EDITH GROSSMAN ~

 

E D I T H    G R O S S M A N

1936 ~ 2023

The Polaroids of Andrei Tarkovsky, 1979-1983 ~

 

S E E

KENNETH WHITE (1936~2023)

 

K E N N E T H    W H I T E

Fifty years on: the lasting tragedy of Chile’s coup ~

 

VICTOR  JARA

R E A D     M E

JOHN HURT ~

 

     Vanguard Records

OSAMU DAZAI ~

 

OSAMU   DAZAI

AMY CLAMPITT ~

 

Gooseberry Fool

The gooseberry’s no doubt an oddity,

an outlaw or pariah even—thorny

and tart as any

kindergarten martinet, it can harbor

like a fernseed, on its leaves’ under-

side, bad news for pine trees,

whereas the spruce

resists the blister rust

it’s host to. That veiny Chinese

lantern, its stolid jelly

of a fruit, not only has 

no aroma but is twice as tedious

as the wild strawberry’s sunburst

stem-end appendage: each one must

be between-nail-snipped at both extremities.

Altogether, gooseberry virtues

take some getting

used to, as does trepang,

tripe à la mode de Caen,

or having turned thirteen.

The acerbity of all things green

and adolescent lingers in 

it—the arrogant, shrinking,

prickling-in-every-direction thorn-

iness that loves no company except its,

or anyhow that’s what it gets:

bristling up through gooseberry ghetto sprawl

are braced thistles’ silvery, militantly symmetrical

defense machineries. Likewise inseparably en-

tangled in the disarray of an

uncultivated childhood, where gooseberry bushes (since

rooted out) once flourished, is

the squandered volupté of lemon-

yellow-petaled roses’ luscious flimflam—

an inkling of the mingling into one experience

of suave and sharp, whose supremely im-

probable and far-fetched culinary

embodiment is a gooseberry fool.

Tomorrow, having stumbled into

this trove of chief ingredients

(the other being very thickest cream)

I’ll demonstrate it for you. Ever since,

four summers ago, I first brought you,

a gleeful Ariel, the trophy

of a small sour handful,

I’ve wondered what not quite articulated thing

could render magical 

the green globe of an unripe berry.

I think now it was simply

the great globe itself’s too much to carry.

December 1981

Don't miss this unique biography — told with a

storyteller's charm.

[ BA ]

RR / RIDING THE FEATHER RIVER ROUTE ~

 

Riding a Union Pacific freight on the former Western Pacific line that runs over the Sierra Nevada and through the Plumas National Forest to the Central Valley of California . Featuring John E. Ringo

PATRICK STREET ~

 

LITERARY ACTIVISM IN INDIA ~

 

 R E A D   M E

From left: Karthika VK, Amit Chaudhuri, Arvind Krishna Mehrotra, and Saikat Majumdar at the launch of the first two titles in the Literary Activism series

A LOST INTERVIEW (Clarice Lispector) ~

R E A D  &  L I S T E N 

REV ROBERT WILKINS ~

 

THE GHOST FOREST ~

 

R E A D    M E

Public Affairs, 2023

LUCINDA WILLIAMS ~

 

R E A D    M E

Crown, 2023

SARA BAUME ~

 

R E A D     M E

Mariner, 2022

ALBERT AYLER ~

 

R E A D     M E

Jawbone 2022

MISSISSIPPI JOHN HURT ~

 

OUMOU SANGARE ~

 

MARINA TSVETAEVA ~

 

R E A D     M E

Ugly Duckling Presse

2016

HENRY AT WORK ~

 

H E N R Y

Princeton, 2023