Dropping Anchor

Alas, I think it's time to move on from ye olde Peculiar River. My life has just gotten too complicated lately and blogging is no longer any fun. Also, I just can't make the time to be part of the blogging community the way I'd want to.

Many thanks to all who linked to me, all who read me, all who commented, and all who stopped me in the halls at school to compliment a post. It's been great fun. But I really have to start devoting more energy to my playwriting and my career.

Much love,

Alex

Oy.

I seem to be having trouble locating my talent. I'm going to have to take a hiatus from the blog until it can be found.

The Way We Read Now

Returning from six weeks of travels, I flipped through a stack of New Yorker magazines and I became conscious of a pattern which I think I'd been unconsciously aware of for some time:

The fiction is getting shorter.

In the July 2 issue, 2 and 2/3 pages were given to the short story.

In the July 9 & 16 issue, it was 6 pages.

July 23: 7 and 2/3.

July 30: 3 and 2/3.

August 6: 3.

August 13: 3.

These page counts include the opening full-page image.

And here's the other thing: Of the authors of the last 6 works of fiction, 3 are non-American and one is dead. Only Antonya Nelson and Stuart Dybek -- two genuinely great short-story writers -- represent living American fiction writers. And, perhaps not coincidentally, their stories were the longest of the six.

People complained, when Tina Brown took over The New Yorker in the early '90s, that she was not literary aesthete enough. That might have been true, and her successor, the current editor David Remnick, has improved the magazine in every way -- except this one.

The American short story has fewer and fewer homes. And this is the magazine that was the patron saint of J.D. Salinger and Jean Stafford, the magazine that published landmark short stories like Susan Sontag's "The Way We Live Now" and Annie Proulx's "Brokeback Mountain."

It's still the country's greatest magazine. But, as a playwright, I feel great solidarity with short-story writers. Not only because I think the two art forms have a lot in common, but because they're both being increasingly marginalized, and it's nearly impossible to make a living in either medium.

Help Wanted

Repub. POTUS seeks energetic, determined, Machiavellian Deputy Chief of Staff. Candidate must be white, male, direct descendent of Satan. Dep. COS duties include reading the stuff the President doesn't feel like reading, ensuring Republican stranglehold on American political discourse for decades to come, and eating the children of Democratic congressmen. Knowledge of martini making a +.

Good riddance, shithead. I feel like celebrating!

Friday Videos

Thanks to Mark Palansky for this one:



Thanks to Jonathan Polansky (a Polack unrelated to the above Polack) for this one:



And from me, a third Polack:

You Know What Sucks?

"Psych."

That show about the phony psychic detective and his straight-man partner. That show that USA advertises the living fuck out of. That show for which Dule Hill has apparently taken elocution lessons, but in no other way does it represent an achievement for its producers, stars, or writers.

And who is watching this show? How did it persist to a second season? I don't know anybody who has watches it. I don't know anybody who knows anybody who watches it.

I've seen it a few times, and it's been televisual dentistry every time. The boys finagle their way into investigating a murder or a theft, the non-psychic feigns clairvoyance and tricks people into giving away information, Dule Hill spends the entire episode rolling his eyes or going, "Whoa, Sean, do I have to remind you you are not psychic?", and in the end the white guy outs the perpetrator and explains everything like Encyclopedia Brown used to do for his moron father -- all within a pastel-y color pallette that makes southern California look like a non-stop Mentos commercial.

The comedy is labored, the buddy team is bland, the mystery never compelling or suspenseful, and poor Dule Hill -- who, despite his occasional marble mouth, was usually terrific on "The West Wing" -- must be bored out of his mind.

So yeah. That's what sucks.

Not Gay, Just Racist

I love this story more than I can say.

Watch a Politician Say What She Really Thinks

Over the last few days Barack Obama and John Edwards have been raking Hillary Clinton over the coals for this answer she gave at the Yearly Kos convention:



But you know what? Hillary's right. Jack Abramoff made "lobbyist" a dirty word, and suddenly it's become politically correct to villify all lobbyists everywhere, as if it was a business created for corrupt people by corrupt people and now everyone else is just starting to notice.

But that's like condemning all labor unions because of Jimmy Hoffa. Lobbying is, in theory, a method by which constituents communicate with their representatives.

I'm Totally Back, Dude

Back in southern California after six weeks of traveling, and am able to devote a little more attention to my poor, neglected blog.

A brief list of things I've done so far this summer:

• I saw my friend Ruth McKee's play The Nightshade Family in the Summer Play Festival in New York. Yay, Ruth!
• I saw my friend Josh Tobiessen's play Election Day, which is running off-Broadway at the McGinn/Cazale Theatre. Yay, Josh!
• Got hooked on "Big Brother." How annoying is Amber?
• Tried to read Erik Larson's "The Devil in the White City," but I got fed up with its forced pulpiness and lack of transparency — I just wasn't buying it.
• Started writing a new play. Yay, me!

That's all. Oh, and the 2+ weeks I spent in the Middle East (scroll down).

I've also fallen in love with this now famous ABC News clip. If you haven't seen it, prepare to cringe. Also, turn up the volume and listen for the off-camera shriek at the end when Ms. Merry Miller says NBC.com instead of ABC.com:

Israel, Part 3

The view of Tel Aviv from my hotel room:

Just south of Tel Aviv, within walking distance, is Jaffa. The fortress dates to the middle ages. It's now filled with art galleries and souvenir shops:

And the city itself, just beyond the fortress. The population is mostly Arab:

Looking north to Tel Aviv:

Every Saturday afternoon, a group of some two dozen drummers gets together at a spot overlooking the beach at the southern end of Tel Aviv and they jam until sunset. It's pretty great:

On my last day in Israel, I stumbled upon this none-too-subtle art installation on Rothschild St., one of the city's main thoroughfares:

The Mediterranean was so beautiful, and every night the sunset looked like this:

And those are all my photos!