Choukri, Proust, and Beame

From the June 26 New York Review of Books, I read Ursula Lindsey's "Mohamed Choukri's Unromantic Tangier," Maurice Samuels's "Proust's Jewish Question," and Michael Greenberg's "The Vanishing Mr. Beame."

struggling through the sand

"One morning right after the sun came up, we saw a trail of baby sea turtles struggling through the sand toward the ocean. One had flipped over onto its back, another seemed stuck in a strand of washed-up seaweed. I wanted to help them, to pick them up and put them in the water but my father wouldn’t let me. I said what if they don’t make it? And he said then they don’t make it."  

~~ from "Romans" by Greta Schledorn

original fiction and baseball-card deals

We have deals on original novels and baseball trading cards.

a life could vanish

"He thought of these years as another life within the one he had.  As though it were a thing he was able to carry. A small box. A handkerchief. A stone. He did not understand how a life could vanish. How that was even possible. How it could close in an instant before you could reach inside one last time, touch someone's hand one last time. How there would come a day when no one would wonder about the life he had before this one."

~~ from Snow Hunters by Paul Yoon

the loneliness of freedom

"At first there was loneliness. Then there was loss. And then there was a greater loneliness, the loneliness of freedom. Freedom: Once I am truly safe, I see that there is too much of it. Freedom means that you are free not to care about anyone or anything. Freedom shows me that all that matters to the free world is money."

~~ from How I Became a North Korean by Krys Lee

I wear blue jeans and write about New York City.

"Lastly, a writer dressed in blue jeans and a dress shirt, read from his book Fight for Your Long Day. He said in his introductory comments, “If I want to sell the book, I guess I need to let you know who I am. My name is Alex Kudera.” The audience clapped enthusiastically. His reading described a day in the life of a very tired adjunct in New York City. So much of what he dealt with Heather could relate to: trying not to leave anything behind, rushing in and rushing out of the classroom, the students desperately trying to talk while you are trying to make it to your next gig and don’t have time to listen, the colleagues and chair who say demeaning things to you but are impervious to the way they talk down to you. It felt good to laugh about it instead of the daily grind of dealing with it, day in and day out."

~~ from Adjunct Headquarters, "Subconference of the MLA" by Lydia Field Snow

Joy Hui Lin remembers Andrew X. Pham

“I stumbled upon my sister's copy of Catfish and Mandala in my early twenties from her Asian American literature studies class at Stanford. I had never read any piece of literature before that captures the painful and specific love of existing in a country that constantly rejects you. I reached out to Pham personally when a Norton editor explained that my living abroad book proposal was a great idea, except she, a white woman, could not feature how to market me, an Asian American woman, as the narrator. To say I was devastated would put it mildly, but Pham replied swiftly and with kindness and empathy. His writings have led the way forward for so many of us who are still trying to love a country that doesn't love us back. Pham evinced through his writings and life that he will be remembered as one of the literary world’s favorite kind of protagonists: a hero, both strong and tender.”

~~ Joy Hui Lin

Andrew X. Pham, rest in peace

Late Friday, I learned that the talented Andrew X. Pham passed on earlier this spring. Catfish and Mandala is a compelling read and one of the first books by an Asian American author I remember reading. I enjoyed his second book, The Eaves of Heaven, as well. He had published his first novel only last year. Rest in peace, Andrew X. Pham.