READ WATCH PLAY FEAST - MAY

AND OFFICE HOURS!

I’ve been slipping on my monthly recs, consumed with trying to wrestle the first chapters of a novel into existence — a YA novel that I’m trying to write “innocently'“ — without too much obedience to what is expected from the form and those who write it. And of course there’s the current desolations that make the privileged Lethe of the immersed artist impossible: the deportations, Gaza’s annihilation, the federal government’s attempt to erase all things “diverse” and civil rights, Trump’s war on universities, whose front line stands a couple minutes walk from where I live.

And yet the days still turn, for some of us at least. May in Boston feels a lot like November. Two of my godchildren are graduating from high school — I still remember carrying them around in my arms and reading to them. A dear friend is about to give birth.

All of this — and more — tangled up in this moment.

Anyway — below you’ll find what’s kept me in life and struggle and reciprocity these last few weeks.

And as always: tremendous gratitude to all our subscribers. Thank you for hanging and sharing with us. The plan always: deeper tools for deeper work.

AND ALSO … TIME FOR ANOTHER OFFICE HOUR!

If you have any questions regarding building stories or the creative life in general — if you have any questions about anything we’ve been discussing — please post them in the comments section below or message me directly.

READ

SPEAKING IN TONGUES

Re-read this one last week and it does not disappoint. A dialogue that dives into the restless seas of language and translation. What I love is that Coetzee and Dimópoulos are deep knotty minds, restless and searching and really fearless.

What I wrote after the first time: Speaking in Tongues is what it must be like to be visited by a higher power — to receive prophecy. The dialogue between Coetzee, one of our greatest writers alive and the astoundingly brilliant Mariana Dimópulos is a fucking revelation full fucking stop. The kind of book you get once in a lifetime, Speaking in Tongues a mithril-blend of scholarship and artistry that will transform your ideas of language, translation, identity and possibly the universe.

From the publisher: “Language, historically speaking, has always been slippery. Two dictionaries provide two different maps of the universe: which one is true, or are both false? Speaking in Tongues—taking the form of a dialogue between Nobel laureate novelist J. M. Coetzee and eminent translator Mariana Dimópulos—examines some of the most pressing linguistic issues that plague writers and translators well into the twenty-first century.

The authors address questions that we must answer in order to understand contemporary society. They inquire if one can truly love an acquired language, and they question why certain languages, like Spanish, have gender differences built into them. They examine the threat of monolingualism and ask how we can counter, if at all, the global spread of the English language, which seems to maraud like a colonial power. They question whether it should be the duty of the translator to remove morally objectionable, misogynistic, or racist language. And in the conclusion, Coetzee even speculates whether it’s only mathematics that can tell the truth about everything.”

https://wwnorton.com/books/9781324096450

ONE DAY, EVERYONE WILL HAVE ALWAYS BEEN AGAINST THIS

This book. This book. This book.

What I wrote after I read it: “One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This strikes with the clarifying force of an angel. By turns furiously troubled and achingly introspective, El Akkad sets fire to the devourous genocidal abyss we call a civilization and all the billion mendacities that sustain it. A landmark of truth-telling and moral courage, One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This is the truest most necessary books you will ever read.”

From the publisher: “On October 25, 2023, after just three weeks of the bombardment of Gaza, Omar El Akkad put out a tweet: “One day, when it’s safe, when there’s no personal downside to calling a thing what it is, when it’s too late to hold anyone accountable, everyone will have always been against this.” This tweet has been viewed more than 10 million times.

As an immigrant who came to the West, El Akkad believed that it promised freedom. A place of justice for all. But in the past twenty years, reporting on the War on Terror, Ferguson, climate change, Black Lives Matter protests, and more, and watching the unmitigated slaughter in Gaza, El Akkad has come to the conclusion that much of what the West promises is a lie … This is a chronicle of that painful realization, a moral grappling with what it means, as a citizen of the U.S., as a father, to carve out some sense of possibility in a time of carnage.”

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/777485/one-day-everyone-will-have-always-been-against-this-by-omar-el-akkad/

THE ANTHROPOLOGISTS

Don’t just take Obama’s word for it — this novel rocks bells.

I adore novels like this — the mind and heart of one person who in their seeking, opens up a world. And the search for home — how universal and endless is that?

MJ Franklin captured it beautifully: “… the book’s mission seems to be simply to plunge the reader into the mind of one woman as she evaluates her days and considers what she wants her life to be as she searches for a new home.”

From the publisher: “Asya and Manu are looking at apartments, envisioning their future in a foreign city. What should their life here look like? What rituals will structure their days? Whom can they consider family?

As the young couple dreams about the possibilities of each new listing, Asya, a documentarian, gathers footage from the neighborhood like an anthropologist observing local customs. “Forget about daily life,” chides her grandmother on the phone. “We named you for a whole continent and you're filming a park.”

Back in their home countries parents age, grandparents get sick, nieces and nephews grow up-all just slightly out of reach. But Asya and Manu's new world is growing, too, they hope. As they open the horizons of their lives, what and whom will they hold onto, and what will they need to release?

Unfolding over a series of apartment viewings, late-night conversations, last rounds of drinks and lazy breakfasts, The Anthropologists is a soulful examination of homebuilding and modern love, written with Aysegül Savas' distinctive elegance, warmth, and humor.”

(read this one on my kindle, so no book pic)

https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/anthropologists-9781639733064/

WATCH

AN AUTUMN’S TALE

Directed by Mabel Cheung • 1987 • Hong Kong
Starring Cherie Chung, Chow Yun-fat, Danny Chan

I’ve been revisiting early works from directors and writers and also 80’s immigrant stories and Mabel Cheung’s An Autumn’s Tale brings all my criteria together in one moving DIY love story. Love lost and almost found, the art school demimonde, documentarian shots of NYC before full-gentrification, incredible chemistry between stars Cherie Chung and Chow Yun-Fat (before he become the God of Hong Kong cinema) makes this an irresistible gem.

From Criterion: “A heartfelt tale of love and loneliness unfolds in New York City in this hugely popular romantic drama, the second film in director Mabel Cheung’s Migration Trilogy. Hong Konger Jennifer (Cherie Chung) arrives in New York with plans to study and reunite with her boyfriend (Danny Chan)—until she discovers him with another woman. Heartbroken and alone in a new city, she finds unexpected connection with her distant relative Figgy (Chow Yun-fat at his most charming), with whose help she begins building a new life for herself.”

https://www.criterionchannel.com/an-autumn-s-tale

PLAY

SOUNDTRACK TO A COUP D’ETAT

This documentary is history at its most damning and challenging — an extraordinary act of re-memory work that not only demands our attention but participation.

From the producers: “025 Oscar® nominee for Best Documentary Feature. United Nations, 1960: the Global South ignites a political earthquake, jazz musicians Abbey Lincoln and Max Roach crash the Security Council, Nikita Khrushchev bangs his shoe, and the U.S. State Department swings into action, sending jazz ambassador Louis Armstrong to Congo to deflect attention from the CIA-backed coup. Director Johan Grimonprez captures the moment when African politics and American jazz collided in this magnificent essay film, a riveting historical rollercoaster that illuminates the political machinations behind the 1961 assassination of Congo’s leader Patrice Lumumba. Richly illustrated by eyewitness accounts, official government memos, testimonies from mercenaries and CIA operatives, speeches from Lumumba himself, and a veritable canon of jazz icons, Soundtrack to a Coup d’Etat interrogates colonial history to tell an urgent and timely story of precedent that resonates more than ever in today’s geopolitical climate.”

https://kinolorber.com/film/soundtrack-to-a-coup-d-etat?srsltid=AfmBOoq9ytHt4VfjZDCT-Vdll4uwv67RmmF-6gW2zzOzNeroi8ZZ3p0U

JOANA CHOUMALI

Last month I caught Joana Choumali’s exhibit Languages of West African Marketplaces at the Harvard Art Museum. The exhibit is over, but Choumali’s the kind of artist that will give you life and should be on everyone’s horizon.

https://harvardartmuseums.org/exhibitions/6415/joana-choumali-languages-of-west-african-marketplaces

Gia Fu is a Hong Kong salsa DJ, producer, who specializes in Afro-Latin music. Talk about DJ saving your life. Can’t wait to catch one of her shows / lectures.

https://www.aaartsalliance.org/magazine/stories/gia-fu-traces-the-cross-cultural-rhythms-of-salsa-music

FEAST

BRIMFIELD ANTIQUE MARKET

For someone like me who grew like up in Santo Domingo and Central NJ — in sight of the NYC skyline — New England can be something of a challenge. But one of the annual pleasures of this region is the Brimfield Antique Flea Market. As close to a carnival as the vintage world gets. I took the goddaughter to the May edition and was as always blown-away — next one will be July 8th. If you’re in the area — not to be missed.

BLUE MOUNTAIN JAMAICAN RESTAURANT

Jamaican is one of my favorite cuisines ever and I’m always on the hunt for real ones. The jerk wings at Chef Deon’s Kitchen on Martha’s Vineyard, for example, slap for days. I ordered from Blue Mountain yesterday and ate so greedily that I forgot to take fotos (these are from their instagram). Their jerk chicken and oxtail were ridiculously fire.

https://bmjrestaurant.com/