Ogres, Pixies, and Giants: Kazuo Ishiguro’s Improvisations

March 31, 2015, by

RM4_7707There was a lot of anticipation for Monday night’s Kazuo Ishiguro Inprint Margarett Root Brown reading from, The Buried Giant, his first new novel in ten years.  I knew it was sold out—left early, warmed up by listening to his interview with St. John Flynn of Houston Public Media, which you can hear here:

Just like everyone else streaming into the beautiful Wortham Center, I was excited.  He was on a “limited” U.S. book tour and Houston had made the cut.

RM4_7669Multiple nominee for the prestigious Man Booker Prize, Ishiguro won in 1989 for his best known work, The Remains of the Day, which was also made into an excellent film starring Sir Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson.  Never Let Me Go had also been made into a film, and Ishiguro has been listed as one of the 50 greatest British writers since 1948 by The Times.  Recipient of the OBE award from the British Crown, he is a palpable force in English letters, tending to experiment stylistically while hovering on similar themes:  self-denial, acceptance of fate, the dance of time with potential and real regrets.

Although born in Japan, and influenced by the culture of the Samurai in interesting ways, Ishiguro comes across as thoroughly English, having lived there since he was five in 1960.  He did not speak English, but enjoyed American Westerns on television, and later, became hugely influenced by the novels of Charlotte Bronte, particularly Jane Eyre and Villette.  Ishiguro began as a singer-songwriter, interested in jazz and its improvisational modes—an influence that has carried over to his writing. Continue reading

“People Have to Breathe Where They Live”: Mary Szybist and Kevin Young Inprint Reading

February 25, 2015, by

RM4_4264Monday night is rainy, cold—a good night for poems.

The weather keeps some people away, but not everyone.  Inprint executive director Rich Levy introduces Mary Szybist and Kevin Young as the readers for the Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series in Cullen Theater at Wortham Center.  Szybist has won a National Book Award, Young an American Book Award.  I see some of my current students in the audience: I am happy they have come.  You don’t get a double billing like this every day.  Each poet has a theme it seems:  Mary, ascension, Kevin, grief.  There are difficulties with both, yet also acceptances.  You don’t have to resolve everything in order to understand it better.  Sometimes understanding it better is as good as it gets.

Szybist reads from Incarnadine, which won the National Book Award.  Before you even open the door to her poetry, you think of crimson, the red that is more luminous than cherry red, the red of Botticelli’s angels, the red of the Virgin Mary.  Szybist is preparing you for what is her obsession:  the strangeness of the annunciation, the anticipatory moments not only of the biblical Mary, but of our own every day lives, in which “dutiful” acquiescence has profound consequences.  Her poems circle around the scene of the Annunciation—but do not linger there, taking the notion of expectancy to every realm, both immediate and imaginative.

Before you even open the door to her poetry, you think of crimson, the red that is more luminous than cherry red, the red of Botticelli’s angels, the red of the Virgin Mary.

Continue reading

Puzzling through stories with Peter Turchi

February 4, 2015, by

Inprint loves to showcase the best in new books by top local authors. One of the most interesting books to come out in the past year is A Muse and A Maze: Writing as Puzzle, Mystery, and Magic by Houston writer Peter Turchi. Turchi is the author of several books, including Map of the Imagination: Writer as Cartographer, named by The New York Times as one of the 100 Best Nonfiction Books of All Time. Turchi,  a faculty member at the University of Houston Creative Writing Program, serves as a frequent interviewer for the Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series.  

A-_Muse_and_A_Maze-cover-236x300Some of my favorite books when I was just a li’l egghead were the Encyclopedia Brown stories by Donald Sobol. I went back to a collection of them recently after reading A Muse & A Maze: Writing as Puzzle, Mystery, & Magic, the new book by University of Houston creative writing professor Peter Turchi.

The Encyclopedia Brown stories present themselves as mysteries. They concern Leroy, a.k.a. “Encyclopedia,” a 10-year-old “Sherlock Holmes in sneakers,” whose father happens to be the chief of police of Idaville, a town “like many other seaside [ones],” with “lovely beaches, three movie theaters, and four banks.” Except no one, writes Sobol, “got away with breaking the law in Idaville.”

The lawbreakers are your typical seaside layabouts; nothing to see here. Encyclopedia’s primary nemesis is a fledgling sociopath named Bugs Meany, instigator of a gang of would-be toughs called the Tigers who try to scam the other townies. Each chapter begins with an aggrieved victim seeking out Encyclopedia and his sidekick, Sally Kimbell. They ride their bikes to the scene of the crime; the story of the accuser and the story of the accused are told, and Encyclopedia pauses dramatically while Sobol interrupts to direct you to page 64 for “the solution.” In the end, some detail that violates the rate at which water evaporates, or the conventions of elevator repair, or the date when the Liberty Bell was cracked, is the lie that tells the truth. The antique lamp or the champion yodeling toad is returned to the rightful owner, and order is restored.  Continue reading

Karen Russell’s “Cosmic Strangeness”

January 30, 2015, by

RM4_0854-001I drive into the concrete city, heading down Louisiana until I hit Texas Avenue.  It is only six. I am early for a reading at the Wortham Center that won’t start until seven-thirty.  I am meeting friends nearby.  Plus, I have secret ambitions for parallel parking.  It never ends up happening, but I can imagine it.

As I am looking for a space, I see Rich Levy, executive director of Inprint, walking with Karen Russell, the author of Swamplandia, which was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. I know who she is because I have been handing out slick advertisements with her picture on them to my students all week.  I tell them there is nothing like hearing an author read her own work.

It is not too cold, but she has on black boots and a coat anyway.  She is from Florida.  She and Rich are walking and laughing.  She looks so young to me! I think of how famous this writer has become, and what that must feel like.  The brochures have told me that “Russell was the youngest of the 2013 MacArthur Foundation ‘genius’ fellowship recipients, and she has been included in The New Yorker’s 20 Under 40, the National Book Foundation’s 5 Under 35, and Granta’s Best Young American Novelists.”  As I see her walking and laughing, I think what a big deal she is, but she isn’t acting like it.  Continue reading

Houstonians celebrate National Poetry Month in fun and exciting ways throughout April

April 15, 2014, by

As most of us in the literary world know, April is National Poetry Month. It is that cheery time of year when we pay tribute to the world of poetry and the people who write great poems. Poets do not traditionally receive the level of book sales, media coverage, and public popularity that other writers do, so I would say they truly deserve a month dedicated to celebrating their unique brilliance.

Anne Carson credit Peter SmithHouston is brimming with poetry activity all month long and if you venture out every once in a while, you will find it difficult not to stumble upon a poetic activity or two. For Inprint, the superstar Anne Carson will be closing out the 2013/14 Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series on April 28th. Michael Ondaatje says Anne Carson is “the most exciting poet writing today.” Houstonians are definitely excited about her reading, with less than a hundred tickets left, Carson is evoking fan girl enthusiasms from poetry lovers. We plan on giving her fans exactly what they want. Unlike other Inprint readings, Carson will be taking the stage by herself, reading and perhaps talking about her poems. She will forgo an on-stage interview. For more information click here.

typewriter for eblastsOn a more local level, Inprint was proud to have the Inprint Poetry Buskers out and about last weekend at UH Mitchell Center’s CounterCurrent Festival. If you haven’t experienced the Inprint Poetry Buskers yet, stay tuned, you’ll be seeing them more and more. They write poems on demand for free using typwriters for anyone who stops by to visit them at festivals and other events. For those who feel that poetry isn’t for them, wait until someone writes you your very own poem! Catch them next at the Menil Community Arts Festival May 3rd .

WITS imageOur friends at Writers in the Schools (WITS) have had a very busy month. WITS celebrates National Poetry Month through the words of Houston students. Executive Director and poet Robin Reagler says, “We publish a poem a day on our blog, and it airs on KPFT also. We are distributing poetry postcards at over 100 Houston locations. We are sponsoring a poetry contest  for kids with cool prizes that include a TV appearance and amazon.com gift cards.” If you want to spread the joy of poetry to your kids, WITS has you covered. Continue reading

Mat Johnson talks about his upcoming interview with George Saunders

January 21, 2014, by

saunders1On Monday we are thrilled to be presenting George Saunders as part of the 2013/2014 Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series. Tickets for his reading sold out very quickly and those who don’t have tickets are kicking themselves for not buying tickets sooner. So what is it about George Saunders that makes him for so many people the writer of the moment?

Mat JohnsonWe thought it would be best to ask Mat Johnson a few questions. Mat is the author of the novels Pym, Drop, and Hunting in Harlem; the nonfiction novella The Great Negro Plot; and the graphic novels Incognegro and Dark Rain. He’s a faculty member at the UH Creative Writing Program and will be conducting the on-stage interview of Saunders on Monday night. A big thanks to Mat for taking the time to talk to us.

Inprint: What was the first thing you read by George Saunders?

Mat Johnson: Pastoralia. It was one of those books that everyone told me I should read because it was so brilliant, and I assumed by that they meant it’s boring-but-smart-enough-that-you-blame-yourself. I bought it, put it off for a while, then when I finally picked it up, I kicked myself for not doing so sooner. It is a great thing when something lives up to its hype, and even surpasses it. This book did that for me. Not just smart and original, but entertaining, engaging. Continue reading

The Spiritual Oomph of Robert Boswell

August 22, 2013, by

bozOn Monday, August 26, Robert Boswell & James McBride launch the 2013/2014 Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series reading from their new novels Tumbledown and The Good Lord Bird. Both books have received high praise from reviewers, so it is no wonder that the reading has sold out.

In addition to being a great writer of fiction, what the general public may not know is that Robert Boswell is also a great teacher of creative writing. Boswell teaches every spring at the UH Creative Writing Program—as co-holder of the Cullen Chair in Creative Writing with his wife, fiction writer Antonya Nelson—and his students love him. We asked Inprint blogger Allyn West to tell us what it’s like to study under Robert Boswell. (We should note that before teaching at UH, Boswell taught at New Mexico State University, in Las Cruces.)

These emails recruiting us grad students to come out for pool nights showed up every Thursday. The sender? Robert Boswell. The venue? My Brother’s Place, in Las Cruces. It was the one place to go in that town. Three years of these emails, and I went out once. Continue reading

On turning 30

May 10, 2013, by

Just 30 no nameMay 9, 2013, was Inprint’s official 30th birthday! Executive Director Rich Levy shares his thoughts about what Inprint is most proud of, what excites Inprint as it turns 30, and where the organization wants to go.

Thirty years: we are in a state of astonishment. To be honest, when I took this job 18 years ago, it was difficult to believe that the making and consumption of literature were compelling facts on the Houston cultural landscape—even with a great Creative Writing Program at the University of Houston (UH CWP). And we have done what we can to keep that program strong and to help attract some of the nation’s best emerging writers to Houston: since 1983, our fellowships and prizes to UH CWP grad students have exceeded $2.5 million and supported more than 500 of the nation’s top emerging writers.

That is a meaningful legacy for the city. These writers lead our workshops, and teach in schools and colleges and community centers throughout the region, sharing their work and skills everywhere, on stage and in bookstores and bars and coffee shops. There’s no part of the city or surrounding areas that hasn’t been touched by these writers and their work in the community. Continue reading

Pronouncing your favorite writer’s name

February 14, 2013, by

Inprint Michael ChabonOne of the reasons I wanted to go to Michael Chabon’s reading was to hear Inprint Executive Director Rich Levy pronounce the writer’s name.

More than a few times over the years I’d been — well, disabused of the pronunciation of a word I had come across reading but never heard aloud.

The first was “expletive.” I was 17, and I was in the habit of passing up chances to cuss by substituting a phrase I must have seen in Reader’s Digest, or something like that: “Expletive deleted.”

But I pronounced the word so it rhymed: “ex-PLEET-ive.” Continue reading

Michael Chabon : La Deuxième Partie

January 2, 2013, by

Chabon208So the end of the world didn’t happen after all, but at least there is a second coming, just not the kind you might imagine. On September 10, 2007, Michael Chabon kicked off the 27th season of the Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series, reading from his book The Yiddish Policeman’s Union—a mix between the detective genre and alternate history. He charmed us all with his dazzling wit and brilliant insight on writing. This year, he’ll do it again. Chabon will kick off the second half of the 2012/2013 Inprint Margarett Root Brown Reading Series on January 28, 2013, reading from his latest novel, Telegraph Avenue. Following the reading, University of Houston Creative Writing Program faculty member, Mat Johnson (author of Incognegro and Pym), will sit down on stage to interview Michael Chabon and talk about Telegraph Avenue.

Before the reading, we thought it would be fun to look back at Chabon’s last visit. Here’s an excerpt from his 2007 on-stage Inprint interview conducted by Fran Fawcett Peterson.

FRAN: One of the themes that comes out in so much of your work and it was particularly evident in these two chapters, which you read, is the father-son relationship and the son trying to live up to the father’s expectations. Could you tell us a little more about that particular theme and where it comes from for you? Continue reading