I've prepared this essay for the 4th Biennial &Now Festival of Innovative Writing & the Literary Arts, to be held this week in Buffalo, NY. I'll be joining Anne-Laure Tissut, Dimitri Anastasopoulos, Dave Kress, and Christina Milletti for "Purple Brain: A Paul West Panel." The essay recalls some of my fond memories of Paul, and…
The following is excerpted from Manifesto: Maximalist Expressionism, or "Shut/-/Up(!) Fiction". As to what transpires in my novel Flicker in the Porthole Glass, I’ve been asked point blank: Does anything happen in this novel? My answer: The novel happens in this novel. In his book of essays, For a New Novel, Alain Robbe-Grillet sums up…
The following is excerpted from Manifesto: Maximalist Expressionism, or "Shut/-/Up(!) Fiction". A large part of the “work” my novel sets out to accomplish is to foreground the way in which self-knowledge is not an exact match for the narrative-of-self we carry around with us in our minds, a narrative subject to constant revision and emendation,…
The following is excerpted from Manifesto: Maximalist Expressionism, or "Shut/-/Up(!) Fiction". I find it hard to believe there are those who counsel aspiring writers to hold as suspect that which amazes or delights in its writing. And while, to be sure, a knee-jerk exultation in every word slapped on the page will most likely spell…
My Experience on Facebook and Why I've Quit [Updated] Some months ago I was swept up into the Facebook craze by old friends from my undergraduate college days. While I'd kept up with a few, most of these old comrades from our punk rock subculture had fallen well off my radar. It seemed every one…
Ed Desautels' Maximum Fiction 