Summer by Corinne Mucna

Imaginary Homework by Theo Ellsworth

The Blue Bear by Lynn Schooler

Sleeper Car by Theo Ellsworth

Flesh Games: a BDSM romp mini comic by Hortaya

Three a mini comics anthology edited by Robert Kirby

Beardfluff by Rembrand Le Compte

The Great Wave of Falling Rock by Josh Shalek

Captains of the Sands by Jorge Amado

Children of Nuggets booklet accompanying Rhino CD compilation

The Adventures of Unemployed Man by Erich Origen & Gan Golan

Pity the Bathtub Its Forced Embrace of the Human Form by Matthea Harvey

Things the Grandchildren Should Know by Mark Oliver Everett

Songs of Jubilee by Sam Cornish

Fool for Love: new gay fiction edited by Lambert & Cochrane

A Round-Heeled Woman by Jane Juska

Unaccompanied Women by Jane Juska

Rising at 5 a.m. by Marc Elihu Hofstadter

The Vintage Book of Contemporary World Poetry edited by J. D. McClatchy

The Light in Ordinary Things edited by Friedman & Miller

This Is Your Country on Drugs by Ryan Grim

Memories of My Melancholy Whores by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Phantom Kangaroo #2

a collection of poetry & prose & photos a chapbook by Heidi E. Cooper

How I Learned to Snap by Kirk Read

Employee of the Year, part I mini comic by Will Scovill & Jen Oaks

Being Dead by Jim Crace

The Little Disturbances of Man by Grace Paley

Sequin Soul chapbook by Joan Jobe Smith

Hardboiled and Hard Luck by Banana Yoshimoto

Ultimate Galactus Trilogy by Warren Ellis, et al

The Outlaw Bible of American Poetry edited by Alan Kaufman

Worse Than War by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen

This Is Reggae Music booklet to 4 CD set

Sorry We’re Close by J. Tarin Towers

Titles Read in 2011

January - April

Scott Pilgrim vol. 1 by Bryan Lee O’Malley

Crow Planet by Lyanda Lynn Haupt

Faster Than the Speed of Hope by Donna M. Lane

Two Lines: a journal of translation vol. 13: Masks. 2006

Scott Pilgrim vol. 2 by Bryan Lee O’Malley

The Force of a Feather: the search for a lost story of slavery and freedom by DeEtta Demaratus

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly by Jean-Dominique Bauby

I am secretly an important man by Steven Jesse Bernstein

Scott Pilgrim vol. 3 by Bryan Lee O’Malley

Deep Ska booklet accompanying 4 CD set

When Even the Sky Hurts by Julia Vinograd

Scott Pilgrim vol. 4 by Bryan Lee O’Malley

The Complete Adventures of the Borrowers by Mary Norton

Poor Stainless: a Borrowers story by Mary Norton

Scott Pilgrim vol. 5 by Bryan Lee O’Malley

Give Our Regards to the Atom Smashers: writers on comics edited by Sean Howe

The Borrowers Avenged by Mary Norton

Did Adam and Eve Have Navels? by Martin Gardner

Born to Run: a hidden tribe … by Christopher McDougall

Scott Pilgrim vol. 6 by Bryan Lee O’Malley

Ringworld Engineers by Larry Niven

Lake Huron Winds poetry chapbook by Mel C. Thompson

I Love You Phillip Morris by Steve McVicker

Unpacking the Boxes: a memoir of a life in poetry by Donald Hall

The Beats: a graphic history by Harvey Pekar

Packing for Mars by Mary Roach

Catfish and Mandala by Andrew X. Pham

Ecco Anthology of International Poetry edited by Ilya Kaminsky

Travels with Lisbeth by Lars Eighner

Silas Marner by George Eliot

Shooting in the Wild by Chris Palmer

The Grandest of Lives: eye to eye with whales by Douglas Chadwick

Mother Night by Kurt Vonnegut

X’ed Out by Charles Burns

May

God’s Man / Madman’s Drum / Wild Pilgrimage by Lynd Ward

The Salt Ecstasies by James L. White, intro by Mark Doty

Patty’s Got a Gun: Patricia Hearst in 1970s America by William Graebner

Ringworld’s Children by Larry Niven

Cat’s Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut

Cometbus #54: In China with Green Day by Aaron Cometbus

Wishbone by Priscilla Lee

In Southern Light: trekking through Zaire and the Amazon by Alex Shoumatoff

June - September

The End of Major Combat Operatons by Nick McDonell

La Perdida by Jessica Abel

The Best American Comics 2007 edited by Chris Ware

Hot Stuff: a brief history of disco by John-Manuel Andriote

The Cave Painters by Gregory Curtis

The Fart Party by Julia Wertz

Far From Home short stories by Walter Tevis

Prelude to a Million Years / Song without Words / Vertigo by Lynd Ward

Godzilla on My Mind by William Tsutsui

Self-Evident Poems by Guy Bennett

Listening to Winter by Molly Fisk

Pluto: sentinel of the outer solar system by Barrie W. Jones

Drinking at the Movies by Julia Wertz

From Wonderland with Love: Danish comics edited by Steffen Maarup

The Ringworld Throne by Larry Niven

Shirtlifter #4 by Steve MacIsaac

Quarterly Review of Literature: contemporary poetry series IV: Wislawa Szymborska, Jane Hirshfield, et al

Three #2, edited by Robert Kirby

The World Split Open: four centuries of women poets edited by Louise Bernikow

The Unswept Path: contemporary American haiku edited by J. Brandi, D. Maloney

Kundalini: the evolutionary energy in man by Gopi Krishna

The Fart Party vol. 2 by Julia Wertz

The Commitment: love, sex, marriage, and my family by Dan Savage

Congress of the Animals a Frank book by Jim Woodring

Shedding Skins: four Sioux poets edited by Adrian C. Louis

Haiku Moment: an anthology of contemporary North American haiku edited by Bruce Ross

A Queer History of the United States by MIchael Bronski

Aunt Jane’s Nieces by L. Frank Baum

This Is Reggae Music: the story of Jamaica’s music by Lloyd Bradley

Role Models by John Waters

Never Have Your Dog Stuffed by Alan Alda

The Complete Annotated Oz Squad, vol. 1 by Steve Ahlquist, et al

The Magic World: American Indian Songs and Poems edited by William Brandon

Tales of Magic Land 2: Seven Underground Kings and The Fiery God of the Marrans by Alexander Volkov, translated by Peter L. Blystone

The Complete Annotated Oz Squad, vol. 2 by Steve Ahlquist, et al

My Sentence Was a Thousand Years of Joy by Robert Bly

Nothing Doing by Cid Corman

The Essential Dykes to Watch Out For by Alison Bechdel

Scenes from an Impending Marriage by Adrian Tomine

Usagi Yojimbo: Yokai by Stan Sakai

The Grave Robber’s Daughter by Richard Sala

Aunt Jane’s Nieces Abroad by L. Frank Baum (as ebook)

Dolphin Diaries by Denise L. Herzing

All Your Base Are Belong to Us: 50 years of videogames by Harold Goldberg

Weathercraft: a Frank comic by Jim Woodring

Ebb and Flood #1, a mini comic by Brian Herrick

Elf World vol. 2, no. 2, Spring 2011, a mini comic anthology edited by F. Vigneault

Astro City: Dark Age, part 2 by Kurt Busiek, et al

Estrus Collection, vol. 2, by Mari Naomi

My Emily Dickinson by Susan Howe

Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim by David Sedaris

Comic Book Guide to the Mission edited by Lauren Davis

Ordering the Storm: how to put together a book of poems edited by Susan Grimm

Kiss and Tell: a romantic resume, ages 0-22 by Mari Naomi

Wonder Tales edited by Marina Warner

Optic Nerve #12 by Adrian Tomine

The Tale of One Bad Rat by Bryan Talbot

Dancing with a Tiger: poems, 1941-1998 by Robert Friend

Tales of Magic Land 3: Yellow Fog and The Mystery fo the Deserted Castle by Alexander Volkov

October - December

Gaylord Phoenix by Edie Fake

Ogner Stump’s One Thousand Sorrows by A. Goldfarb

I’m Walking as Straight as I Can by Geri Jewell

Beautiful & Pointless: a guide to modern poetry by David Orr

Love Is the Reason: a Cavalcade of Boys story by Tim Fish

Lies Grown Ups Told Me: a comics anthology edited by Nomi Kane, Caitlin M., Jen Vaughn

Sweethearts by Emmett Williams

Luci’s Let Down by Marjee Chmiel & Sandra Lanza

My Dreaming Waking Life: 6 poets, 66 poems by Hofstadter, et al

Book of Boy Trouble, vol. 2: Born to Trouble edited by R. Kirby & D. Kelly

A Controversy of Poets edited by Robert Kelly and Paris Leary

Bonk by Mary Roach

The Duchess Who Wouldn’t Sit Down: an informal history of hospitality by Jesse Browner

Century of Clouds by Bruce Boone

The Beet Queen by Louise Erdrich

Sidewalk Empire and Wish the World parts 1 & 2, mini comics by Eddie H. Ahn

The Bridge Project a comics anthology edited by Matt Leunig

Drunk and Disorderly: selected poems, 1978-2000 by Alan Catlin

Crack Comics #63

The Lights in the Sky Are Stars by Frederic Brown

Falling Sky by Julia Vinograd

Seventh Generation: contemporary native writing edited by Heather Hodgson

The Cute Manifesto by James Kochalka

The Believer #73: The Music Issue, July/Aug 2010

The Lampshade: a holocaust detective story by Mark Jacobson

Fox Bunny Funny by Andy Hartzell

Visit Teepee Town: native writings after the detours edited by Diane Glancy and Mark Nowak

Dead, She Said by Steve Niles and Bernie Wrightson

Beast Begat Beast mini comic by James the Staton

Notes for My Body Double by Paul Guest

Radiant Silhouette: new & selected work, 1974 - 1988 by John Yau

Reading Comics: how graphic novels work and what they mean by Douglas Wolk

One More Theory about Happiness by Paul Guest

A Lifetime with Lions by George Adamson

Voices within the Ark edited by Schwarz, Rudolf

Auntie Mame: an irreverent escapade by Patrick Dennis

Mute by Raymond Luczak

Epigenetics: the ultimate mystery of inheritance by Richard C. Francis

Swallow Me Whole by Nate Powell

How Music Works by John Powell

Thinger Dingers mini comic by J. T. Yost

Titles Read in 2012

January - March

Marvel Masterworks: X-Men, vol. 4 by Roy Thomas, Werner Roth

Adam, Eve and the Serpent by Elaine Pagels

Belonging: new poetry by Iranians around the world edited by Niloufar Talebi

Born Wild by Tony Fitzjohn

The Ice Cave by Lucy Jane Bledsoe

The Velvet Underground & Nico by Joe Harvard

If You Knew Then What I Know Now by Ryan Van Meter

The More Difficult Beauty by Molly Fisk

Timescape by Gregory Benford

Paradiso Diaspora by John Yau

Magician’s Book: a skeptic’s adventures in Narnia by Laura Miller

Close Calls with Nonsense: reading new poetry by Stephen Burt

Hawaiian Cowboys by John Yau

The Wounded Alphabet: poems collected and new by George Hitchcock

The Cento: a collection of collage poems edited by Theresa Malphrus Welford

News of the Universe edited by Robert Bly

Crackpot: the obsessions of John Waters by John Waters

The Brave Never Write Poetry by Daniel Jones

Wonderstruck by Brian Selznick

Unlikely Friendships: 47 remarkable stories from the animal kingdom by Jennifer S. Holland

Farm City: the education of an urban farmer by Novella Carpenter

Practice by Dan Bellm

With Eyes at the Back of Our Heads by Denise Levertov

Ing Grish by John Yau

Windows on the World by Frederic Beigbeder

This Great Unknowing: last poems by Denise Levertov

Music of a Distant Drum by Bernard Lewis

Eda: an anthology of contemporary Turkish poetry edited by Marat Nemet-Nejat

O Taste and See by Denise Levertov

Paying for It: a comic strip memoir about being a john by Chester Brown

The Royal Book of Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

Waiting to Land: a mostly political memoir, 1985-2008 by Martin Duberman

Kabumpo in Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

What You Least Expect: selected poems, 1930-2011 by Rebecca Radner

The Sorrow Dance by Denise Levertov

Full Service: my adventures in Hollywood and the secret sex lives of the stars by Scotty Bowers with Lionel Friedberg

My Heart is That Eternal Rose Tattoo by John Yau

Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America by Gilbert King

The Cowardly Lion of Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

Sasquatch Stories by Mike Topp

Grampa in Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

Among African Apes edited by Martha Robbins & C. Boesch

April - August
Debt: the first 5000 years by David Graeber

Drama: an actor’s education by John Lithgow

The Lost King of Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

My Index of Slightly Horrifying Knowledge by Paul Guest

Concrete a collection of prints by Andrew Topel

black on white on black a chapbook of vizpo by Andrew Topel

Wisdom Teeth #1, a zine edited by Stephanie Foo & Neil Carman

The Hungry Tiger of Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

Poems, 1972-1982 by Denise Levertov

My Symptoms by John Yau

The Saint of Letting Small Fish Go by Eliot Khalil Wilson

Oblique Prayers by Denise Levertov

The Gnome King of Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

The Static Element by Natan Zach

Resurrection of the Body and the Ruin of the World by Paul Guest

Is That a Fish in Your Ear?: translation and the meaning of everything by David Bellos

The Dolphin in the Mirror by Diana Reiss

Across the Line / Al otro lado: the poetry of Baja California edited by Harry Polkinhorn and Mark Weiss

The Virgin Project 2 edited by K. D. Boze & Stasia Kato

The Rejection Collection: cartoons you never saw and never will see in The New Yorker edited by Matthew Diffee

King of Shadows by Aaron Shurin

Life Itself by Roger Ebert

The Giant Horse of Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

Better Angel by Richard Meeker

Breathing the Water by Denise Levertov

Jack Pumpkinhead of Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

Tough Shit: life advice from a fat, lazy slob by Kevin Smith

Mammoth Book of Best Crime Comics edited by Paul Gravett

The Chimps of Fauna Sanctuary by Andrew Westoll

The Passionate Spectator: essays on art & poetry by John Yau

White Trash Debutante by Jennifer Blowdryer

Neuromancer by William Gibson

Shuck by Daniel Allen Cox

The Negritude Poets edited by Ellen Conroy Kennedy

The Big Splat, or how our moon came to be by Dana MacKenzie

City Tree of Concrete and Hope by Luke Warm Water

The Yellow Knight of Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

Ishi: last of his tribe by Theodora Kroeber

The Science of Yoga: the risks and the rewards by William J. Broad

Big Questions by Anders Nilsen

The Giraffe and the Pelly and Me by Roald Dahl

Where I Was From by Joan Didion

Selected Poems by Tchicaya U Tam’si, translated by Gerald Moore

Iktomi’s Uprising by Luke Warm Water

Dog Years by Mark Doty

Wrong Wrong Wrong a chapbook by Jennifer Blowdryer

Daytripper by Fabio Moon and Gabriel Ba

Sparkle & Blink 3.1, the Quiet Lightning reading for June 8, 2012

Pirates in Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

Three #3 a comics anthology edited by Robert Kirby

Leo Geo and his miraculous journey through the center of the earth by Jon Chad

My Friend Dahmer by Derf Backderf

The Purple Prince of Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

Voyage to the Whales by Hal Whitehead

Best American Comics 2008 edited by Lynda Barry

Song of the Ape: understanding the language of chimpanzees by Andrew R. Halloran

Evening Train by Denise Levertov

Healing the Split: collected essays by Marc Elihu Hofstadter

Magic Mushrooms and other highs edited by Paul Krassner

Ojo in Oz by Ruth Plumly Thompson

My Family and other animals by Gerald Durrell

The Grief Performance by Emily Kendal Frey

September - December

X-Men: Schism 2011, by Jason Aaron

Gas #8, 96/97, edited by Kevin Opstedal

Why Translation Matters by Edith Grossman

Further Adventures in Monochrome by John Yau

Cats Are Weird by Jeffrey Brown

Brush Fire by Tchicaya U Tam’si

Below the Belt & other stories by Phil Andros

Sand of the Well by Denise Levertov

Billion Wicked Thoughts by Ogas and Gaddam

Torn from the Nest by Clorinda Matto de Turner

Twentieth-Century Latin American Poetry edited by Stephen Tapscott

”There was chemistry,” a true story by “David” and Chii Maena

Cold Comfort by Maggie Anderson

Micrograms by Jorge Carrera Andrade

Moomin: the complete comic strip vol. 1, by Tove Jansson

Harper’s April 1997 issue

Huevos verdes con jamon por Dr Seuss, translated by Aida Marcuse

The Long Trip: a prehistory of psychedelia by Paul Devereux

Drama by Raina Telgemeier

Plantas que nunca florecen by Ruth Heller, translated by Ivonne Murillo

The Full Spectrum edited by David Levithan and Billy Merrell

Relearning the Alphabet by Denise Levertov

Bill Peet: an autobiography by Bill Peet

The Hidden Europe: what Eastern Europeans can teach us by Francis Tapon

Every Step You Take by Jock Soto

Dropped Names by Frank Langella

Moomin: the complete comic strip vol. 2, by Tove Jansson

Drift: the unmooring of American power by Rachel Maddow

The Madman and the Medusa by Tchicaya U Tam’si

Buttering the Wind by Julia Vinograd

The Double Image by Denise Levertov

The Green River Killer by Jeff Jensen & Jonathan Case

Eminent Outlaws by Christopher Bram

Here and Now by Denise Levertov

Class Dismissed: a year in the life of an American high school by Meredith Maran

Kitties: a couscous collective collection Evan Waldinger, et al

The Garden of Eden by Ernest Hemingway

Collected Earlier Poems, 1940-1960 by Denise Levertov

The New African Poetry edited by Tanure Ojaide and Tijan M. Sallah

Leaving Yuba City by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni

Straight: the surprisingly short history of heterosexuality by Hanne Blank

Rain of Iron and Ice: the very real threat of comet and asteroid bombardment by John S. Lewis

Believing Is Seeing: observations on the mysteries of photography by Errol Morris

The Jacob’s Ladder by Denise Levertov

Denslow’s Mother Goose by W. W. Denslow

DNA USA: a genetic portrait of America by Bryan Sykes

Legitimate Dangers: American poets of the new century edited by Michael Dumanis & Cate Marvin

Marbles: mania, depression, Michelangelo and me by Ellen Forney

Jesse Walker, Oz fan

The Wizard of Oz, the 1939 MGM musical, is ubiquitously known. The original L. Frank Baum novel is famous, too, of course, but it’s not long before you’re losing people if you talk Oz. You knew L. Frank Baum wrote sequels to Wizard, right? 13 of them, fourteen if you count a book of short stories. Then there are the children’s fantasies Baum wrote about lands he placed near Oz and characters from those fairylands would stop by Oz (or vice versa). But Baum wrote for a living and his was not the age when a children’s book author could become a billionaire (J. K. Rowling, you go, girl!), so Baum wrote other stories, like the series Aunt Jane’s Nieces for teens, and he collaborated on work for the stage and screen (though those actually are part of how he lost money!), and one must note Baum lived a full life before he wrote The Wizard of Oz. I’ve read all the Oz books and most the rest of Baum’s writing and have read biographies of Baum and studies of the many versions of Oz. I know a lot about Oz and Baum, so I recognize when someone else does, too. 

When I was reading Jesse Walker’s taxonomy of American conspiracy theories, The United States of Paranoia, I was a little surprised when L. Frank Baum showed up being quoted on American Indians. Baum is not going to top anyone’s list of authorities on the topic. Baum started and ran a weekly newspaper in Aberdeen, North Dakota, and in his newspaper Baum tried to calm anti-Indian hysteria, saying, “‘the Indian scare’ was ‘a great injustice’ fanned by ‘sensational newspaper articles.’” Recent Baum commemorations have been protested because Baum later wrote that the situation of the American Indian tribes had become so degraded that the Indians would really be better off dead, so, as Walker says, one “can’t accuse the man of special pleading” in his debunking.  

Oz, post-Baum, appears in Jesse Walker’s discussion of post-WWII era paranoia. After L. Frank Baum died, his publisher contracted with another writer to continue the Oz series. Thus the books continued to make money and provide royalties to Baum’s widow and sons. By the 1940s Jack Snow, a longtime fan, had inherited the mantle of Royal Historian of Oz, and got two Oz books published in the official series. Jesse Walker groups Jack Snow’s The Magical Mimics in Oz with other works of post-WWII dread like John W. Campbell’s Who Goes There? which “featured an alien with the ability to adopt the appearance of the people it consumes,” and The Invasion of the Body Snatchers which did pretty much the same thing. “In The Magical Mimics in Oz … supernatural creatures capture Dorothy and the Wizard, adopt their physical forms and take the opportunity to engage in espionage within the Emerald City, searching for the spell that will allow their race of monsters to invade Oz and subject the rest of its people to the same fate.”

L. Frank Baum is listed among famous theosophists in Walker’s chapter on religious conspiracies, and Baum’s Oz-adjacent fantasy, The Sea Fairies, gets quoted to exemplify the metaphor of the octopus as monopolistic capitalism. (The girl, Trot, tells her newfound undersea friends that “‘on the earth, where I live, we call the Stannerd [sic] Oil Company an octopus, an’ the Coal Trust an octopus …’” The octopus Trot is telling this to interrupts her to demand a less insulting metaphor.) 

Clearly Jesse Walker has an unusual depth of knowledge of Oz and L. Frank Baum. I wonder if he’s a member of The International Wizard of Oz Club, like me. 

source: The United States of Paranoia: a conspiracy theory by Jesse Walker

Tom’s Ghost

In the development of the MP3 sonic compression format the voice of Suzanne Vega was used as a test for the quality of the sound. Vega warbles “Tom’s Diner” a capella on her album Solitude Standing. If you listened to “Tom’s Diner” and couldn’t tell the difference between an MP3 and a loss-less version, the MP3 must be doing a good job. An MP3 takes up a lot less space in your computer’s memory so if it’s works for you as well as a more memory intensive version, you can use that computer memory for important things, like more MP3s. 

I remember Kent found an MP3 version of the original “Tom’s Diner” being presented next to another compression version and a loss-less recording. I listened carefully. But I think I ended up choosing the MP3 as the best-sounding. Maybe it was the fault of the so-so speakers we were using. Maybe I just don’t have a sensitive ear. (You can test yourself at NPR.)

I bought Solitude Standing back in the 80s, mainly because I liked “Luka,” a disturbing story about an abused child set to a sprightly tune. There’s something about unhappiness you can dance to that works for me. The rest of the album was fine, but “Tom’s Diner” didn’t really register until a few years later when DNA released a remix/cover version which not only added extensive backing music to Vega’s unaccompanied voice but recut her vocal so that a passage in which Vega sings da-da-da becomes the chorus and the song ends a few lines short of the original. 

DNA was not the only one to essay a new version of the song. Suzanne Vega gave permission for other artists to alter “Tom’s Diner,” and she ended up with enough interesting versions to compile a CD she called Tom’s Album. Besides the DNA take I really like the one that incorporates the theme music from the old sitcom I Dream of Jeannie. The lyrics are rewritten, too. It grabs the backing music from DNA. It is so weirdly magic in its layers of theft.

Kenneth Goldsmith in his book, Wasting Time on the Internet, writes about 

a project called “Ghost in the MP3” in which [doctoral music student Ryan Maguire] took all of the audio that was removed from the MP3 compression on “Tom’s Diner” and re-presented it … The overall feeling of Maguire’s piece is indeed ghostly, like listening to the inverse of Vega’s song or perhaps an avant-garde ambient remix of it.

I barely hear “Tom’s Diner” in “Ghost in the MP3.” I suppose I have heard ambient remixes of songs that sound about as little like the song they were, um, inspired by? I like this, though. I think my favorite parts are where you hear Vega’s intakes of breath. 

quote source: Wasting Time on the Internet by Kenneth Goldsmith

Noam Chomsky offers a ray of hope

I’d never read a book by Noam Chomsky, but I knew of him, mostly by reputation. Highly intelligent (some call him a genius for his work in linguistics), highly principled, pessimistic, a political scold. When I saw Chomsky’s newest book, Who Rules the World? at the library, I picked it up, interested in adding to my understanding of him and what he bases his pessimism on. I didn’t think I would be surprised. I wasn’t. But, damn, the book is depressing. Not only is the United States not a heroic force of goodness in the world (yeah, that I knew), it’s pretty much responsible for the bad state of things. If the US were to suddenly vanish, well, would things be worse or better? I suspect “better” would be Chomsky’s guess. 

And this was before Trump. Judging by the way Noam Chomsky looks at things, one might foresee improvement for the rest of the world if under Trump the US stops caring what happens anywhere else so stops spending money on mucking with everybody else’s business. On the other hand, Trump having a vast nuclear arsenal at this disposal can’t be good. Chomsky seems convinced it’s primarily been luck that’s kept us all from being blown to hell. 

What passes for a ray of hope in Chomskyland? How about this:

The strongest stand [against Global Climate Change] has been taken by the one country they [indigenous people] govern, Bolivia, the poorest country in South America and for centuries a victim of Western destruction of one of the most advanced of the developed societies in the hemisphere, pre-Columbus. 

After the ignominious collapse of the Copenhagen global climate change summit in 2009, Bolivia organized a World People’s Conference on Climate Change with thirty-five thousand participants from 140 countries — not just representatives of governments but also members of civil society and activists. It produced a People’s Agreement, which called for very sharp reductions in emissions, and a Universal Declaration on the Rights of Mother Earth.

Here are some of the rights declared:

Mother Earth and all beings of which she is composed have the following inherent rights: the right to life and to exist; the right to be respected; the right to regenerate its bio-capacity and to continue its vital cycles and processes free from human disruptions; the right to maintain its identity and integrity as a distinct, self-regulating and interrelated being; the right to water as a source of life; the right to clean air; the right to integral health …

You can read the rest of the Declaration at the Rights of Mother Earth website. 

Is there any hope of these rights being respected any time soon? Ever? 

What seems to surprise Noam Chomsky and give him some good feeling is that this initiative is coming from a region, the Americas south of the US, that has so long been the US’s fiefdom, the part of the world where the US has taken for granted it can impose its vision and enforce its preferences, even to launching military coups and paying paramilitaries to kill people the US doesn’t like. Yet here Bolivia is, raising a finger to the man. 

Evo Morales is the Native American president of Bolivia. I remember during the hunt for Edward Snowden, the CIA contractor who released tons of secret data, Bolivia was considering offering Snowden asylum. President Morales’ plane was even searched in Austria to grab Snowden, who, it turned out, wasn’t on the plane. The countries responsible for forcing Morales to land in Austria ultimately said oops, sorry-ish. What they would have said (or done) if Snowden had been on board remains a question. It’s not like the incident showed any respect for Bolivia’s sovereignty. 

quote source: Who Rules the World? by Noam Chomsky

Johnny Marr, kissed by a boy

As a teen, future Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr had a good gay mate named Tony. “Tony was a beautiful creature, another Bowie fan, with a blonde Ziggy haircut, high cheekbones, and green eyes like a Siamese cat. He wore red Oxford bags [trousers] with white platforms and a black Harrington jacket.” This accounting of clothing choices is not unusual in Johnny Marr’s memoir. The man is into clothes. “Tony was three years older than me and was the first guy I knew who was openly gay. The trends and times [1975] meant that boys who looked like girls, and girls who looked like boys, were commonplace, especially if you were into David Bowie, and plenty of straight men were fashionably camp and effeminate.” Tony came from a tough family, with two older brothers. “Tony wasn’t camp but he was cutting and had a sense of self-possession that gave him a feline poise and inscrutability. … We were together a lot, and it got some people talking, which didn’t bother me …”

So here’s the story of Johnny Marr getting his first male kiss:

The two of us were in PIccadilly Gardens one Saturday afternoon just after I’d had my hair cut. We were waiting at the bus stop when two big uglies with north Manchester accents came over and started making cooing noises and blowing kisses. I looked at Tony’s face as he continued talking to me, and I could see he was aware of the situation. ‘Eh,’ said one of the lads, ‘are you queers?’ They were obviously up for a fight. I readied myself for the inevitable as Tony continued to talk to me with his back to the goons and appeared to be ignoring their remarks until one pushed him in the back and said, ‘Eh, y’fuckin’ queer.’ With that, Tony grabbed my head and kissed me on the lips for what seemed like a very long time, then spun around and attacked the biggest of the two with two really hard punches to the face until the lad went on to his knees. He then grabbed the other guy, who was backing off, punched him very hard in the face and threw him down into the road full of traffic. … [A]s we ran off towards the train station Tony turned to me and said, ‘That was nice’ …

Tony also assured his young friend that no more kisses were to come.

Johnny never describes another same sex kiss so we’re left to assume that this was his one and only. It wasn’t really a consensual kiss, but Johnny seems not have been offended.

In his memoir Johnny Marr never speculates about the sexuality of songwriting partner and Smiths lead singer Morrissey, nor does he offer much in the way of lyric readings, other than that Johnny was proud of the songs they wrote together, Morrissey’s words, as well as his own music.

At one of the Smiths’ first gigs they played one song they hadn’t written themselves: “a song by the girl group The Cookies, called ‘I Want a Boy for My Birthday,’ which I realised would send out a message that not only didn’t bother me but which I was fairly amused by and quite excited about.”

source: Set the Boy Free: the autobiography by Johnny Marr

The irresistible inner emptiness of ABBA

Karl French sums ABBA up in a sentence:

What their songs were increasingly revealing was just a very pop, rather Scandinavian soul, where irresistible pop melodies and harmonies complemented or carried lyrics that explored romantic misery and despair, inner emptiness, artistic exploitation, sexual predation, as well as palm trees, tigers, and the queasy desire to be someone’s fiddle.

I was an ABBAphile as a tween. I bought all their albums. As I listened to them over & over I delved ABBA’s slightly off English and sometimes problematic themes, while, you know, singing along. ABBA wrote more than one divorce song, did you know?



source: ABBA Unplugged by Karl French