The Cartophile Imprint
The Cartophile Imprint is about immediacy. Our umbrella organization will attempt to remap the infinite via frequent releases of print-on-demand literature, downloadable music, internet radio/podcasts and homemade art.
Books
Greatness is the first novel by Scott Tienken.
The anti-memoir of institutionally uncool Edward French who navigates deserts of self-help, organized crime, and women in search of Greatness.
EXCERPT:
Friday, February 11, 7:45 p.m.
The Doc said I can’t delete so I won’t. I might be cured by a sentence. A word. Since all my thoughts are “valid” the cure could be right under my nose. We can wrap this up after one entry and say goodbye to each other forever:
“You should have been in the circus, Mr. French.”
“You are a genius, Mr. French.”
“You should join the church, Mr. French.”
“Blogging” like this shows that I’m “willing to work.” Maybe I will get my company’s money’s worth out of this “laptop” now. Perhaps everything in my life will become “useful” and “manageable.” All my loose ends tied up. See, I really was taking notes, Doc. I do give a damn.
Can you tell I’m not a writer and do not like talking about myself? Doc found this out and now all of you will. But most of you probably can’t talk or write that great yourselves. Still, I’ll do my best to make sense. Just don’t expect Shakespeare or The Bible. Hopefully, we get along and learn something. And who knows, we might have some fun.
Let’s get something over with: I am here “blogging” for Doc because I’ve been having more and worse “episodes” lately. For the last two months now, three or four times a week, mostly at night, I wake up thrashing, spitting, kicking, hitting, yelping, you name it. It lasts about twenty seconds. It is half fit, half seizure. I can’t stop it and wait inside myself for it to end. When I come out of it the strong, disgusting aftertaste of metal makes me nauseous and sometimes pukey. It used to be I only tasted metal just before the episodes started. I’ve had these since I was a kid. But until now at most only once or twice a month. And nowhere nearly this severe.
On the bright side, I’m exhausted afterwards and sometimes fall right to sleep. Though overall I’ve had a harder time falling asleep since they started. But I’ve always had a hard time falling asleep.
The sleep experts found nothing. Tests say my brain is fine even though Doc isn’t convinced the episodes aren’t “lower-form dreaming.” Either way, I refuse to take any medications. I don’t want to be a zombie. I still manage to do a hell of a job at work every day, come home, and make Evelyn happy in bed when she wants to be made happy.
Worst of all is that the episodes are starting to happen in the daytime more. And these are the strongest. I’ll be sitting at my desk, totally fine, and all of sudden get very hot and the metal slowly fills my mouth. Then a full seizure starts. It feels like I am drowning, disappearing, blacking out. I feel like what I picture dying to feel like; being buried and not being able to dig out. Like I have no say in the lights being turned out on me. And though it makes no sense now, when it is happening, the only thing that saves me is hitting at anything within reach. Desk, window, people, anything. Stapler, soda can. If I don’t, I will die. That is how it feels. Desperate.
Two Saturdays ago while watching television with Evelyn she got hit in the ribs and I kicked her. Not very bad, but enough. Obviously she knows I’m not a batterer. She’s been through most of the night ones and come back for more. Still, she threatened me. See Doc more often or A) She would break up with me and or B) Call my mother. That’s how she put it: “A and or B.”
So now I see Doc twice a week and pay him to take a more active interest in me. Will you all take an interest? I’m nothing like what you like on television. Or anything like you I bet. But there are tens of millions of you out there and most of you probably speak English. So chances are there will be lots of you who pop in to see what Edward French is all about. There are comment boxes. Feel free.
To be in “good faith with myself” I will be blogging every day except Sunday to “talk things to their root” and “work to be happy.” I am also supposed to be leaving the house more and “engaging the world,” having more “interactions.” Just because Doc talks like this doesn’t mean he is a hippy or space cadet, just that he has a way of talking that is fancier than it needs to be. It’s the sort of talk you hear in the boardroom sometimes when the account execs are having a contest to see who can seem more impressive. They will have worn their best suits that day and figure talking fancy goes with the suits better than their ties. Mike Muller does this. So does Anthony The Jerk Cabrini. If you like modern television you would like Cabrini The Jerk but definitely not me. Doc said I should “be positive.” But there is nothing positive about The Jerk. Knowing who your enemies are (like The Jerk) is useful. I know to avoid him. I wish him nothing but bad luck. See, Doc, this is the “thoroughness” you recommended. I have considered The Jerk’s role in my life and “expressed what (he) means to me.” I am comfortable thinking of and treating him in a way consistent with the nickname I have given him; The Jerk.
So you know, I have been quoting from The Bible. Me and Doc put it together. His pocket-sized pamphlet with my notes on it. Living by its tips and sayings will bring the “structure” and “accountability” I need in order to “heal.” It shall never leave me. I must “put my faith in it.” Not being much of a believer I am not feeling “positive” that The Bible will work. But I will try because I am frightened. The episodes make me feel dangerous. One of them could end me or someone else.
Doc won’t believe that I am “happy.” Is it because My unwritten Bible does not have so many rules? I just live my days and do what I feel like doing. Isn’t that the American Dream? Outside of the episodes, I live a normal, healthy life. I rarely cry or get angry. I do not have any conditions or allergies. I am not oppressed. Traffic is only a problem when it rains. My job pays very well. I have a girlfriend who likes making love almost as often as I do.
Read More.
BuyGreatness.
Tongues Tied To Anchors is the first collection of poems by Laurence Lillvik.
The poems were written in 2009 with the goal of one poem a week.
EXCERPTS:
DIY
She applied bacon
Grease to her pressure
Points, lay naked in
The muddy pond, and
Waited for the crawdads.
What, Honey?
Wendy, when you read to
Me, when you really fucking
Read to me, all I can hear
Is the goddamn buzzing of
Government-sponsored bee-
Keepers, they’re everywhere
Wendy. Without bees our
Food is gone, is what they’re
Saying at the co-op, except for
Those meat tubes that just
Eat and eliminate, I’ve seen
Drawings, Wendy, a mouth
And an anus, and a bunch
Of muscle-fiber we can chow
On, and ethics aside it’s a little
Nasty. Now, I would have never
Guessed my ghosts would want
To join us in your quonset hut,
But every night I can hear Henry
Miller pissing in a whore’s bidet.
Cleaning Batshit From A Villainous Nest
No fist, no framework, her
Lipstick inappropriate, her
Vestments: spider-silk.
“Nature’s kevlar,”
I whispered
To the boom operator.
She was lit from below and
The poachers wrung their
Mitts, and the spume now
Did spill, uncanny and
Damned, over the sides of
The vile aquariums. The
Alternative weeklies have
Taken to abusing such
Phrases as “Bat Shit Crazy”
Though The Judge knows
That guano can cauterize
a mountainside.
Speculative Beachcombing
Spent the day piling drift wood.
Shaping it into a shelter.
Knowing it couldn’t do shit against a real storm.
Watching the skies for a real storm.
Dragging the vinyl cushions stolen from those assholes’ patio.
Worrying about the rubbers.
Buying the rubbers and two bottles of DM cough syrup.
Waiting outside the liquor store.
Giving money to the bum.
Drinking four beers in forty-five minutes, half a DM.
Carving the sign into a plywood plank.
“Welcome Back Brandy.”
Wondering where the fuck she is.
A Poem For Patricia Highsmith
His
Biography
Was
Published
A
Fortnight
Before
He
Had
Seen
Patricia’s
Breasts
Bared
In
A
Photograph,
So
The
Events
That
Transpired
Thereafter
Required
A
Novella-
Length
Epilogue
Be
Tacked
Onto
The
Later
Editions.
Still Life (After Death)
Scattered amid the
Actual wreckage were
Thumbnail sketches of
Inclement intentions,
Skull-sized bilge-pumps
Leaking amniotic fluid,
Eight pounds of lunchmeat,
Mini-cassette recordings
Of axe-handled threats,
Photographs of nail-bitten
Hands with peeling polish,
Probably pre-teen, whiskey
Tumblers full of potting
Soil, and page after page
Of stenographic paper
Smeared with muted lore.
Buy Tongues Tied To Anchors.
Music
The Skullcrushing Hummingbird Radio Show.
Live every Tuesday 8-10pm (pacific) on The Portland Radio Authority
Archived podcasts and playlists available here.
Pine Needles.
Pine Needles are a collective of field recorders and instrumentalists who aurally map some of the outposts and thoroughfares of the public realm.
“NW Nicolai” is the first release in the Libretto for Cities series.
Beans and Whiskey is their virtual 7″.
Download .zip file: beans_whiskey.zip
A Conversation between Scott Tienken and Larry Lillvik
Scott Tienken and I co-founded The Cartophile Imprint together this year. We've known each other for a decade and a half but our ideas usually get spilled into the ether over pints of beer or cups of joe. I wanted to get some of Scott's thoughts onto the page.
Larry: To start, you’re welcome to give as much or as little biographical info as you’d like.
Scott: Ah geez, er, can’t wait for world cup this summer. Portland, Oregano. Currently into keeping ricotta in the frig. Love my sweet wife. Jackt about The Cartophile Imprint.
Larry: Your first release on “The Cartophile Imprint” is the novel Greatness. Can you get into the process of writing it. Drafts, flow, etc. A timeline. Where were you living, working?
Scott: Between cities at the time (Portland and Oakland) and had a fat, jobless month house-sitting in Frisco in front of me before going to Vietnam for a month. Without a project/pursuit of some kind antsiness creeps in easily. It happened the man across the table told me about the novel in a month challenge (see nanowrimo.org). This appealed to me. Tidy. Discipline built in. No real time to worry over end results/outlining/theme (all curse words), nicely suited to writing largely on instinct. Pick a character, think about him, get to know him, channel him. (Is this what it’s like for actors?) Enter his psychology and turn him loose. This isn’t at all to say that the secret bones to pick and sussing-out strategies aren’t in the quiver. More, that you don’t actively try to put your character in the position of necessarily demonstrating or exemplifying anything/any idea. (Heh, is there anything more egoistic and transparently windbag as many novels set in academic settings?) The sheer multiplicity of our associative brains makes it ‘realistic’/inevitable that a well-channelled first-person will reveal himself by thinking/talking and make plot choices for you in the process. Imagination is a possession in that way. We all travel with these generative ghosts we care about to various degrees. The ghost of (protag) Edward French was productive because he is a useful person to live among certain secret bones. Process-wise that was the easy part. Then came six to eight rereads/edits over a two year on/off period to hone the language for psychological realism and into having its own sort of musical impact.
Larry: Greatness is told through the blog posts of an unstable individual. Shortly after I read it I found a piece in Harper’s where they had the final blog posts of a guy who “went postal” in an L.A. Fitness Gym. I found his general tone and subject matter very similar to your protagonist Ed French. Should the world worry about you? Where the hell did Ed French come from?
Scott: Heh, yeah, we’ve all got the beasts within (quickie context recommendation here for Jean Renoir’s The Human Beast where only trains/machinery can suppress the aimless rage inside Gentle Jean Gabin) and who knows which of Ed’s cousins are mine. Don’t know how many times already the preface “there is nothing autobiographical about this” has been dropped. Mostly hoping my mom at least believed that. And cases/philosophies that call bullshit on “I don’t do autobiographical” might persuade me. Did a short story with French about six years ago because he is so colossally self- and culturally unaware. Also a collection of unappealing traits, but beyond cruelty. Not a loveable loser. Just a little pill to take against the maraud of media, ego, and self-presentation. An angry story, really. Not very useful. He felt ill-used, ill-shared, unresolved.
----French remained/returned because he requires effort to comprehend, to feel empathy for, to like, to welcome. (Human empathy, solidarity, thoroughness; these are some of my biggest not-so-secret bones.) And he has so damn little practice at calibrating himself to the way of the world that he deserves patience. This tension causes psychic pain, incubates violence. He needed to work harder, enter the world, and suffer. Show that his brain works very similarly to others’. Put himself in a position to enter society. Redeem himself. Also, someone on the precipice of committing cruelty should be closely studied. Yikes, veering towards ethnography here. Stopping.
Larry: When discussing “The Cartophile Imprint” the other day you kind of scared me with your emphasis on “frequent.” Right now I have finally adopted a “one thing at a time” approach because my “fingers in all the pies” scheme left me with a bunch of unfinished projects. My goal last year was to write a collection of poems and then launch “The Cartophile Imprint.” Having completed those missions this year I’m working on a novel. Luckily I do a weekly radio program so that fits into your “frequent” paradigm. What plans do you have for “The Cartophile Imprint?”
Scott: Yeah, heh, the yoke of “frequent.” Akin to the nanowrimo-Commandments discipline/pressure. Small scale: Want to be consistently (heh, positioning away from ‘frequent’) sharing the work that is important to us. So used to emailing this and that to friends that this will be a nice hub/consolidator. Again; tidy. Largescale? Cartophile is a means of bringing in allies who want to see/share work within our damn broad but rigorously cultivated aesthetic. Heh, it sounds snootingtons but that’s how it is. It will be a record label, publishing company, radio launch, art all-in-one. Not innocent of the vanity “We can be become a very enjoyable part of your life.”
Larry: I’d never given much thought to architecture before I met you. You’ve always enjoyed walking around cities and now it appears to be yielding tangible results. Could you tell me more about your “alleys” project, and then Pine Needles?
Scott: The Alleys Project started as being specifically about the meanings/implications of alleys. Alleys are full of ghosts to me. (Reference: The scene in Mulholland Drive when the camera slowly goes around a possibly horrific fence). They draw me in. They demonstrate much about the psychology of boundaries, the way homes/businesses/transport are experienced, the way place/space is mapped to our brains. A depository/vestibule for many secret bones.
----Heh, so it is quickly spiraling into an ongoing study of/diary on/epic prose poem about The Spatial Experience. (Context: along the lines of/check out Walt Benjamin’s Arcades Project.) Massive. Though the scaled down sub-section purely about alleys is set for optimistic 2011 release.
Pine Needles. Love the music of public realm. Machinery. Gatherings. Human industry. Traffic. Wind between buildings. On and on. Very accidental, spontaneous. Moving through space there are so many sounds close and far that travel over/around/within physical and built landscapes (sometimes think of large city blocks like the chambers of a harmonica), colliding and interacting with one another. Vary from block to block, floor to floor, time of day. Stationary, walking, driving. (Think of driving as a whammy bar.) Infinite symphonies available everywhere.
----So the small, relatively discreet digital recorder is a godsend. Record the public track and then accompany with instruments. The first release (NW Nicolai) in our Libretto for Cities project is a combination of a walk through an industrial district with a piano accompaniment. Two tracks. There will be no tech fancy-dancing of any kind in the public track so that the listening can feel more like a true experience. For instance, I walked while recording the NW Nicolai public track and want the approach to/distances from sound sources to be heard and felt. Really fun honing the science of it all. Looking forward to learning a world more about acoustics.
Larry: Circumstances have brought you back to Portland, OR. We’ve talked about how “easy” it is to live here. The city basically caters to our demographic, for better or worse. I know you’ve moved away in the past because you felt you needed more of a challenge to get your creativity flowing. Could you talk about the places you’ve lived and it’s relationship to creative output? How’s Portland treating you this time around?
Scott: Yikes, dude. Loathe to formulize. Or to claim to know how big a factor my own mental space is in the creative drive/process. Can say that getting out of dodge the first time through felt necessary; needing to explore the new or re-explore the old does a nice cleaning out of the old noodle. Expectations change. Chunks of you become less jaded. Processes evolve or are replaced. Kinda recoil at the use of “challenge” now because it sounds so patronizing. Truly believe that the capacity for delight, fascination, or curiosity in a place is largely affected by one’s spatial and psychological safety. A place/city fills with good, bad, and, worst of all, familiar ghosts that haunt you, lure you into the lazy feeling “I know this place” or “this neighborhood/restaurant/local government/populace = X.” “Here is what I can expect here.” You are tempted into generalizations, thinking you ‘know’ something. So moving and travel become handy/dandy cure-alls. You are forced to experience, say, D.C. on its own terms. Allow your preconceptions to be destroyed. Let it inhabit you. (Which is to say, your bones are getting washed or sculpted or dry-cleaned.) The trick is being born anew in each place you arrive in a day. (Next to impossible but the effort rewards.) Even if you have lived there your whole life. This Exploration Mode allows the creativity to flow because you are seeing and thinking more expansively/thoroughly. It is a freedom too -> The full circle and sum up: Those circumstances are my sweet wife here in Portland. And loving it anew.
And yet: Boston does objectively suck right now.
Larry: How about travel? I’m pretty complacent, I only like to travel when I know somebody who can show me around the destination. You’ve done a good deal of traveling solo and traveling to remote places. Obviously it’s going to manifest in your writing somehow, any thoughts on this?
Scott: Find it useful for sheer unfamiliarity and the above mentioned reorienting power of it all. Think it teaches/demonstrates how huge style differences are unnecessarily complicating and should not screen commonalities across (pernicious) borders. Travel (and good art for that matter) should leave you feeling less local/provincial/parochial and more broad-minded (Heh, do people still use that term? “broad-minded?”).
Though there’s no real ammo getting filed away for (curse-word) setting. Just finished a story about Laos (visited) that feels less successful in evoking place than another story set in Moscow (unvisited). Which is to say imagining places is fun (Word to The Map) as long as the trappings (for me) remain pretty darn universally imaginable.
A Conversation between Scott Tienken and Larry Lillvik
Scott Tienken and I co-founded The Cartophile Imprint together this year. We've known each other for a decade and a half but our ideas usually get spilled into the ether over pints of beer or cups of joe. I wanted to get some of Scott's thoughts onto the page.
Larry: To start, you’re welcome to give as much or as little biographical info as you’d like.
Scott: Ah geez, er, can’t wait for world cup this summer. Portland, Oregano. Currently into keeping ricotta in the frig. Love my sweet wife. Jackt about The Cartophile Imprint.
Larry: Your first release on “The Cartophile Imprint” is the novel Greatness. Can you get into the process of writing it. Drafts, flow, etc. A timeline. Where were you living, working?
Scott: Between cities at the time (Portland and Oakland) and had a fat, jobless month house-sitting in Frisco in front of me before going to Vietnam for a month. Without a project/pursuit of some kind antsiness creeps in easily. It happened the man across the table told me about the novel in a month challenge (see nanowrimo.org). This appealed to me. Tidy. Discipline built in. No real time to worry over end results/outlining/theme (all curse words), nicely suited to writing largely on instinct. Pick a character, think about him, get to know him, channel him. (Is this what it’s like for actors?) Enter his psychology and turn him loose. This isn’t at all to say that the secret bones to pick and sussing-out strategies aren’t in the quiver. More, that you don’t actively try to put your character in the position of necessarily demonstrating or exemplifying anything/any idea. (Heh, is there anything more egoistic and transparently windbag as many novels set in academic settings?) The sheer multiplicity of our associative brains makes it ‘realistic’/inevitable that a well-channelled first-person will reveal himself by thinking/talking and make plot choices for you in the process. Imagination is a possession in that way. We all travel with these generative ghosts we care about to various degrees. The ghost of (protag) Edward French was productive because he is a useful person to live among certain secret bones. Process-wise that was the easy part. Then came six to eight rereads/edits over a two year on/off period to hone the language for psychological realism and into having its own sort of musical impact.
Larry: Greatness is told through the blog posts of an unstable individual. Shortly after I read it I found a piece in Harper’s where they had the final blog posts of a guy who “went postal” in an L.A. Fitness Gym. I found his general tone and subject matter very similar to your protagonist Ed French. Should the world worry about you? Where the hell did Ed French come from?
Scott: Heh, yeah, we’ve all got the beasts within (quickie context recommendation here for Jean Renoir’s The Human Beast where only trains/machinery can suppress the aimless rage inside Gentle Jean Gabin) and who knows which of Ed’s cousins are mine. Don’t know how many times already the preface “there is nothing autobiographical about this” has been dropped. Mostly hoping my mom at least believed that. And cases/philosophies that call bullshit on “I don’t do autobiographical” might persuade me. Did a short story with French about six years ago because he is so colossally self- and culturally unaware. Also a collection of unappealing traits, but beyond cruelty. Not a loveable loser. Just a little pill to take against the maraud of media, ego, and self-presentation. An angry story, really. Not very useful. He felt ill-used, ill-shared, unresolved.
----French remained/returned because he requires effort to comprehend, to feel empathy for, to like, to welcome. (Human empathy, solidarity, thoroughness; these are some of my biggest not-so-secret bones.) And he has so damn little practice at calibrating himself to the way of the world that he deserves patience. This tension causes psychic pain, incubates violence. He needed to work harder, enter the world, and suffer. Show that his brain works very similarly to others’. Put himself in a position to enter society. Redeem himself. Also, someone on the precipice of committing cruelty should be closely studied. Yikes, veering towards ethnography here. Stopping.
Larry: When discussing “The Cartophile Imprint” the other day you kind of scared me with your emphasis on “frequent.” Right now I have finally adopted a “one thing at a time” approach because my “fingers in all the pies” scheme left me with a bunch of unfinished projects. My goal last year was to write a collection of poems and then launch “The Cartophile Imprint.” Having completed those missions this year I’m working on a novel. Luckily I do a weekly radio program so that fits into your “frequent” paradigm. What plans do you have for “The Cartophile Imprint?”
Scott: Yeah, heh, the yoke of “frequent.” Akin to the nanowrimo-Commandments discipline/pressure. Small scale: Want to be consistently (heh, positioning away from ‘frequent’) sharing the work that is important to us. So used to emailing this and that to friends that this will be a nice hub/consolidator. Again; tidy. Largescale? Cartophile is a means of bringing in allies who want to see/share work within our damn broad but rigorously cultivated aesthetic. Heh, it sounds snootingtons but that’s how it is. It will be a record label, publishing company, radio launch, art all-in-one. Not innocent of the vanity “We can be become a very enjoyable part of your life.”
Larry: I’d never given much thought to architecture before I met you. You’ve always enjoyed walking around cities and now it appears to be yielding tangible results. Could you tell me more about your “alleys” project, and then Pine Needles?
Scott: The Alleys Project started as being specifically about the meanings/implications of alleys. Alleys are full of ghosts to me. (Reference: The scene in Mulholland Drive when the camera slowly goes around a possibly horrific fence). They draw me in. They demonstrate much about the psychology of boundaries, the way homes/businesses/transport are experienced, the way place/space is mapped to our brains. A depository/vestibule for many secret bones.
----Heh, so it is quickly spiraling into an ongoing study of/diary on/epic prose poem about The Spatial Experience. (Context: along the lines of/check out Walt Benjamin’s Arcades Project.) Massive. Though the scaled down sub-section purely about alleys is set for optimistic 2011 release.
Pine Needles. Love the music of public realm. Machinery. Gatherings. Human industry. Traffic. Wind between buildings. On and on. Very accidental, spontaneous. Moving through space there are so many sounds close and far that travel over/around/within physical and built landscapes (sometimes think of large city blocks like the chambers of a harmonica), colliding and interacting with one another. Vary from block to block, floor to floor, time of day. Stationary, walking, driving. (Think of driving as a whammy bar.) Infinite symphonies available everywhere.
----So the small, relatively discreet digital recorder is a godsend. Record the public track and then accompany with instruments. The first release (NW Nicolai) in our Libretto for Cities project is a combination of a walk through an industrial district with a piano accompaniment. Two tracks. There will be no tech fancy-dancing of any kind in the public track so that the listening can feel more like a true experience. For instance, I walked while recording the NW Nicolai public track and want the approach to/distances from sound sources to be heard and felt. Really fun honing the science of it all. Looking forward to learning a world more about acoustics.
Larry: Circumstances have brought you back to Portland, OR. We’ve talked about how “easy” it is to live here. The city basically caters to our demographic, for better or worse. I know you’ve moved away in the past because you felt you needed more of a challenge to get your creativity flowing. Could you talk about the places you’ve lived and it’s relationship to creative output? How’s Portland treating you this time around?
Scott: Yikes, dude. Loathe to formulize. Or to claim to know how big a factor my own mental space is in the creative drive/process. Can say that getting out of dodge the first time through felt necessary; needing to explore the new or re-explore the old does a nice cleaning out of the old noodle. Expectations change. Chunks of you become less jaded. Processes evolve or are replaced. Kinda recoil at the use of “challenge” now because it sounds so patronizing. Truly believe that the capacity for delight, fascination, or curiosity in a place is largely affected by one’s spatial and psychological safety. A place/city fills with good, bad, and, worst of all, familiar ghosts that haunt you, lure you into the lazy feeling “I know this place” or “this neighborhood/restaurant/local government/populace = X.” “Here is what I can expect here.” You are tempted into generalizations, thinking you ‘know’ something. So moving and travel become handy/dandy cure-alls. You are forced to experience, say, D.C. on its own terms. Allow your preconceptions to be destroyed. Let it inhabit you. (Which is to say, your bones are getting washed or sculpted or dry-cleaned.) The trick is being born anew in each place you arrive in a day. (Next to impossible but the effort rewards.) Even if you have lived there your whole life. This Exploration Mode allows the creativity to flow because you are seeing and thinking more expansively/thoroughly. It is a freedom too -> The full circle and sum up: Those circumstances are my sweet wife here in Portland. And loving it anew.
And yet: Boston does objectively suck right now.
Larry: How about travel? I’m pretty complacent, I only like to travel when I know somebody who can show me around the destination. You’ve done a good deal of traveling solo and traveling to remote places. Obviously it’s going to manifest in your writing somehow, any thoughts on this?
Scott: Find it useful for sheer unfamiliarity and the above mentioned reorienting power of it all. Think it teaches/demonstrates how huge style differences are unnecessarily complicating and should not screen commonalities across (pernicious) borders. Travel (and good art for that matter) should leave you feeling less local/provincial/parochial and more broad-minded (Heh, do people still use that term? “broad-minded?”).
Though there’s no real ammo getting filed away for (curse-word) setting. Just finished a story about Laos (visited) that feels less successful in evoking place than another story set in Moscow (unvisited). Which is to say imagining places is fun (Word to The Map) as long as the trappings (for me) remain pretty darn universally imaginable.
________________________
So there you have it. Basically The Cartophile Imprint is a means to get our words and music off our hard drives and out into the world. It's an act of impatience and an eternal flame under our asses to finish projects and move onto the next ones. I know Scott has a stack of short stories that will compose a future release, and I am now moving onto a novel of mid-century Manhattan that features the likes of Marcel Duchamp and Harry Smith. We also look forward to bringing others into the fold.
I'm forever grateful for Dennis's support and offering up his blog to give The Cartophile Imprint a proper Grand Opening. Thanks to all of the other Distinguished Locals who've been both a support and inspiration over the four years or so I've been a part of this community. - Larry
http://thecartophileimprint.com
The Cartophile Imprint On Facebook.
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p.s. Hey. This weekend, you out there, meaning, well, us get to celebrate and learn more about another checkmate-like move by one of the amazing artists whom this blog is lucky enough to call a d.l. In this case, L@rstonovich answered my call to allow this joint to help launch both his new publishing venture and his own first collection of poetry, a book I finished reading last night and so very highly recommend to you with bells on and a psychedelic sparkle in my eye. Let it and the Cartophile Imprint wash over you until further notice please, and any congrats or thoughts or anything else you can type in his direction would be wonderful. Thanks a ton, L@rsty, and thanks in advance to the rest of you. Right, now ... ** Misanthrope, Well, I'd guess the doctor knows his shit, but what do I know? Anyway, sounds like pretty good news, considering. You sound chipper enough. See, that's the difference. I pity the male sexual organ too much to ridicule it. Or something. That made no sense at all, or least now that Freud is dead, thank God. ** Oscar B, Hey, pal. Helluva movie, no? Oh, I'm going to call you in a bit because I need help/advice re: something I need to do with Photoshop that I suspect is really easy to accomplish, but I just don't know how to do it. Maybe you can help? Anyways, talk to you in a bit. ** David Ehrenstein, Hey. Oh, Lou Christie is a zillion times more interesting than Chris Montez unless I'm missing something about CM, which is more than possible. Well, Sedaris's elfs aren't drugged and handcuffed to beds, are they? ** Kier, Yeah, what's weirdest is that neither Oscar nor I got 'Flesh Worlds'. Mail has gone missing before, and a package to Yury is mysteriously MIA at this very moment, so I don't know. It might just be taking a bizarrely long time. That happens a fair amount too. Sure, if you want to send a blog gift, I'll accept it late and happily, but if it's too much of a hassle, no big, my friend. ** Sypha, June 15th, that's pretty danged soon. So, so curious. 'IB' got a rave in Publishers Weekly, and that doesn't happen to Bret's books all that often, so we'll see what that means. * Tosh, Too weird even for you? That is a benchmark of sorts. Not that I'm saying you're a hunter and gatherer of weirdos or anything. Quite the contrary. Yeah, I actually found a really good Chilton quote about Lou Christie when I was putting together the post, but then I somehow lost track of it. It was to the effect that Lou Christie was one of his five all-time favorite songwriters. Anyway, thanks for the props, T. ** Paul Curran, Hi, Paul. Oh, ouch, shiver, etc. re: your dog. Poor, poor thing. I'll wait to say whatever about 'Enter the Void' below, but, when it does open over there, do not miss it. ** Tigersare, Hey, Guy! A fellow Lou Christie fan. Actually, I was quite amazed that so many other fans showed up here yesterday. I didn't expect that. Until Kevin K piped in, I didn't think anyone in my 'real' 3D 24/7 life shared my thing for his work. Yeah, The Tammys stuff is excellent. I was going to include a sample or two, but I decided to go purist or whatever. I was really hoping to find a youtube clip for 'Jungle'. Do you know that track? It and 'Cryin' in the Streets' are probably my favorite Christies. A pleasure to share the love for with you, pal. Any progress on your new album? ** Alan, Generally, Yury's new -- although not so new anymore -- job has been going really well, much better than when he was at Toni & Guy, and he's significantly happier, more content, whatever. He just gets these impossible to please, know-nothing, control freak clients once in a while. As do all hair-oriented workers, I guess. Thanks for asking, man, and I'm of course very pleased Nobuko liked my lovin' doggie persona. ** NB, Dude. Oh, yeah, very sorry about not getting back to you re: the FB message. I really am just fucking awful with correspondence at the moment. I have to join in with Math and roll my eyes a bit at the advice to stay in West Hollywood. I'm not fond of that area in general unless you mean you might stay at one of the groovy hotels on the Sunset Strip. That, I would understand. It really depends on where you want to be centered. I'm more into the east area like Math is -- Los Feliz, Silverlake, Hollywood, etc. How much are you ready and willing to pay for a hotel room? That's the first and biggest question. If you can give me an idea, I can suggest specific hotels to you, no problem. You could do a lot worse than never come back from LA. Me, I'm fine, a little too busy, pulling my hair out a bit over my novel, but, yeah, fine really. You? ** Kevin Killian, If I had known you were a fellow Christiehead ... well, the world would have been a less white shade of pale a lot sooner. It makes me sad that he's dredging around as an opening act in Vegas and basically just triggering middle aged people's nostalgia these days. He should be fronting some brainy young indie band and rocking Coachella. Oh, well. Long story short, I agree with you 100%, and let's bend each other's ears in Lou's direction the next time I see you, deal? Lots of love, K. ** Math, Thanks for talking some sense into NB's tourist side before I got the chance. West Hollywood, indeed! ** Ken Baumann, Hey. Yes, yes, I saw 'Enter the Void'. Okay, I think it's incredible, amazing, and the most audacious, impressive cinematic thing I've seen since probably 'Inland Empire', and its audaciousness trumps even 'IE'. I was thrilled and riveted to my atoms. I want to see it again in maybe a week because the one thing I'm not entirely sure about is whether the through-line -- narrative, I guess, although that term seems too stiff or something -- re: incest and reincarnation functions properly because I was so mesmerized by the insane, bravura style and filmmaking that I couldn't track the 'story' with the care that I wanted, so my thoughts on that aspect will have to wait a short while. But, yeah, I think it's kind of a dream come true of a film. Noe's daring and guts are worship worthy, I think. I can imagine a lot of people will find 'EtV' insufferable, but I think it's really brilliant. You thought very highly of it too, right? On your question, I'm pretty productive, I guess, and diligent, but I do procrastinate, never really about my fiction, and almost never when I'm working with no deadline and no responsibility to others. I'm a huge procrastinator when it comes to writing non-fiction, which is one big reason why I'm happy not be writing for magazines hardly at all these days. So, mm, I don't think there's much advice in that except maybe to say that I think my procrastinating is almost always fueled by guilt, and I just try to keep guilt out the equation as much as I can. It's funny you say you're a procrastinator because you seem like a fellow very productive type to me. Maybe you have an unrealistic goal as far as your own productivity goes, and you're less a procrastinator than a worrier at the gates of utopia, whatever the fuck I meant by that, ha ha? ** Matt Cassidy, Hey, Matt! Really, really nice to see you! You been good? Fantastic about your 'anti-folk recordings'. Yeah, I can't give them proper attention right now in the midst of the p.s. 'cos I need to keep moving along, but I'll go listen to the music later on today, and I'll hit you with feedback if you don't mind coming back around here again. In the meantime, I'll pass the news along. Everyone, Matt Cassidy is a really interesting artist who works in various mediums and is an occasional commenter here. He has recently made what he calls 'anti-folk recordings', and you can check them out here, and I highly recommend you do that. Thanks a lot, Matt. Talk to you soon. ** Bollo, Void did really pretty books. It was awesome to see Peter Sotos' work get the royal treatment over there. I'm going to head downstairs and be a little pushy with the Recollets office people to make totally sure Oscar's and my 'Flesh Worlds' aren't hiding somewhere. Great weekend to you, J. Oh, and your gift did arrive, and it's killer, thank you. ** _Black_Acrylic, Hey, Ben. Glad you liked the Christie fest. Yeah, the absence of Skinny duties from your life could easily turn out to be a blessing, as elderly Americans like to put it. The election stuff: I don't quite get it. I mean, if the Lib Dems form a government with the Tories, won't that completely discredit their whole thing? It seems really weird. I'm keeping my confused eye on it. Here's some hoping re: Leeds even if I'm an ignoramus who doesn't quite know what I'm hoping for. Well, I'm hoping you get what you want. ** Chilly Jay Chill, Oh, you filthy minded freak, ha ha. I like Lorine Niedecker's work a fair amount. I find it much more seductive and charismatic than Duncan's work. It's odder and has less dense scrim or something. I'm not at a final opinion on the new NP album yet either. I definitely like it a lot, and more than 'Challengers', and, yeah, it doesn't have the sublime genius of their first three albums. But I think I need a few more spins to reckon fully with it. ** Steven Trull, Aw, thanks, man! ** CleoL_V, Well, that's just a hell of a new name. ** The Dreadful Flying Glove, Hey! I'm so very pleased to see you! So very, very pleased! The Christie stuff is crazy, right? I've dreamed of doing a real interview with him to find out where exactly it's coming from since, due to his not having yet been given a proper revisionist style going over, he basically just answers questions about what it was like to be on American Bandstand then 'blow it all' by turning into a druggie. That BBC Radio 2 show sounds wonderful and so, so English. I'll see if I can stream it or something. Why you so beat? What's the haps with you of late, my buddy? ** JW Veldhoen, You met Luc Sante? Cool. He's great. I mean his work. I don't know him personally in the slightest. Your like-fest is, like, inspiring. ** Kiddiepunk, Mm, you'll have to decide for yourself, but you do need to see it for sure. Maybe I'll go with you. I need to see it again. It blew my fucking mind, man. I'm good. In the usual workaholic mode. Waiting for you to get back and distract me. Call me when you get in. You'll need a ... whatever-it's-called chocolat after that flight, and I always need a double espresso. ** Inthemostpeculiarway, Roger Ebert also thinks the 3D movie is the death of civilization, which is just stupid. Oh, washcloth on your face, sorry. That was quite a self-indicting jump of the gun on my part. I don't look the type either. When you eventually meet me, you'll be amazed that I wrote all those evil books. Your friend is just non-stop interesting, at least as a day report component. I read about Lindsey Lohan playing Linda Lovelace. I think it's good. I think it'll be her, uh, 'Boys Don't Cry' or her 'The Wrestler' or something. My day: Worked on the novel (slow, frustrating), kept putting together the birthday posts (slow, marvelous), and needed to pay my rent but didn't, and now I have to make the boss wait until Monday when the Recollets office opens again, but she won't care. The fire alarm went off in the Recollets, and it's an awful and very loud shriek, and I don't think a single resident even opened their door to see what was wrong, so it's good that it was a mistake, and it's sad to realize that we're all doomed. So, Oscar and I went to see 'Enter the Void'. I already raved about it to Ken up above. It's kind of more like a really weird, amazing experience than a movie. Based on the hardcore blow jobs and penetration shots in it alone, it's hard to imagine 'EtV' getting much of a release in the States, not even to mention that it's just about the least commercial fairly big budget (I would guess) movie ever made or something. Like I said, I fully anticipate a lot of people, maybe even people around here, are going to hate it or find it unwatchable, but I really loved it, and I think it's a towering thing. Oscar seemed really blown away by it too. After that, it was late-ish, and I just sort raved about the movie to Yury for a while, checked my email and stuff, then crashed. Okay, let's go do our weekends now and spill the beans come Monday, okay? Have a very fine one, my friend. ** Larry-bob, Hey, man! Thank you a lot for stopping by. Always an honor to be in your presence, sir. Trippy that you mention 'FRESH out of Borstal'. I haven't thought about that album in years. I think you're the only person I've ever known who knows that album. Wow. You doing well, man? I most certainly hope so. Thanks a lot for sharing your wisdom, and much love and respect to you, L-b. ** Jax, An 11:30 in the morning audience is, like, ... retired people? Lunch break people? Mm, I don't think I have a big problem with the actual story part, or maybe I do in the sense that I can't think up a story until I nail down the style and structure stuff, and, consciously at least, those are the hardest things to decide on for me. But stories in and of themselves aren't my real interest or strong suit or something. That's cool about the rising interest in and growing venues for radio plays over there. Awesome, underrated, under-utilized medium, as you well know. Gisele and Catherine Robbe-Grillet and I were supposed to do one for Radio France late last year, but the new theater piece got in the way. Maybe late this year. There's a chance I might get to go to Edinburgh with 'Jerk'. There's some vague idea that I would do a talk or something related to the performance, but I don't know if that'll pan out. But maybe, yeah. I'm trying. Thanks, Tom ... I mean Jax old buddy. ** Little foal, Hi, man. I'm glad you liked the Christie stuff. Those weird, yelping back up vocals on 'Cryin' ... ' are wild, no? I'm glad your day was awesome. Who needs things happening when awesomeness is hanging around? You have a stellar weekend, okay? ** Bill, Hey, Bill! Yeah, your gift arrived dandily and is just great. Are you in Vienna now? If so, how's that? What's going on? ** Slatted Light, Oh, cool, hey, man! You already have Blake's new novel? How did you do that? Damn, I'm going to be all over HP for a copy. 'Enter the Void' is, as I said, something you should do everything possible not to miss seeing, especially in a theater. Seeing it in a theater is ideal. Your thoughts on the election are most pragmatic indeed, and I know my pragmatism, I think. You make absolute sense. I don't know nearly enough about the current Tory party and agenda to say anything intelligent, but I guess I worry about the accumulating little damage they could do, not that Labour's policies haven't become an unprincipled mess. Very confusing. ** Jeff, Hey, Jeff, Cool that you liked the Christie stuff. I do like unearthing pop auteurs from that period, and I'll keep at it. Thanks for the vote of confidence. Oh, the post you're looking for. Hold on. Let me see if I can find it. Right, here it is. I hope you have a very good weekend, man. ** I'll leave you with Cartophile and L@rstonovich now. Enjoy the show and the rest of your weekends too. See you on Monday tout suite!
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