"Let me begin with a bit of autobiography. I grew up in the Depression, before radio had advanced very far, before television had appeared at all. People were much more bookish then, and there was a quite highly educated literary public. There were lots of magazines—I mean literary magazines, whose editors themselves were writers. And libraries were full of people trying to keep warm, and they were reading all kinds of books. There were discussing them, too. You’d go out on the library steps in a city like Chicago—or New York for that matter—and you’d see groups of people actually arguing about ideas . . . . It’s much less common now, notwithstanding the growth of the universities. It was a really democratic phenomenon. That is to say, people of all classes participated in this. There would be working stiffs—of course tough guys wouldn’t do this sort of thing—and it was all right for lower middle class citizens and even proletarians and members of “minorities” to talk about public questions and literary questions. And you could sit around in cafeterias and over your nickel cup of coffee and could have a conversation lasting far into the night.

When I was in high school it seemed to me that this was an ongoing and very important concern of Americans all over the country, that they were reading and writing and that it was a permanent condition. As a child of immigrants I had no reason to think otherwise. This was America. America had an ongoing and permanent literary life.

Well, I turned out to be wrong, but it was an accident that I proved to be wrong because it was there, and it was there in all modern countries, not just in the United States . . . . We were reading the French and Japanese and Germans and Spaniards—as well as Dreiser and Sherwood Anderson, and Wallace Stevens. All of that was going on at that time. There was a certain familiarity with important political figures. It was all a great stimulus, a huge lark. Everybody took part in it and nobody dreamed that it was so close to what we now take for granted—it’s all but extinct. Well, in a way it is and in a way it isn’t. You still have a minority everywhere in the country interested in poems and novels."

- Saul Bellow

quote:

Originally posted by Marc Summers so, who goes to these things? hippies? rich folk? i need to know what to wear based on what social group attends these things.

Both I think. Plus where I live it's a bunch of people that think their being 'smart' by attending these things. So I kinda want to drink before hand, might make it funnier

Anyone else think it's funny that this thread is still open but Marc's got closed? Talk about favoritism

quote:

Originally posted by bas Selma this is humor, humor meet Selma...hopefully you two will get along

Oh but I know it was humor mon ami!..you didn't think I was actually arguing with you did you?

quote:

Originally posted by bas Anyone else think it's funny that this thread is still open but Marc's got closed? Talk about favoritism

I did think of that as well, to be honest...

quote:

Originally posted by bas Anyone else think it's funny that this thread is still open but Marc's got closed? Talk about favoritism

lol

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quote:

Originally posted by Enigmatik Oh but I know it was humor mon ami!..you didn't think I was actually arguing with you did you?

I don't know, let's be friends

quote:

Originally posted by bas I don't know, let's be friends

We're like the only Arabs in the CORe...We're freinds by default.

Hooray!

how about eating before going to this? does it last that many hours?

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sempre contra a corrente do jogo

I like to snack. Plus if there IS food there I'll feel a bit silly being the only one not eating anything

are headphones illegal in at a poetry convention?
at the end of the night, if she accuses you of not paying attention, just recite your favorite rap lyrics.
It'll be like those Snickers commercials where the hero gets caught, then "need a minute?" and than bam, you save yourself and eat ice cream out of her anus.

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Everything is beautiful. Let the music carry you. Baby I will follow you forever. Nowhere else I'd rather be when you're lying next to me. Let the music carry us together.
anti-JennyPie Alliance
SuspicionVandit: Are you God?
Paul Van Dyk 09-24-2009: No, but I can sign your sleeve under that name if you let me!