Nights in Cuadra Picha
Michael’s weekend doesn’t really begin until eight or nine, after thoughts of selling phones recede in his mind and he’s on the bus all the way to the south of the city, about an hour away. When he...
View ArticleStuck in Another’s Apartment
The other morning I was in the first apartment I’d ever shown. Including the open house the day before, it was my fourth time showing it. I was waiting for an Israeli mother who had to okay her...
View ArticleThe Real And The Unreal—How Are We To Write?
Credit: newstatesman.com The Norwegian novel, My Struggle, by Karl Ove Knausgaard is the most famous autobiographical work in recent memory. His honest portraits of reality help us reflect on our own...
View ArticleMy 500th Post!
The man woke the boy early, while the mother was still in bed. “Where are we going?” the boy asked, his voice unfamiliar from sleep. “We have a meeting, said the father. “Get dressed and come...
View ArticleThree Year Old Journal Entry
Based on the facts, today was a great day. I woke up late, got to work on time, got taken out for a $20 meal, wasn’t bothered by anyone, left when I had completed my seven hours, had an appointment...
View ArticlePaestum: Home to The Best-Preserved Greek Temples in the World
About an hour south of Naples are the ruins of a twenty five hundred year old city called Paestum. Humans have inhabited this region for more than 250,000 years, living in caves along the seashore...
View ArticleThe Yoke of Freedom
In the morning, even before I woke up, my chains were freedom. I was paralyzed in a casserole of unconsciousness. My coffee turned to grounds, my face was bloated and angry, everyone around me was...
View ArticleSix Poems From Toronto
I. The morning sun shone and rain seemed less likely. Maple tree boughs blew, greenish-blue waters emerged in the distance. Tall, glass-faced towers flanked our right, beyond the tracks. The New Yacht...
View ArticleA Ranking of the Romantic Poets via the Tiber
To me, Keats is the greatest of these poets because of “Ode on Melancholy:” “In the very temple of Delight,/Veil’d Melancholy has her sovran shrine.” Once I understood, like Borges said, my life was...
View ArticleThe Author as Narrator in 21st Century Literature
In recent years, authors have increasingly combined autobiographical and fictional conventions to gain readers’ trust. As opposed to the apathetic and unreliable postmodern narrator, whose fun-house...
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