Fellini’s beached monster November 16, 2007
Posted by Mark Folse in Debrisville, New Orelans, New Orleans, NOLA, Rebirth, Recovery, Remember, Toulouse Street.
Tags: Dante, Divine Comedy, Fellini, film, La Dolce Vita, New Orleans, NOLA

Sometimes at night the darkness and silence weighs on me. Peace frightens me. Perhaps I fear it most of all. I feel it’s only a facade, hiding the face of hell. I think of what’s in store for my children tomorrow; “The world will be wonderful”, they say; but from whose viewpoint? We need to live in a state of suspended animation, like a work of art; in a state of enchantment… detached. Detached.

— Divine Comedy The Certainty of Chance Lyrics
as a speech by Steiner in Fellini’s La Dolce Vita

No, I am not about to violently snap, like Steiner in La Dolce Vita. The speech always struck my differently, perhaps the way it struck Marcello in the film before the tragic murder-suicide, not as advice but as a framing for a life in a seemingly pointless universe. Isn’t that the way Marcello chooses to live in the end, almost in a state of suspended animation?

I have always found a strange sort of solace in what others might find depressing. I do not seek the peace which passeth understanding, except perhaps in despair as one might seek solace in drink or in death. Satori seems tempting, but strikes me as ultimately dehumanizing. I am not ready to surrender up my self and my suffering for an empty bliss. Instead I need to learn to survive in this world where the first noble truth is inscribed like scar tissue somewhere deep beneath the skin.

Here in the original land of misfit toys we call New Orleans we need to find the truth hidden in Dante’s speech as filtered through Fellini’s Steiner, not as Marcello did by embracing the emptiness but in our own way; not precisely in a state of suspended animation but instead isolated from the sterility of late American culture; by defining our own space, “like a work of art; in a state of enchantment…. detached”; defining our own fourth noble truth, our own Way of celebrating through the darkness that leads us to the light; leads us not to Fellini’s monster on the beach, but to the innocence of the girl on the strand.

We must not detach from our world, but from theirs, must insistently be ourselves at whatever cost.

The crowds are long gone, and the end of the noisy disassembly of the tents is almost done. The neighborhood crows who roost somewhere back around Maurepas Street, are once again calling in the morning although I have not spotted one yet. You would think the garbage feast of Jazz Fest would be a prime time of year for the Fortin Street crows but every year they leave for some spot unknown. Perhaps it was not just the distraction and exhaustion of living across from carnival for two weeks but also their absence which has kept me from writing much, here or elsewhere.

Welcome home, brothers. I have stories for you.

“13 Crows”

13.
Black sinner that I am,
lay me out
naked as I came.
Let them feed
& I’ll       fly away
laughing.

& 17 Poets! features three readers this evening at 8 p.m.: Mel Coyle, Quo Vadis Breaux, and Asali DeVan followed by the open mic. Gold Mine Saloon, 701 Dauphine St. Coyle is from Chicago and other places where the corn grows. She co-edits the journal TENDE RLOIN and curates ColdCuts, a fabulous reading series in New Orleans. Some say she looks like an elf. The chapbook OPERA TRANS OPERA written with Jenn Marie Nunes is now available through aliceblue. Breaux has published poetry, essays and creative non-fiction in a number of anthologies. She is the Executive Director of the Center for Ethical Living and Social Justice Renewal where she works with volunteers dedicated to recovering New Orleans. She and her husband live in New Orleans. They have four sons. Ecclesiastes is a mother, wife, daughter, educator, event producer, spoken word artist, and community servant. She has presented her brand of “activist poetry” on stages and in classrooms across the country, and is a highly sought speaker on community development issues. In addition to authoring the Essence Empowerment Seminars, she coordinates the Congo Square African Marketplace, has taught spoken word, social justice, and service learning at Tulane University, and co-founded the Akoben Words-In-Action Festival and is Executive Producer of the Tremé 200 Festival.

& Also on Thursday evening at 5:30 p.m. Garden District Book Shop features Jill McCorkle’s new novel Life After Life. McCorkle’s first novel in seventeen years is alive with the daily triumphs and challenges of the residents and staff of Pine Haven Estates, a retirement facility now home to a good many of Fulton, North Carolina’s older citizens.

& Tonight at the East Jefferson Parish Regional Library, author night hosts N. S. Patrick’s <em<The Mysteries of Jack the Ripper. Patrick is a native of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. He attended Albion College and obtained a BA in Business Administration. He served as an officer in the U. S. Navy from 1962 to 1969. He lives in Kenner, Louisiana.

& On Friday, May 17 Garden District presents Nell Dickerson’s Porch Dogs, with the LSPCA with adoptable dogs and a Doggy Kissing Booth. Porch Dogs combines fine-art portraits of man’s best friend with beautiful architectural documentation of the Southern porch. Dickerson fondly recalls childhood nights on the sleeping porch of her grandparents’ Mississippi Delta home the sounds of katydids, cicadas, and tree frogs, the merciful breeze from the overhead fan. But during the heat of the day, the family sought refuge indoors, leaving the dog to his lonely vigil. “I felt like he understood that the porch was the gateway between inside and outside and that it was his duty to keep sentry there in case someone wanted to pass,” she recalls.

& McKoewn’s Books and Difficult Music hosts An Evening of Art and Emerging Writers Saturday hosted by Thaddeus Conti and featuring Jamie Chiarello, Caroline Rash, Adam O’Connor, Jacob Dilson, Kerry Leigh and Jonathan Milan Walters. Drawings by Thaddeus Conti will be displayed in the manner of Tibetan prayer flags. 7 p.m.

& On Saturday Maple Street Book Shop Uptown hosts Science fiction writer Brandon Sanderson, author of A Memory of Light, the final book in Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time series, will be signing (and numbering) his new young adult novel, The Rithmatist, on May 18th from 1 ‘til 3pm at our Uptown shop. The first 50 people in attendance will receive a Rithmatist bag complete with chalk and instructions for making Rithmatist chalkings!

& Celebrate Children’s Book Week with Octavia Books Saturday, May 18 at 11 a.m. when artist/author Alex Beard comes to tell stories from and sign his three wonderful books, CROCODILE’S TEARS, MONKEY SEE, MONKEY DRAW, and THE JUNGLE GRAPEVINE. CROCODILE’S TEARS tells the story of a rhino and a tickbird and the endangered animals they encounter on a journey to discover why crocodile is crying. This funny and cautionary tale has been heralded by Kirkus Review as, “…ecological storytelling at it’s finest!” MONKEY SEE, MONKEY DRAW tells the story of a troop of monkeys and an elephant who learn to paint and draw with their hands and feet in a tale about confronting fears and the discovery of creative expression. THE JUNGLE GRAPEVINE tells the story of eight African animals who learn about the dangers of rumors through an outrageous game of telephone. Octavia Books has been selected as an official event host site for the 94th annual celebration of Children’s Book Week, May 13-19 in 2013! The longest-running national literacy initiative, Children’s Book Week is celebrated yearly in schools, libraries, bookstores, and homes across the country.

& On Saturday the Old Metairie Branch of the Jefferson Parish Library hosts the Greater New Orleans Chapter of LA Poetry Society for a reading workshop from 2-4 p.m. in the meeting room

& Sunday May 19th at 2 p.m. Garden District Book Shops features Peggy Frankland with Susan Tucker and their book Women Pioneers of Louisiana Environmental Movement. This book provides a window into the passion and significance of thirty-eight committed individuals who led a grassroots movement in a socially conservative state. The book is comprised of oral history narratives in which women activists share their motivation, struggles, accomplishments, and hard-won wisdom. Additionally interviews with eight men, all leaders who worked with or against the women, provide more insight into this rich–and also gendered–history.

& Sunday at 8 p.m. at the Collumns Hotel Chris Champagne, author of The Yat Dictionary and a poetic and comedic satirist par excellence hosts his Ray Nagin Going Away Party. ” $15-info 504 330 9117

& The MelaNated Writers Collective hosts the last in their series of Sunday Shorts readings featuring MWC’s Danielle Gilyot and Pdeauxdungue Writers group’s Tad Bartlett. 8 p.m. at the Red Star Gallery on Bayou Road.

& The new Sunday show from Spoken Word New Orleans is Poetry and Paint Brushes. Spoken Word artists perform as a resident artists paints the crowd and performers. At 6 p.m. at Special Tea, 4337 Banks Street. No longer at the Bayou Road location.

& On the second, fourth, and fifth Sunday of each month, Jenna Mae hosts poets and spoken-word readers at 8:00 p.m. at the Fair Grinds Coffee House on 3133 Ponce de Leon St.

& Monday evening the East Bank Regional Library in Metairie hosts The Fiction Writers’ Group with featured guest author Tony Fennelly. This is a support group for serious writers of fiction. We do not focus on poetry, essays or nonfiction. Events consist of critique sessions from group members, author talks and writing exercises. Free of charge and open to the public. Registration is not required. 7-9 p.m.

& The New Orleans Haiku Society holds its monthly meeting at the Latter Memorial Library at 6 p.m.

& Susan Larson, the former book editor of the former Times-Picayune newspaper and member of the National Book Critics Circle hosts The Reading Life on WWNO (89.9 FM) on Tuesdays at 1:30 p.m. She features interviews with authors of local and national interest.

& At Cafe Istanbul poet, satirist and author of The Yat Dictionary Chris Champagne will unleash his poetical wit at 8 p.m., no cover but donations accepted. Satirical wit in poetry hasn’t been this much fun since Juvenal and Horace got in that nasty bar fight or, if you find that too obscured: If this were anywhere else than nominal democracy Champagne would be wasting away in a gulag where the leading cause of death would be hysterical laughter.

& Tuesday at Octavia Books at 6 p.m. Bill Loehfelm will be signing his newest novel, The Devil in Her Way, at our Healing Center shop at 6:30 p.m. When Maureen Coughlin first appeared in The Devil She Knows (2011), the New Orleans Times-Picayune called her “unforgettable” and “the character of the year.” Booklist named The Devil She Knows one of 2011’s ten best thrillers and declared Maureen “as compelling a character as this reviewer expects to see this year.” Now she’s back in Bill Loehfelm’s new thriller, The Devil in Her Way, and her life has changed in more ways than one: She’s starting over in New Orleans as a newly minted member of the police force.

& Every Tuesday at 6 p.m. the Barnes & Noble West Bank hosts Westbank Writers’ Group. Every is welcome, from novices to serious authors. Join us for inspiration, friendly critiques, or just to connect with other local writers.

& Starting this Tuesday the New Orleans Public Library Martin Luther King Branch hosts ReWrite: A Writing Workshop. ReWrite is a writing workshop led by Zuri McCormick for ages 18 and up. May 21, 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. Beginning in June, 1st Friday of each month, 2 – 4 p.m. and 3rd Tuesday of each month, 11 a.m. – 1 p.m.

& Also from NOPL on Tuesday, the Hubbell Branch in Algiers hosts an author night with Poppy Tooker discusses Mme. Begue’s Recipes of Old New Orleans Creole Cookery at 6 p.m.

& Also on Tuesday the East Jefferson Regional Library hosts an Author Talk! with Ed Branley, Legendary Locals of New Orleans. Branley is a prolific chronicler of historic New Orleans, with prior titles on the history of K&B Drugstore, D.H. Holmes and other New Orleans institutions.

& Wednesday there is a weekly poetry reading hosted at the Neutral Ground Coffee House at 9 p.m

Having established a stable orbit and allowing for the radio delay from Saturn, we resume our old habit of Radio Free Toulouse Street.

Tomorrow is the last day for New Orleans students to enter the Latter Memorial Library’s Bad Poetry Contest. Prizes for the best of the worst entries include gift cards to local book stores and a new journal to fill with good poetry. There will be a public reading featuring the winners Thursday, May 16th at 6PM at Latter Library (5120 St. Charles Avenue). Refreshments and snacks will be served!

& Tonight (Thursday, May 9) Garden District Books features Jean Morgan Meaux: In Pursuit of Alaska: An Anthology of Travelers’ Tales 1879-1909 at 5:30 p.m. This collection of Alaskan adventures begins with a newspaper article written by John Muir during his first visit to Alaska in 1879, when the sole U.S. government representative in all the territory’s 586,412 square miles was a lone customs official in Sitka. It closes with accounts of the gold rush and the 1909 Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition in Seattle. Jean Meaux has gathered a superb collection of articles and stories that captivated American readers when they were first published and that will continue to entertain us today. The authors range from Charles Hallock (the founder of Forest and Stream, a precursor of Field and Stream) to New York society woman Mary Hitchcock, who traveled with china, silver, and a 2,800 square foot tent. After explorer Henry Allen wore out his boots, he marched barefoot as he continued mapping the Tanana River, and Episcopal Archdeacon Hudson Stuck mushed by dog sled in Arctic winters across a territory encompassing 250,000 miles of the northern interior.

& Join Room 220 for a Happy Hour Salon featuring readings by three exciting and celebrated novelists—Rachel Kushner, Nathaniel Rich, and Zachary Lazar—from 6 – 9 p.m. on Thursday, May 9, at the Press Street HQ (3718 St. Claude Ave.). Kushner, who will be visiting from Los Angeles, and New Orleans-based Rich both have new novels out that have been greeted with great critical acclaim. Lazar, a Tulane professor and author, has recently finished a new novel, and we look forward to (hopefully) hearing an excerpt from it at the event. Maple Street Bookshop will be on hand with the authors’ books for sale.

& Rodger Kamenetz, author of The Jew in The Lotus, will give a talk “What I Learned About Judaism from the Dalai Lama” in honor of the Dalai Lama’s upcoming visit to New Orleans. Event at Temple Sinai Reform Congregation, 6227 Saint Charles Ave, is free and open to the public.

& Tonight 17 Poets! features Chris Champagne and Bryan Spitzfaden . Champagne is a satirical poet, comedian and the author of The YAT Dictionary.

& Octavia Books hosts a startling new version of the children’s classic The Itsy Bitsy Spider by renowned children’s picture book author and illustrator Rebecca Emberley. “Here is a gorgeous retelling by Rebecca and her Caldacott Medal- winning father, Ed Emberley, of the classic tale of a spider climbing up the water-spout. Using their unique collage artwork, the Emberleys’ vision breathes new life and brilliant color into this toddler favorite. This is not your grandmother’s spider!” No indeed it is not. If this were a Miyazaki file I would have that uneasy feeling when the spider on this cover first appeared even though its jeweled body suggested goodness.

& Saturday’s Story Time with Miss Maureen at Garden District Books Uptown will feature Harry the Dirty Dog by Gene Zion at 11:30 a.m.

& The Studio in the Woods will host its annual FORESTival featuring resident artists exhibitions and performance on Saturday from 11:00 am – 5:00 pm, 13401 Patterson Road (essentially the very end of the Algiers River Road). Artist presentations including: Sarah Quintana & Co. singing original compositions from The Delta Demitasse series Sunpie and the Louisiana Sunspots Choreographer Monique Moss will reprise Katrina Cranes Secondline with Nina Nichols‘ giant puppet and the Panorama Duo with Ben Schenck, clarinet, and Boyanna Trayanova, snare drum Adventures in clay with Jane Hill Triple B’s: Berhman Brass Band Tshirts designed by Pippin Frisbie-Calder and silkscreened live with Ben Fox-McCord from Press Street/Antenna Gallery Jewelry for sale by Georgette Fortino Art activities in the Kids’ Creative Corner Tours of the woods with botanist David Baker Food and drink for purchase Tours of the founders’ home with Joe & Lucianne Carmichael

& On Saturday Garden District Book Shop Hosts Jackson Galaxy’s Cat Daddy: What the World’s Most Incorrigible Cat Taught Me About Life, Love, and Coming Clean at 2 p.m. In this book, Galaxy tells the poignant story of his thirteen-year relationship with a petite gray-and-white short-haired cat named Benny, and gives singular advice for living with, caring for, and loving the feline in your home. When Benny arrived in his life, Galaxy was a down-and-out rock musician with not too much more going on than a part-time job at an animal shelter and a drug problem. Benny’s previous owner brought the cat to the shelter in a cardboard box to give him up. Benny had seen better days —- his pelvis had just been shattered by the wheels of a car — and his owner insisted he’d been “unbondable” from day one. Nothing could have been further from the truth. An inspiring account of two broken beings who fixed each other, Cat Daddy is laced throughout with Galaxy’s amazing “Cat Mojo” advice for understanding what cats need most from us humans in order to live happier, healthier lives.

& The Peauxdunque Writers Alliance continues its Sunday Shorts reading series, this week featuring Terri Stoor along with Jeri Hilt! Doors open at the Red Star Galerie (2513 Bayou Road) at 8 p.m., with readings starting at 8:30.

& The new Sunday show from Spoken Word New Orleans is Poetry and Paint Brushes. Spoken Word artists perform as a resident artists paints the crowd and performers. At 6 p.m. at Special Tea, 4337 Banks Street. No longer at the Bayou Road location.

& On the second, fourth, and fifth Sunday of each month, Jenna Mae hosts poets and spoken-word readers at 8:00 p.m. at the Fair Grinds Coffee House on 3133 Ponce de Leon St.

& Monday evening the East Bank Regional Library in Metairie hosts The Fiction Writers’ Group. This is a support group for serious writers of fiction. We do not focus on poetry, essays or nonfiction. Events consist of critique sessions from group members, author talks and writing exercises. Free of charge and open to the public. Registration is not required. 7-9 p.m.

& Susan Larson, the former book editor of the former Times-Picayune newspaper and member of the National Book Critics Circle hosts The Reading Life on WWNO (89.9 FM) on Tuesdays at 1:30 p.m. She features interviews with authors of local and national interest.

& Tuesday at Maple Street Book Shop at The Healing Center Bill Loehfelm will be signing his newest novel, The Devil in Her Way, at our Healing Center shop at 6:30 p.m. When Maureen Coughlin first appeared in The Devil She Knows (2011), the New Orleans Times-Picayune called her “unforgettable” and “the character of the year.” Booklist named The Devil She Knows one of 2011’s ten best thrillers and declared Maureen “as compelling a character as this reviewer expects to see this year.” Now she’s back in Bill Loehfelm’s new thriller, The Devil in Her Way, and her life has changed in more ways than one: She’s starting over in New Orleans as a newly minted member of the police force.

& Every Tuesday at 6 p.m. the Barnes & Noble West Bank hosts Westbank Writers’ Group. Every is welcome, from novices to serious authors. Join us for inspiration, friendly critiques, or just to connect with other local writers.

& Tuesday evening brings Don Paul’s Poetry Ball 5 at the Cafe Istanbul at 8 p.m., featuring Asam Devan Ecclesiastes, Asia Raniey, Daniel Remhold, and special guest Lee Grue, followed by an open mic.

& Garden District will feature the UNO Press edition of Black and White on the Rocks by Rick Barton, the Creative Writing Workshop’s beloved director at 5:30 p.m. Black and White on the Rocks is a captivating tale set in the charming architecture of New Orleans. Michael Barnett drives the turns of this novel through greed ruled corruption, racial prejudice, friendship, and convoluted schemes. Barton has wrapped this story of bribery and redemption within the warmth of a loving marriage, offering sweet reprieve when life reveals its troublesome secrets that boil for release.

Fredrick Barton is the author of the novels The El Cholo Feeling Passes, Courting Pandemonium, Rowing to Sweden, and A House Divided, which won the William Faulkner Prize in fiction.

& Wednesday, May 15 Jenna Mae will host a salon at 7:30 p.m. celebrating the release of Jimmy Ross’ new collection from Lavender Ink: Say What! (http://www.lavenderink.org/content/link-titles/161) The thin, dreadlocked Ross–story teller par excelence, komusō poet, actor, baby-sitter of poor poets’ children and long-standing host of the open mic at 17 Poets! is ter beloved Crazy Uncle of the New Orleans literary family, who can pull an amazing tale from behind your year like a miraculous piece of favorite candy. The evening will feature readings by Megan Burns, Desiree Dallagiacomo, and signing and reading by Jimmy Ross. Art by Jim Tascio and Ozone. Jimmy Ross’ famous baklava and other goodies. BYOB or by donation.

& On Wednesday the NOPL will present An Evening of Codes, Symbols, and Secrets. The #1 international bestselling author Dan Brown will be streamed live and shown at the Algiers Regional Branch at 6:30 p.m. as he speaks about his new novel Inferno plus a range of topics including science, religion, codes, book publishing, movie making, and a few surprise topics. This will be Dan Brown’s only public U.S. appearance. Streamed Live from Lincoln Center.

& Wednesday there is a weekly poetry reading hosted at the Neutral Ground Coffee House at 9 p.m

Next Thursday May 16 at 7 p.m. come support UNO’s Team English in Gambit Weekly’s Adult Spelling Contest at The Rusty Nail, hosted by Gus Kattengul, Gambit sports writer. Competing for student scholarships for the UNO English Department, MA Rich Goode will try and best 19 other spelling bee contestants. Prizes will not only go to the winner of the contest, but also to the speller who brings the most supporters, so it’s important that Team English turns out. Please feel free to invite your friends to this event! $5 cover and 20% of the bar take will go to the winning charities.

P.I.P

Thankfully, with Jazz Fest going full swing and authors all at the Book Tent, this will be a short list. That means I get set up my Blues Tent-front stoop, fill the coffee mug and just start to watch the world go by.

& so onto the other listings…

Local romance author Farrah Rochon is giving away a Kindle to celebrate her birthday and the release of her newest book Delectable Desire. You just have to like her page through this link to enter.

& Here is the rest of Thursday’s line up at the Jazz Fest Book Tent: Ron Thibodeaux, 12-1PM, Uell or High Water: How Cajun Fortitude Withstood Hurricans Rita and Ike; John Swenson, 1-2PM, New Atlantis: Musicians Battle for the Survival of New Orleans; Ben Sandmel, 2-3PM, Ernie K-Doe; Lorin Gaudin, 3-4PM, New Orleans Chef’s Table; Jay Mazza, 5:30-6PM, Up Front and Center.

& Tonight 17 Poets! Literary & Performance Series presents an evening celebrating the works of artists, writers and poets from publications of Trembling Pillow Press; readings by poets John Sinclair, Lee Meitzen Grue, Valentine Pierce, Herbert Kearney, Geoff Munsterman, Bill Lavender, Dave Brinks et al @ Goldmine Saloon (701 Dauphine Street in the French Quarter) at 7:30p.m. Featured program followed directly by Open Mic hosted by Jimmy Ross. There is no way I could squeeze the vitae of this amazing line up into a single column and there is not separate post with all the details. Let’s just say this is a night not to be missed featuring the very best of New Orleans poetry.

& Octavia Books will host a children’s book event at 4:30 p.m. today featuring Tad Hills’ GOOSE NEEDS A HUG and HOW ROCKET LEARNED TO READ.

& Every Thursday the Norman Meyer Branch Library hosts a teen writing workshop led by teens upstairs in the teen area. Encouraging creative arts exploration through reading, engaging discussions, and group activities. Youth ages 12-17 are invited! Group limited to 15 participants. Call the Branch to reserve a space.

& Friday evening at 6:30 p.m. Octavia books presents an evening with Augusten Burroughs, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Running With Scissors, to present and sign THIS IS HOW, his groundbreaking book that explores how to survive what you think you can’t. I think this ought to launch some fascinating conversations with Katrina survivors.

& Here is the rest of the Jazz Fest Book Tent author line up:

On Friday: Chris Champagne, 12-1PM, Yat Dictionary; Cornell Landry, 1-2PM, The Adventures of a Mardi Gras Bead Dog; Bill Loehfelm, 3-4PM, Devil in Her Way.

On Saturday: Ken Foster, 1-2PM. I’m A Good Dog; Tom Piazza, 2-3PM, Southern Journey Of Alan Lomax; Keith Spera, 3-4PM, Groove Interrupted; Elianna Casa, 4-5PM, Cool Kids Cook; Diane de Las Casas, 5-6PM, The Little “Read” Hen.

On Sunday: Kevin Bozant, 1-2PM, Quaint Essential New Orleans; David Spielman, 2-3PM, When Not Performing; WWOZ, 4-5PM, That Sounds Good; Earl Hampton, 5-6PM, Streetcar Guide to New Orleans.

And then you can stop and buy a copy of Coloring Book for the Criminally Insane, A Howling in the Wires or Carry Me Home at the Fortin Street Stage, 3000 block of Fortin between the Sauvage and Mystery Street gates. All proceeds from these sales go toward help some folks start a new small press.

& The new Sunday show from Spoken Word New Orleans is Poetry and Paint Brushes. Spoken Word artists perform as a resident artists paints the crowd and performers. At 6 p.m. at Special Tea, 4337 Banks Street. No longer at the Bayou Road location.

& On the second, fourth, and fifth Sunday of each month, Jenna Mae hosts poets and spoken-word readers at 8:00 p.m. at the Fair Grinds Coffee House on 3133 Ponce de Leon St.

& Monday the Black Widows Salon at Crescent City Books welcomes Lawrence Powell and Rich Campanella. The Tulane historian and the geographer, both award winning, will be discussing their work and New Orleans. This is not a lecture but a salon in which attendees are invited to participate. 7-9 p.m. Seating is limited, so we suggest you email books@crescentcitybooks.com to reserve.

& Monday evening the East Bank Regional Library in Metairie hosts The Fiction Writers’ Group. This is a support group for serious writers of fiction. We do not focus on poetry, essays or nonfiction. Events consist of critique sessions from group members, author talks and writing exercises. Free of charge and open to the public. Registration is not required. 7-9 p.m.

& Susan Larson, the former book editor of the former Times-Picayune newspaper and member of the National Book Critics Circle hosts The Reading Life on WWNO (89.9 FM) on Tuesdays at 1:30 p.m. She features interviews with authors of local and national interest.

& Every Tuesday at 6 p.m. the Barnes & Noble West Bank hosts Westbank Writers’ Group. Every is welcome, from novices to serious authors. Join us for inspiration, friendly critiques, or just to connect with other local writers

& On Tuesday at 6:30 pm Octavia hosts a discussion and book signing with Wenonah Hauter featuring her provocative new book, FOODOPOLY: The Battle Over the Future of Food and Farming in America, an exposé of how agribusiness and food corporations are undermining a healthy food system—and how voting with your fork will not solve the problem.

& Wednesday there is a weekly poetry reading hosted at the Neutral Ground Coffee House at 9 p.m.

Th-th-th-that’s all folks. If I make it to Garden District I’ll let you know what the crowds are like and get a snap of Odd Words with Ms. Smith if it kills me.

Spectator: “He’s not coming.”
Toni: “What?”
Spectator: “The man. He’s not coming.”
— from the Godot episode of Treme

Yes it’s a Beckett sort of afternoon: the gray threat of rain, the interminable diesels idling across the street, my best chance of distraction a call from a lawyer. Where would the savor of happiness or pleasure be without their absence?

Friday:
Phil Sandusky 12-1PM New Orleans: Impressionist Cityscapes
Elsa Hahne 2-3PM The Gravy
Denise McConduit 3-4PM DJ Books

Saturday

Sally Newhart 12-1PM Original Tuxedo Jazz Band
Tom Piazza 1-2PM Southern Journey of Alan Lomax
David Spielman 2-3PM When Not Performing
Poppy Tooker 3-4PM Mme. Begue’s Recipes of Old New Orleans Creole Cookery
Christi Rice & Megan Nolan 4-5PM When The Lights Went Out In The City
Edward Branley 5-6PM Legendary Locals of New Orleans

Sunday
Allison Vines-Rushing & Slade Rushing 12-1PM Southern Comfort Cookbook
Deb Shriver 1-2PM In the Spirit of New Orleans
Johnette Downing 2-3PM How to Dress a Po-Boy
John McCusker 3-4PM Creole Trombone
Neighborhood Story Project 5-6PM Straight Outta Swampton

Next Thursday
Ron Thibodeaux 12-1PM Hell or High Water: How Cajun Fortitude Withstood Hurricanes Rita and Ike
John Swenson 1-2PM New Atlantis: Musicians Battle for the Survival of New Orleans
Ben Sandmel 2-3PM Ernie K-Doe
Lorin Gaudin 3-4PM New Orleans Chef’s Table
Jay Mazza 5:30-6PM Up Front and Center

& Thursday evening the Alvar Library hosts the first in a series of spring poetry readings at 7 p.m. featuring Nik DeDominic, Brett Evans, Gina Ferrara, and Kay Murphy. Thursday is always a busy day for the NOPL, so check out the full calendar of events here.

& 17 Poets! Literary & Performance Series presents two extraordinary poets this Thursday, BILL ZAVATSKY and MICHAEL TOD EDGERTON, at Gold Mine Saloon in New Orleans, 701 Dauphine Street in the French Quarter, on Thursday, April 25 @ 7:30. Open Mic hosted by Jimmy Ross follows the featured program. Born in 1943 in Bridgeport, Connecticut, Zavatsky worked as a pianist from the age of fifteen to twenty-five and studied music at the New School. He holds a bachelor’s and a master’s degree from Columbia University.With Zack Rogow, he co-translated Earthlight: Poems of André Breton (Sun & Moon Press, 1993), which won the PEN/Book-of-the-Month Club Translation Prize. Zavatsky also co-translated The Poems of A.O. Barnabooth, by Valery Larbaud, with Ron Padgett. He is the author of Where X Marks the Spot (Hanging Loose Press, 2006); For Steve Royal and Other Poems (Coalition of Publishers for Employment, 1985); Theories of Rain and Other Poems (1975). Edgerton’s newest collection from Lavender Ink is Vitreous Hide. His poems have been published in the Boston Review, Chelsea, Denver Quarterly, EOAGH, Five Fingers Review, New American Writing, New Orleans Review, Sonora Review, Word For/Word, and other journals.

& Also this evening Wil Tustin will be signing Ambushed at Maple Street Book Shops’s Healing Center shop at 6:30 p.m. Ambushed is his first novel and is a culmination of over twenty years of research and teaching. It is historical fiction and a first person account of Paul the Apostle’s life.

& The Jefferson Parish East Bank Regional Library will host Poetry Event! An Evening with Melinda Palacio this evening at 7 p.m. Palacio grew up in South Central Los Angeles and now lives in Santa Barbara and New Orleans. She also writes a Friday column for La Bloga.com. She is a 2007 PEN Center USA Emerging Voices Rosenthal Fellow and has published a novel and a book of poetry.

& Saturday’s Story Time with Miss Maureen will feature The Magic Rabbit by Annette LeBlanc Cate for the stroller roller set.

& Saturday the Barnes & Noble in Metairie will hosts Todd-Michael St. Pierre w signing his local cookbook, Taste of Treme, at 1 p.m.

&The Melanated Writers Collective new The Sunday Shorts Reading Series starts this Sunday, April 28, at Red Star Galerie at 2513 Bayou Road. MelaNated Writing Collective member L. Kasimu Harris kicks off the series with his fine new short story work, and the opening session of the series will be capped off by the hypnotic fiction of Sabrina Canfield.) . Doors open at 8, readings start promptly at 8:30, and will include Q&A with the authors following each reading

& Sunday Xavier University presents The Poetic Vision Tour is a national traveling concert tour that features spiritually infused, inspired music. The PVT believes that music as an art form should not merely instruct but should inspire, not merely educate, but express. The Spring Tour of 2013 features a special musical journey through 800 years of spiritual poetic music, from 13th century Morocco & the tradition of Qasidas to the Qawalli music of Mughal India & modern Pakistan, & finally to the folk music of the United States in the 1050s-1970s & urban hip hop from 1980-present. The event is free and open to the public. Doors open at 6:30 in the James and Caroline Duff Banquet Center at Cintas on Xavier’s campus.

& The new Sunday show from Spoken Word New Orleans is Poetry and Paint Brushes. Spoken Word artists perform as a resident artists paints the crowd and performers. At 6 p.m. at Special Tea, 4337 Banks Street. No longer at the Bayou Road location.

& On the second, fourth, and fifth Sunday of each month, Jenna Mae hosts poets and spoken-word readers at 8:00 p.m. at the Fair Grinds Coffee House on 3133 Ponce de Leon St.

& Barnes & Noble in Metairie hosts award-winning actress Diane Ladd for a discussion and signing of her new book, A Bad Afternoon for a Piece of Cake: A Collection of Ten Short Stories Sunday at 2 p.m.

& Monday evening the East Bank Regional Library in Metairie hosts The Fiction Writers’ Group. This is a support group for serious writers of fiction. We do not focus on poetry, essays or nonfiction. Events consist of critique sessions from group members, author talks and writing exercises. Free of charge and open to the public. Registration is not required. 7-9 p.m.

& Susan Larson, the former book editor of the former Times-Picayune newspaper and member of the National Book Critics Circle hosts The Reading Life on WWNO (89.9 FM) on Tuesdays at 1:30 p.m. She features interviews with authors of local and national interest.

& Meet the Authors Tuesday beginning at 5:30 p. m. at the Cabildo, the Pirate’s Alley Faulkner Society and the Louisiana State Museum join hands to celebrate publication of five new books by New Orleans authors. The event is free and open to the public and, as we are offering free refreshments, we request an advance rsvp to Faulkhouse@aol.com so that we can adequately
prepare. Authors being honored are Debra Shriver, Brenda Marie Osbey, Judy Conner, Sanem Ozdural, and N. S. Patrick.

& This Tuesday Octavia Books hosts the release of New Orleans historian Emily Clark’s new book, ;THE STRANGE HISTORY OF THE AMERICAN QUADROON: Free Women of Color in the Revolutionary Atlantic World at 6 p.m. Clark’s book, drawing on the rich archives of New Orleans, tell a different story. Free women of color with ancestral roots in New Orleans were as likely to marry in the 1820s as white women. And marriage, not concubinage, was the basis of their family structure. In The Strange History of the American Quadroon, Clark investigates how the narrative of the erotic colored mistress became an elaborate literary and commercial trope, persisting as a symbol that long outlived the political and cultural purposes for which it had been created. Untangling myth and memory, she presents a dramatically new and nuanced understanding of the myths and realities of New Orleans’s free women of color

& Every Tuesday at 6 p.m. the Barnes & Noble West Bank hosts Westbank Writers’ Group. Every is welcome, from novices to serious authors. Join us for inspiration, friendly critiques, or just to connect with other local writers

& Wednesday there is a weekly poetry reading hosted at the Neutral Ground Coffee House at 9 p.m.

Today is Bob Kaufman‘s birthday. Go check some poems on PoetryFoundation.org. (Poets.org lists no poems.)

& so to this listings…

& Thursday is a busy day for The New Orleans Public Library. You can view the full week’s events here:

• NOPL continues its El día de los niños/El día de los libros (Children’s Day/Book Day) program with a story time for toddlers featuring Asia at the Hubbell Branch, 10:30-11:30 a.m. This program is a celebration every day of children, families, and reading that culminates yearly on April 30. The celebration emphasizes the importance of literacy for children of all linguistic and cultural backgrounds.
• NOPL also hosts Create Black Out Poetry at the Latter Branch at 4 p.m. This is a teen poetry/craft celebrating National Poetry Month. We will be reading poetry, making poetry, listening to music, light refreshments and giveaways.
• At 5:30 pm the Norman Mayer Branch of NOPL hosts Writing Workshops Led by Youths upstairs in the teen area. Encouraging creative arts exploration through reading, engaging discussions, and group activities. Youth ages 12-17 are invited! Group limited to 15 participants.
• At 6:30 p.m. NOPL’s Algiers Branch continues its series Pass the Word Poetry Workshop. “Stand Up, Look Up, Speak Up: How to Present Your Work in Public” presented by Valentine Pierce. Sponsored by Poets & Writers, Inc.

Tonight at 6 p.m. Octavia Books hosts a presentation and booksigning with Mary Ann Sternberg celebrating the release of her new book, RIVER ROAD RAMBLER: A Curious Traveler along Louisiana’ s Historic Byway, and the the new edition of her much celebrated ALONG THE RIVER ROAD: Past and Present on Louisiana’s Historic Byway. Sternberg has spent over two decades exploring this historic corridor, uncovering its intriguing and often – under-appreciated places. In River Road Rambler, she presents fifteen sketches about sites along this scenic route. From familiar stops, such as the National Hansen’s Disease Center Museum at Carville and the perique tobacco area of St. James Parish to lesser – known attractions such as Our Lady of Lourdes grotto in the town of Convent and the Colonial Sugars Historic District,

& Thursay at 7:30 p.m. 17 Poets! is in temporary quarters at 828 Lesseps St. in the Bywater this Thursday due to sewage and water construction in the building. Featured are y Kelly Davio, Kit Robinson and Freddi Evans followed by the open mic. Davio is Managing Editor of The Los Angeles Review, Associate Editor of Fifth Wednesday Journal, and a reviewer for Women’s Review of Books. She is a Pushcart nominee whose work has been honored in Best New Poets. Robinson is the author of The Messianic Trees: Selected Poems, 1976–2003 (Adventures in Poetry, 2009), Train I Ride (BookThug, 2009), The Crave (Atelos, 2002) and 16 other books of poetry. Williams Evans is an alumna of Tougaloo College, Tougaloo, Mississippi where, as a music major, she began studying traditional African music on a study-travel to the University of Ghana at Accra. Evans is the award-winning author of three historically-based children’s books: A Bus of Our Own (2001), The Battle of New Orleans: the Drummer’s Story (2005), and Hush Harbor:Praying in Secret (2008). Evans latest book, Congo Square: African Roots in New Orleans, received the 2012 Humanities Book of the Year Award from the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities.

& Tonight at 9 p.m. at the Shadowbox Theater there will be a whole “Lot o’ Shakespeare”!, the New Orleans Premiere of Tim Mooney’s hit one-man show. One monologue from every Shakespeare play performed entirely at random based on the spin of a Bingo cage! Prizes! Prizes! Prizes! This will be Mooney’s first ever New Orleans appearance… (Not counting the Cat’s Meow!) Four performances, Thurs, 4/18-Sun, 4/21.

& Friday at 5:30 p.m. Rod Dreher discusses and signs her book, The Little Way of Ruthie Leming at the Garden District Book Shop. The Little Way of Ruthie Leming follows Rod Dreher, a Philadelphia journalist, back to his hometown of St. Francisville, Louisiana (pop. 1,700) in the wake of his younger sister Ruthie’s death. When she was diagnosed at age 40 with a virulent form of cancer in 2010, Dreher was moved by the way the community he had left behind rallied around his dying sister, a schoolteacher. He was also struck by the grace and courage with which his sister dealt with the disease that eventually took her life. In Louisiana for Ruthie’s funeral in the fall of 2011, Dreher began to wonder whether the ordinary life Ruthie led in their country town was in fact a path of hidden grandeur, even spiritual greatness, concealed within the modest life of a mother and teacher.

Friday night at 6 p.m. Maple Street Book Shop Bayou St. John presents the next installment of The Diane Tapes features [Field][White][Burns] reading from their work. Jared White was born in Boston and lives in Brooklyn. He is the author of the chapbook YELLOWCAKE, published as part of the Narwhal anthology from Cannibal Books in 2009. His recent poems have appeared in Sink Review, Esque, Coconut, Harp & Altar, We Are So Happy To Know Something, and in audiovisual format on the Flying Object web site. He is the co-owner of Berl’s Brooklyn Poetry Shop and the co-curator of Yardmeter Editions. Farrah Field is the author of Rising(Four Way Books, 2009) and the chapbook Parents (Immaculate Disciples Press, 2011). Her poems and essays have appeared in many publications including Sixth Finch, Ploughshares, Harp & Altar, Lit, Typo, La Petite Zine, and Drunken Boat. Two of her poems were selected by Kevin Young for The Best American Poetry 2011. Megan Burns edits the poetry magazine, Solid Quarter. Her book Memorial + Sight Lines was published in 2008 by Lavender Ink. She has four chapbooks, Frida Kahlo: I am the poem and Framing a Song (Trembling Pillow Press),irrational knowledge (Fell Swoop press) and a city/ bottle boned (Dancing Girl Press).

& Saturday morning for Story Time at Maple Street Book Shop’s Uptown location Miss Maureen will read The Steadfast Tin Soldier by Hans Christian Andersen, retold by Cynthia Rylant, and illustrated by Jen Corace. 11:30 am.

& Saturday at Garden District Book Shop at 1 p.m. Kerry Dunn discusses and signs his book, Joe Peace. Twenty years ago, Joe Peace was an ace homicide investigator for the Austin Police Department, until his penchant for cocaine and a disastrous affair with his partner Cassie buries him at the bottom of the APD’s burnout brigade. When the psychotic founder of the most powerful drug cartel convinces Joe the cash is greener on the other side of the fence, Joe becomes a player in the drug scene, buys a mansion, and collects beautiful coeds like butterflies, but the party ends when new details of Cassie’s death surface, opening wounds long scarred over.

Saturday at Maple Street Book Shop’s Bayou St. John location Christopher Schaberg, Assistant Professor of Contemporary Literature and Critical Theory at Loyola, will be reading and signing his book, The Textual Life of Airports at 6 p.m. . This is a book about airport stories. It is about common narratives of airports that circulate in everyday life, and about the secret stories of airports—the strange or hidden narratives that do not always fit into standard ideas of these in-between places. Tales of near disaster, endless delays, dramatic weather shifts, a lost bag that suddenly appears-such stories are familiar accounts of a place that seems to thrive on and recycle its own mythologies. You can read an interview with Schaberg at Press Street’s Room 220 blog.

& Sunday from 3-6 p.m. Garden District Book Shop hosts Judy Conner discussing and signing her book, Southern Fried Divorce: The After Party. The shop’s website mentions “free booze and nabs” and I’m not certain what nabs are at a divorce celebration party. No mention if they’ll put the plywood on the pool table for dancing. Her new books brings more true stories of outrageous everyday life in the Big Easy from Judy Conner’s, author of the much-loved bestseller Southern Fried Divorce (which actor John Goodman called “more fun than a box of glue-huffing monkeys on St. Peter and Bourbon”). I might just have to stop by for a nab but watch out for glue-huffing monkeys.

& The new Sunday show from Spoken Word New Orleans is Poetry and Paint Brushes. Spoken Word artists perform as a resident artists paints the crowd and performers. At 6 p.m. at Special Tea, 4337 Banks Street. No longer at the Bayou Road location.

& On the second, fourth, and fifth Sunday of each month, Jenna Mae hosts poets and spoken-word readers at 8:00 p.m. at the Fair Grinds Coffee House on 3133 Ponce de Leon St.

& Susan Larson, the former book editor of the former Times-Picayune newspaper and member of the National Book Critics Circle hosts The Reading Life on WWNO (89.9 FM) on Tuesdays at 1:30 p.m. She features interviews with authors of local and national interest.

& The Lunch ‘n’ Lit Book Club will meet at the Rosa Keller Library Tuesday, April 23rd, at 12:30 pm to discuss How Lincoln Learned to Read: Twelve Great Americans and the Educations that Made Them by Daniel Wolff.

& Sarah Carr will be discussing and signing her book Hope Against Hope: Three Schools, One City, and the Struggle to Educate America’s Children Wednesday at 6 pm. at Maple Street Book Shop’s Uptown location. Hope Against Hope takes place in a New Orleans ravaged by Hurricane Katrina, but even more important in journalist Sarah Carr’s story is a highly unnatural disaster: American poverty. Carr’s book takes an intimate look at the real people—students, principals, teachers—affected by “school reform,” a slippery term that means privatization, a weakening of teachers’ unions and elected school boards, and an increasing dependence on testing data.

& Wednesday there is a weekly poetry reading hosted at the Neutral Ground Coffee House at 9 p.m.

& Wednesday night at UNO Elana Bell will read her poetry 8 p.m. at the UNO Fine Arts Gallery (on Harwood Drive, across from the Liberal Arts Building). The reading will be followed by a booksigning and wine and cheese reception. This event is free and open to the public. Elana’s first collection of poetry, Eyes, Stones (LSU Press 2012) is the winner of the 2011 Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets

yeah, sure, I’ll be in unless I’m out
don’t know if the lights are out
or you hear voices or then
I might be reading Proust
if someone slips Proust under my door
or one of his bones for my stew,
and I can’t loan money
or the phone
or what’s left of my car
though you can have yesterday’s newspaper
an older shirt or a bologna sandwich
or sleep on the couch
if you don’t scream at night
and you can talk about yourself
that’s only normal;
only I am not trying to raise a family
to send through Harvard
or buy hunting land,
I am not aiming high
I am only trying to keep myself alive
just a little longer,
so if you sometimes knock
and I don’t answer
and there isn’t a woman in here
maybe i have broken my jaw
and am looking for wire
or I am chasing the butterflies in
my wallpaper,
I mean if I don’t answer
I don’t answer, and the reason is
that I am not yet ready to kill you
or love you, or even accept you,
it means I don’t want to talk
i am busy, i am mad, i am glad
or maybe I am stringing up a rope;
so even if the lights are on
and you hear sound
like breathing or praying or singing
a radio or the roll of dice
or typing –
go away, it is not the day
the night, the hour;
it is not the ignorance of impoliteness,
I wish to hurt nothing, not even a bug
but sometimes I gather evidence of a kind
that takes some sorting,
and your blue eyes, be they blue
and your hair, if you have some
or your mind — they cannot enter
until the rope is cut or knotted
or until I have shaven into
new mirrors, until the world is
stopped or opened
forever.

– Charles Bukowski

“Of all the islands he’d visited, two stood out. The island of the past, he said, where the only time was past time and the inhabitants were bored and more or less happy, but where the weight of illusion was so great that the island sank a little deeper into the river every day. And the island of the future, where the only time was the future, and the inhabitants were planners and strivers, such strivers, said Ulises, that they were likely to end up devouring one another.”
— Roberto Bolano, The Savage Detectives

Believe in your work. Launch the raft. Trust the currents. Find your own island.

& The New Orleans Public Library is sponsoring El Día de los Niños/El Día de Los Libros (Children’s Day/Book Day), a month of programs that celebrate children, families, and reading and emphasize the importance of literacy for children of all linguistic and cultural backgrounds. I missed last Tuesday’s event, but the next is today at 10:30 a.m. at the Hubbell Library, a story time for toddlers featuring European stories. A list of all of the events can be found here.

& Thursday from 5:30 to 6:30 pm the Norman Meyer Branch library in Gentilly hosts Writing Workshops Led By Youths. Upstairs in the teen area. Encouraging creative arts exploration through reading, engaging discussions, and group activities. Youth ages 12-17 are invited! Group limited to 15 participants.

& Tonight, April 11 17 Poets! features poet Gina Myers and songwriter Nasimiyu perform April 11, 8PM at the 17 Poets! Literary and Performance Series (www.17poets.com) followed by the open mic. Myers is the author of A Model Year (Coconut Books, 2009), and several chapbooks, including False Spring (Spooky Girlfriend, 2012). Her second full-length book, Hold It Down, will be published by Coconut Books in 2013. New Orleans-based songwriter Nasimiyu wields a colorful and eclectic Indie/Folk/Retro-pop sound, embodying a new, socially conscious movement that is bright and uplifting as the revolutionary generation that inspired it. Captivating audiences with her lyrically charged songs, Nasimiyu has been touted as the “New Age Nina Simone,” by Snarky Puppy’s Mike League and as “2012′s artist to watch,” in Gambit Magazine.

& Also on Thursday Octavia Books hosts a special evening with former Poet Laureate of Louisiana Brenda Marie Osbey who will read from and sign her new collection. This is Osbey’s fifth collection and her first since the publication of ALL SAINTS: New & Selected Poems, a recipient of the 1998 American Book Award. HISTORY AND OTHER POEMS takes as its task nothing less than an examination and mapping of the never-ending evil of the Transatlantic Slave Trade and the still-palpable effects of European and American colonialism some seven centuries after the making of the New World.

& Tonight the Algiers Library continues its month-long, national celebration of poetry established by the Academy of American Poets since 1996. In celebration of National Poetry Month, Algiers Regional will host Pass The Word poetry workshops presented by local authors. This week features Asia Rainey.

& And the Jefferson Parish East Bank Regional Library hosts an Author Event! at 7 pm featuring J.W. Mallard and his book Lines of a Circle. Julia Isbell has been afforded a good life by her parents who give her everything she needs, including love. But when her mother Viola is dying, she reveals one truth about Julia’s identity that will change her life forever—she is not a true Isbell. Who and where are her parents? Mallard has had multiple careers in his lifetime, one that involved the U. S. Marine Corps and the one he holds as a computer programmer. This is his first book.

& Saturday’s Story Time with Miss Maureen will instead feature Johnette Downing singing and signing her latest book, How to Dress a Po’Boy, at Maple Street Book Shop’s Uptown location 11:30 am to 1 pm. There will be snack-sized po’boys, juice boxes, and cookies.

& Saturday at Garden District Books at 1 p.m. Cecily White discusses and signs her book, Prophecy Girl Prophecy Girl is part of a debut series that follows a girl who is the center of a prophecy that states she is destined to kill everyone she loves. Guardians, immortals, demons, a foreboding prophecy, and forbidden love make the series ideal for YA and adult audiences.

& Also on Saturday the new East Near Orleans Regional Library celebrates its first anniversary with a day-long program including presentations on available programs, activities for small children and teens, and a raffle. And cake. Did I mention there will be cake? From 10:30 am to 3 pm at 5641 Read Blvd.

& The Dickens Fellowship of New Orleans meets Saturday at 2 pm at Metairie Park/County Day School’s Bright Library, with guest LSU Professor of English Elsie B. Michie speaking on “Dickens and Desire.”

& Saturday poet Megan Burns will perform at the 1239 Congress 2nd Saturday Art Show. Burns is the publisher at Trembling Pillow Press (tremblingpillowpress.com) and edits the poetry magazine, Solid Quarter (solidquarter.blogspot.com). She has two books Memorial + Sight Lines (2008) and Sound and Basin (2013) published by Lavender Ink. She has two recent chapbooks: irrational knowledge (Fell Swoop press, 2012) and a city/ bottle boned (Dancing Girl Press, 2012). Her chapbook Dollbaby is forthcoming from Horseless Press. She has been making dolls that incorporate poems and performing regularly with them since December, 2012. This is the first time all the dollbabies will be assembled for an art show.

& Books and food: this can’t miss. National Library Week Food Truck Roundup on Monday, April 15 from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.t the Main Library in the CBD 219 Loyola Ave. Come eat on Monday with Taceaux Loceaux, La Cocinita, Empanada Intifada, NOLA Girl Food Truck & Catering, LLC, Foodie Call New Orleans Needs More Food Trucks.

& The new Sunday show from Spoken Word New Orleans is Poetry and Paint Brushes. Spoken Word artists perform as a resident artists paints the crowd and performers. At 6 p.m. at Special Tea, 4337 Banks Street. No longer at the Bayou Road location.

& On the second, fourth, and fifth Sunday of each month, Jenna Mae hosts poets and spoken-word readers at 8:00 p.m. at the Fair Grinds Coffee House on 3133 Ponce de Leon St.

& Monday at 5:30 at Garden District Books William Kent Krueger discusses and signs his book, Ordinary Grace.. From “New York Times “bestselling author William Kent Krueger comes a brilliant new novel about a young man, a small town, and murder in the summer of 1961. View the book trailer here.

& Monday is also the weekly meeting of the New Orleans Haiku Society at the Latter Memorial Library, 6 pm to 7:30 pm.

& Susan Larson, the former book editor of the former Times-Picayune newspaper and member of the National Book Critics Circle hosts The Reading Life on WWNO (89.9 FM) on Tuesdays at 1:30 p.m. She features interviews with authors of local and national interest.

& Also on Tuesday the NOPL hosts its next El día de los niños/El día de los libros (Children’s Day/Book Day) program at the Children’s Resource Center featuring a story and activities about Ethiopia.

& Wednesday, April 17 The Spring 2013 issue of Louisiana Cultural Vistas celebrates with its contributors and readers at The Louisiana Humanities Center, 938 Lafayette St. This month’s party features artists Louviere + Vanessa, plus author/photographer John McCusker and writer Ellen Blue. Abita beer and Zapp’s chips will be provided. Doors open at 6pm.

& Come celebrate Dorado 2, the newest release from Verna Press at McKeown’s Difficult Music and Books. Poets Joseph Bienvenue, Thaddeus Conti and Gina Ferrara will be reading in the redesigned space of McKeown’s Books at 4737 Tchoupitoulas Street. Verna is a New Orleans press operated by the printer and poet, Peter Anderson. Dorado 2 is the latest ripple in the ongoing stream of excellent letterpress chapbooks and broadsides.

& Also on Wednesday Octavia Books hosts a reading and signing with New York Times bestselling author Stuart Woods when he returns to Octavia Books to present his sensational new Stone Barrington thriller, UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES. Woods is the author of fifty-two novels, including the New York Times–bestselling Stone Barrington and Holly Barker series. He is a native of Georgia and began his writing career in the advertising industry. Chiefs, his debut in 1981, won the Edgar Award.

& Wednesday at the Algiers library El día de los niños/El día de los libros (Children’s Day/Book Day) continues with Tastes of the World providing drinks from various countries – Ages 12-17, starting at 4 p.m.

& Wednesday there is a weekly poetry reading hosted at the Neutral Ground Coffee House at 9 p.m.

& Wednesday Maple Street Book Shop’s Downtown Book Club, now called the St. Claude Avenue Book Club, led by Ken Foster, will be meeting at 7 pm at Fatoush in the Healing Center to discuss The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami. Am am a full-on, J-Pop, fan-boy fool for Murakami. Damn I want to do this but another book to (re)read by Wednesday?

“You give me a reason to live
You give me a reason to live
You give me a reason to live…”
– “You Can Keep Your Hat On”
    Randy Newman

Originally posted at Alternative Roundezvouz Tango.

& Thursday evening at 6 p.m. Garden District Books hosts Nathaniel Rich and his novel. Odds Against Tomorrow. A novel about fear of the future–and the future of fear New York City, the near future: Mitchell Zukor, a gifted young mathematician, is hired by a mysterious new financial consulting firm, FutureWorld. The business operates out of an empty office in the Empire State Building; Mitchell is employee number two. He is asked to calculate worst-case scenarios in the most intricate detail, and his schemes are sold to corporations to indemnify them against any future disasters. This is the cutting edge of corporate irresponsibility, and business is booming. As Mitchell immerses himself in the mathematics of catastrophe–ecological collapse, war games, natural disasters–he becomes obsessed by a culture’s fears. Yet he also loses touch with his last connection to reality: Elsa Bruner, a friend with her own apocalyptic secret, who has started a commune in Maine. Then, just as Mitchell’s predictions reach a nightmarish crescendo, an actual worst-case scenario overtakes Manhattan. Mitchell realizes he is uniquely prepared to profit. But at what cost? At once an all-too-plausible literary thriller, an unexpected love story, and a philosophically searching inquiry into the nature of fear, Nathaniel Rich’s Odds Against Tomorrow poses the ultimate questions of imagination and civilization. The future is not quite what it used to be.

& Thursday at 6 p.m. Octavia Books hosts reading and signing with author Wiley Cash featuring his phenomenal debut novel, A LAND MORE KIND THAN HOME, a mesmerizing literary thriller about the bond between two brothers and the evil they face in a small North Carolina town. Wiley Cash displays a remarkable talent for lyrical, powerfully emotional storytelling. Octavia calls the book “a modern masterwork of Southern fiction, reminiscent of the writings of John Hart (Down River), Tom Franklin (Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter), Ron Rash (Serena), and Pete Dexter (Paris Trout)” and Ernest J. Gaines says “Wiley Cash is a talented and disciplined young writer, and his first novel proves it. I think this could be the beginning of a long, fruitful career.”

& The New Orleans Public Library offers two programs among many others this Thusday: 5:30 PM – 6:30 PM, Writing Workshops Led by Youths – Norman Mayer Branch and 5:30 PM – 7:00 PM, Pass the Word: Poetry Workshop – Algiers Regional Branch. In celebration of National Poetry Month, Algiers Regional will host poetry workshops presented by local authors. This week Asia Raney is featured.

& Friday upstairs at Mimi’s in the Marigny, author Mark LaFlaur hosts a book launch party for this new novel Elysian Fields. A New York writer and editor, LaFlaur is best known in New Orleans for his activism via Levees Not War. His first novel is the tale of young would-be poet is torn between his long-held dream of being a great artist and obligations to his aged, ailing mother and his emotionally volatile brother, the all-demanding Bartholomew. Will someone in his family have to die before he can get to California? And how might that be arranged? Moira Crone calls it “evocative, poignant, complex and well paced . . . full of delights.” He will also give a reading at Garden District Book Shop May 7.

& Friday night at Antenna Gallery Room 220 hosts the season’s second Happy Hour Salon with authors Ottessa Moshfegh and Carlus Henderson from 6 – 8 p.m. on Friday, April 5, at the Press Street HQ (3718 St. Claude Ave.). As always, this event is free and open to the public, and complimentary libations will be on hand (though we strongly encourage donations). Moshfegh, though yet to publish a book, is one of the country’s best young short story writers. David McLendon says her stories “maybe cause a bit of discomfort.” But Moshfegh presents her characters’ pitiful hopelessness so artfully a reader can’t help but be filled with gratitude for the small bits of bliss and victory available in a generally horrendous world. Her fiction has appeared in many of the nation’s best journals (and others that are at least respectable), including the Paris Review, NOON, Guernica, the Columbia Review, Unsaid, Sleepingfish, Fence, and Vice. She has won a slew of fancy awards and lives in Los Angeles. Henderson is a Zell Fellow in the MFA program at the University of Michigan who splits his time between Detroit and New Orleans. He has also won a number of fancy awards, and has been a high school teacher in New Orleans, a cheese salesman in Vermont, and a dockworker along the Eastern seaboard. Moshfegh’s visit is generously supported by grants from the SouthArts Foundation and Poets & Writers.

& Saturday at 11:30 a.m. Story Time with Miss Maureen returns to the Maple Street Book Shop Uptown location with Frog and Toad are Friends by Arnold Lobel.

& Saturday at 1:30 p.m. Garden District Books brings Helana Brigman and. Fresh Table: Cooking in Louisiana All Year Round. Louisiana’s identity is inextricably tied to its famous foods; gumbo, red beans and rice, jambalaya, and étouffée are among the delicious dishes that locals cherish and visitors remember. But Louisiana’s traditional cuisine has undergone a recent revision, incorporating more local ingredients and focusing on healthier cooking styles. In The Fresh Table, locavore and native New Orleanian Helana Brigman shares over one hundred recipes that reflect these changes while taking advantage of the state’s year-round growing season.

& Saturday at the Latter Memorial Library Gina Ferrara hosts the Poetry Buffet at 2 p.m. featuring “Poets Reading Poets” in which local poets read works by their favorite authors.

& Sunday night at 7 p.m. Slam New Orleans hosts a reading on the theme of Team SNO (the 2013 version) has been decided. The Poetry Olympics are in the books. Now it’s time to kick off the new slam season and celebrate a year’s worth of Slam New Orleans shows at the Shadowbox Theatre. The theme of the night is “New $#%&.” Poets, in celebration of National Poetry Month and a brand spanking new slam season, we urge you to let those freshly inked poems out of their college-ruled prisons and spit us some of your new hotness. Team SNO (the 2013 version) has been decided.”

& This Sunday’s reading at the Maple Leaf Poetry Series features poet and mistress of ceremonies at the south’s oldest continuous poetry reading Nancy Harris reading from and signing her new book, Beauty Eating Beauty (Portals Press)

& If you miss LaFlaur’s Friday book lunch, Sunday at 2 p.m. Garden District Books presents LaFlaur and his novel Elysian Fields. “Life in the Weems family of 1999 New Orleans is anything but Elysian in this engrossing Southern Gothic snapshot.”

& The new Sunday show from Spoken Word New Orleans is Poetry and Paint Brushes. Spoken Word artists perform as a resident artists paints the crowd and performers. At 6 p.m. at Special Tea, 4337 Banks Street. No longer at the Bayou Road location.

& On the second, fourth, and fifth Sunday of each month, Jenna Mae hosts poets and spoken-word readers at 8:00 p.m. at the Fair Grinds Coffee House on 3133 Ponce de Leon St.

& Monday at 6:30 p.m. Octavia Books features Pam Houston and CONTENTS MAY HAVE SHIFTED, “a tale so vivid, intricate, and intimate that it puts high-def TV to shame” (Elle). Houston’s latest takes us from one breathtaking precipice to the next as we unravel the story of Pam (a character not unlike the author), a fearless traveler aiming to leave her metaphorical baggage behind as she seeks a comfort zone in the air. She flies around the world, finding reasons to love life in dozens of far-flung places from Alaska to Bhutan

& Tuesday evening at the Columns Hotel Pam Houston will be 1718 Society’s featured reader. 1718 is a student-run literary organization of Tulane, Loyola, and UNO students, hosts their reading series the first Tuesday of every month at the Columns Hotel on St. Charles Avenue. Readings start at 7 p.m. and are open to the public. Houston will be reading from her book Contents May Have Shifted. Pam Houston is the author of two collections of linked short stories, Cowboys Are My Weakness and Waltzing the Cat, the novel, Sight Hound, and a collection of essays called A Little More About Me, all published by W.W. Norton. Her stories have been selected for volumes of Best American Short Stories, The O. Henry Awards, The Pushcart Prize, and Best American Short Stories of the Century. She is the winner of the Western States Book Award, the WILLA award for contemporary fiction, and The Evil Companions Literary Award

& Susan Larson, the former book editor of the former Times-Picayune newspaper and member of the National Book Critics Circle hosts The Reading Life on WWNO (89.9 FM) on Tuesdays at 1:30 p.m. She features interviews with authors of local and national interest.

& Wednesday there is a weekly poetry reading hosted at the Neutral Ground Coffee House at 9 p.m.

& Wednesday also bring another installment of Don Paul’s Poetry Ball at the Cafe Istanbul, starting at 8 p.m. and featuring Chuck Perkins, James Nolan, Megan Burns, and special guest Kalamu ya Salaam. Free admission, cash bar. Open mic following the featured performers.

I anxiously opened the latest package from Quarterly with your most recent book selection because it was unexpected, my debit card gone lost on Carnival day and the number the company had no longer valid. I will read the enclosures later today. I know Roxanne Gay’s work through The Rumpus, but first I had to pick up the book. I hefted The Colossus of New York, weighing the “A tour de force” from the Times Book Review between the title and the author’s name. I wasn’t far into the opening, “City Limits” when I laid it down again, worried this book could be The One, except she’s already married. It could be the book of New Orleans I’ve been writing by fits-and-starts, in private and on my blogs, for the last seven years. It is the book I have to write or I’ve run my life all to hell for nothing. And it will have been done already, by another writer for another city.

The jacket copy alone should have been enough to warn me but I had to go ahead and open it, read through the blurbs (Danger, Will Robinson) and into the first chapter and I know New York isn’t the only place one where the initiated live in the memory of what’s gone. I just read Elena Passarello’s Let Me Clear My Throat, the excellent essay on the sportscaster Myron Cope and that piece basically could just as well have been about New Orleans’ own Hap Glaudi and the essay says exactly the same damn thing as “City Limits”. Whether its New York or Pittsburgh or New Orleans the old souls carry that geography of used to be in their heads. It’s not unique to Colson Whitehead or New York. Still, I’m afraid this is the book that would ruin me to write the book I should, afraid it might swallow my own voice like a haunted box or I will find my own plans laid out before me, my ship taken and me left to rot on a waterless rock, that it might leave me feeling incapable of the task, might rob me of the right idea of how to organize my own love letter cum ode and all of the other fine words of the reviewers on the back Whitehead’s.

But I’m going to keep it. I guess I’ll have to pay Quarterly who just dinged me again after trying to bill my old debit card, just when I was about to drop the subscription along with the Rumpus Poetry Book Club because when you are down to rolling your own cigarettes even some necessities have to go. I’m going to wrap this book up in Christmas paper and put it in the box where I keep my measly Christmas things, a drug-store Charlie Brown tree and the Marilyn Monroe skirt-girl ornament that hangs from it, that wicker basket cone with the red berries I wore as a hat to the Brew du Vieux holiday party with a bicycle flasher on top and the doorman wrote “Blinky” on my taster cup and “Sparklie” on my date’s and we took one look at our cups and could have danced all night, and still have begged for more—there I go, off on a tangent again but that is not just me, or a conscious, writerly voice: it is this city. If you are not ADHD when you arrive in New Orleans you will be when you leave because Look a tuba! Our squirrels carry parasols and saxophones and dance at funerals and peek out from the carpet as bits of glitter you still find 40 days after Mardi Gras and you can’t help but stop and look.

So, I’ll put this book in away in that box wrapped in dollar store Santa paper and leave it until then, until I have a manuscript. No, I haven’t been writing much of that sort on the blog lately, those odd bits of New Orleans. I walk down the street and instead of finding those perfect bits of New Orleans—Leopold Bloom crossing Bourbon Street—instead I find myself looking for a good place to put out my cigarette. And I need to snap out of it. I know it’s a curse to say My Book aloud and in public when you don’t have one but I think of it as a geis, a particular sort of Celtic curse the universe lays on you that will either lead to tragedy or triumph and it is all on you to live within its bounds. And when I unwrap this book at the end of the year, I’ll write you again—perhaps privately, this time—and say, ah, Maud, you shouldn’t have. I didn’t even send a card.

Sincerely,

Mark Folse

Santa Claus Eve and Easter Bunny Day are problematic for an apostate like myself who is none the less deeply imprinted with a Catholic upbringing, a near equivalent of the secular Jew: steeped in the culture by a complete indoctrination in guilt and exceptionalism that no therapy could hope to erase. It doesn’t help to notice in your son’s catechism classroom that the colors of the Church calendar are purple, green and gold, to ride on the bus home and watch a Latino woman cross herself at each church passed and be reminded of an old girlfriend, to look at the St. Expedite candle on my bedroom mantle. I could easily complete some of the more gruesome qualifications for excommunication from an institution I abhor but it would make no difference. Fish on Friday still seems as right as red beans on Monday or meatballs on Wednesday even if the last time I had my throat blessed was in grammar school.

What to do on Jelly Bean Sunday? I think I still have the plaid shirt I used to wear to church on Easter Sunday when I was raising my children, as solemnly promised, as Catholics, one that looks like a horrible accident at the Paaz factory but I really have nowhere to go in it. I often buy a new straw hat Holy Week but after vacuuming all of the change out of the couch, I’ve decided to just steam the ones I have back into shape and try to scrub the sweat stains out with some Oxyclean and a toothbrush. Still, when the Goddess Diana Ecclesiastical Calender conspires with the weather to bring us Ishtar Easter at Spring, some observance is required. I will probably do what I usually do come that Sunday in honor of Jesus the Teacher and in contravention of the dictates of Peter’s church. I will listen to Pharoah Sander’s Love is Everywhere, a song that to me is the bell-blessed communion chant of the church of all mankind, and read Wallace Steven’s Sunday Morning.

A walking parable,
he stood alone on Golgotha
in mute testament, watching
the chosen disciples
debase themselves in grief.

On the third day, more or less,
Lazarus sat
contemplating the great stone
standing in grave monument
beside the hollow tomb,
relishing the serene emptiness
of the deserted cemetery.

– Mark Folse

& Starting today at 7 p.m. the Alvar Public Library, 913 Alvar St., will launch a reading series on the Fourth Thursday of March, April, and May, featuring a series of local poets reading their original work. This week features Ellen Allen, Delia Tomino Nakayama and Catilin Creek Shroyer.

& Tonight at 17 Poets! at 8 p.m. featured are Katarina Boudreaux and Maurice Carlos Ruffin followed by the open mic. Katarina Boudreaux has been published in Poetry Motel, Oak Bend Review, Texas Poetry Journal and by the Ottawa Valley Writer’s Guild. Maurice Carlos Ruffin is a third-year MFA student at the University of New Orleans. He’s also a member of several writing collectives, including the Peauxdunque Writers Alliance and the Melanated Writers of New Orleans. Maurice’s work has been published in the Apalachee Review, the South Carolina Review and his story “The Pie Man” received the University of New Orleans Creative Writing Workshop’s 2011 Ernest Svenson Fiction Award, and an earlier version was first runner-up in the short story category at the 2010 William Faulkner-Wisdom Competition

& Thursdays the Norman Meyer Branch Library hosts a Writing Workshop lead by youth upstairs in the teen area, Encouraging creative arts exploration through reading, engaging discussions, and group activities. Youth ages 12-17 are invited. Group limited to 15 participants. Call the branch for details. 596-3100

& Also tonight the Norman Meyer branch hosts a book discussion for The Big Read, sponsored Xavier University of Louisiana, in partnership with New Orleans Public Library. The book selected for The Big Read is A Lesson Before Dying by Louisiana native Ernest Gaines.

& Saturday Maple Leaf Book Shop’s Uptown location will feature the following authors in lieu of Story Time with Miss Maureen. Dianne de las Casas and her daughter, Kid Chef Eliana, will be signing at 11:30-1 p.m. Dianne will be signing her book, The Little Read Hen, while Kid Chef Eliana will be signing Cool Kids Cook Louisiana. About Dianne’s book: The Little Read Hen is a literary spin on a beloved folk tale, perfect for aspiring young writers interested in learning how their own fledgling ideas can hatch into a polished story. Holly Stone-Barker’s vibrant cut-paper illustrations add riotous fun to each page. About Eliana’s book: For kids who want to cook Louisiana-style, Kid Chef Eliana keeps the good times rolling in this kid-friendly cookbook of Louisiana cuisine. For a peek at what Chef Eliana does, watch her make jambalaya and pralines on the Wendy Williams Show!

& Saturday at Garden District Books join Latoya Easter signing her book Can’t Cry at 1 p.m.. “Lela Crimsome is a young, beautiful, independent, successful entertainment lawyer who’s never willing to give an inch of trust to anybody; let alone a man. Quinton Jacobs is a rugged, seductively handsome, blue-collar father with a low self-esteem and a ghetto fabulous baby mama. He’s a loving father, who sacrifices everything for his son; even if it means sabotaging his own life. But, can he truly say he’s the baby’s daddy?”

& Saturday at the Latter Memorial Library Gina Ferrara hosts the Poetry Buffet at 2 p.m. I’ll post a list of readers as soon as I get it.

& This Sunday’s reading at the Maple Leaf Poetry Series is Open Mic at 3:30 pm in the rear courtyard.

& The new Sunday show from Spoken Word New Orleans is Poetry and Paint Brushes. Spoken Word artists perform as a resident artists paints the crowd and performers. At 6 p.m. at Special Tea, 4337 Banks Street. No longer at the Bayou Road location.

& On the second, fourth, and fifth Sunday of each month, Jenna Mae hosts poets and spoken-word readers at 8:00 p.m. at the Fair Grinds Coffee House on 3133 Ponce de Leon St.

& Susan Larson, the former book editor of the former Times-Picayune newspaper and member of the National Book Critics Circle hosts The Reading Life on WWNO (89.9 FM) on Tuesdays at 1:30 p.m. She features interviews with authors of local and national interest.

&Tuesday evening the Maple Street Book Shop’s First Tuesday Book Club will be meeting at 5:45 p.m. at our Uptown location to discuss <en<Paris to the Past: Traveling Through French History by Train by Ina Caro.

& Wednesday there is a weekly poetry reading hosted at Weekly Poetry Reading the Neutral Ground Coffee House at 9 p.m.

Panelist John Jeremiah Sullivan was one of Kirsh’s first targets: “A talented writer such as John Jeremiah Sullivan might, fifty years ago, have tried to explore his complicated feelings about the South, and about race and class in America, by writing fiction, following in the footsteps of Walker Percy and Eudora Welty. Instead he produced a book of essays, called Pulphead, on the same themes; and the book was received with the kind of serious attention and critical acclaim that were once reserved for novels.” The Southern Editor of the Paris Review and contributor to GQ, Harper’s Magazine and Oxford American took exception to the idea that essayists, especially those who write for magazines are somehow beneath literary notice. He called it “cultural eugenics’ and a reject of 300 years of English literary history to attack magazine writers or suggest the essay was dead. “Lamb, Hazlitt, de Quincy were all writing for magazines” but are presented now cleaned up and anthologized.

Beller said that too many essays today are predictable. “Too many essays even in the best magazines, from the first two paragraphs you know where they’re going.” He praised Sullivan’s work for its twists and turns. comparing them to early Paul McCartny songs. “They are like three or four songs all strung together.” Panelist Elena Passarello, author of Let Me Clear My Throat and a contributor to Creative Nonfiction, Oxford American and Slate, turned to writing and essays in particular after a career in acting. says she tries to creative performative moments on the page. “The essays that fire on all cylinders show the workings of a human mind, [the author's] or another’s.” Beller, who suggested something similar earlier (see above) said the form also allows writers to take “their eccentricities out into the world,” which lead to a discussion of his own contribution to the New York Times Food section on the peanut butter and pickle sandwich.

Noted geographer and author Richard Campanella was quick to challenge the prevailing notion. Buying into the exoticism “privileges for the picturesque” when the residents of the city do not spend 365 days a year at Carnival or second lines or watching Mardi Gras Indians. He traced the notion of the city’s reputation as the initial collision of newly arrived Americans with the original Creole settlers and the Spanish Administration, and writers of that initial period set the stage for those who would follow and set the exotic tag firmly in place: Grace King, Lafcadio Hearn and Lyle Saxon. “They romanticized it and it was picked up by the city’s industrialized tourist industry.”

Kim Marie Vaz stood up for the city’s exotic reputation. “We generate our own exoticism because our culture is unique,” the author of a recent work on the carnival Baby Dolls asserted. Writer Nathaniel Rich suggested the city preserves its exotic aspects because it is “the most self-referential city in American. It doesn’t care what’s going on outside” which he said was the source of the city’s “wonder and problems.” New Yorker Thomas Beller, now a Tulane professor, said when he first moved to New Orleans he was trying to impose his own internal geography onto the city, and came to recognize the city’s troubled side as “the New York I grew up in the 1970s.” He found the city’s character was created in part by a disposition to holding onto things and investing objects with an emotional value.”

Campanella said much of the current influx of new residents to the city can be traced to its exotic reputation. Beller said the influx of new residents more inclined to progress and preservation “provokes kind of allergic reaction” among many New Orleanians. “They really are upset about the erasure that goes along with that. And I’m a bit more inclined to favor the holding onto things. New Orleans is very good for that.” Asked about the city’s continuing ability to absorb new residents into the existing culture without erasure, Campanella said “it’s not the end of history. It’s the next chapter.” Vaz said the culture would continue to change and grow. “You have a lot of people who are working 365 days a year to preserve the culture.”

Vaz and Campanella traced much of the city’s exotic reputation to early writers like Heard and King, but called out Lyle Saxon of the famous WPA Guide to New Orleans and Robert Talent, author of several books promoting the city’s exotic legend. “My work is a reaction of the exoticism of Talent and Saxon,” Vaz said of her work on the Baby Dolls, an old carnival tradition that grew out of the city’s segregated prostitution district as a marching krewe of Black sex workers. “People are surprised that [much of the culture] came out of intense segregation.” Campanella agreed that academic writers are questioning the past focus on the “exoticism and exceptionalism.”

Thomas Beller is the author of two works of fiction, Seduction Theory and The Sleep-Over Artist, and a collection of personal essays How To Be A Man. Richard Campanella is a geographer with the Tulanue University School of Architecture and the author of six critically acclaimed books, including Bienville’s Dilema: A Historical Geography of New Orleans. Nathaniel Rich is the author of two novels, Odds Against Tomorrow and The Mayor’s Tongue. Kim Marie Vaz is an associate dean and professor at Xavier University and author of The BABY DOLLS: Breaking the Race and Gender Barriers of the New Orleans Mardi Gras Tradition.