Highbrow Action at the Brooklyn Book Festival

International Authors had a presence last Sunday at the Brooklyn Book Festival. The Williamsburg Art and Historical Center was our host for the event, and as things turned out we had the honor of representing the Center.

Originally, we were only going to present Emanations: Third Eye as part of the WAH Center display, but then a last minute email from Terrance Lindall informed us that something had come up, and he and his assistant from the WAH Center could not make the event. The table was all ours. Did we have other books to display? And could we represent WAH?

Well, of course!

The full range of International Authors books were presented before the public.  I was joined by surrealist painter Bienvenido Banez, Jr. and Hudson Valley poet Kristine Shmenco, seen here along with yours truly in the following photographs.

I remain very grateful for the opportunity, and on behalf of International Authors I wish to extend my thanks to Terrance Lindall and Yuko Nii, who made the afternoon possible. Terrance and Yuko have been very kind to International Authors over the years, and it has been very enjoyable working with an organization that shares so much in common with our consortium. See, for example, this description of Yuko Nii's "Bridge Concept," as well as this description of just one of the many projects the WAH Center pursues through maintaining its collections and its philanthropic efforts.

Meanwhile, Bien, Kristine and I had a wonderful time talking to festival goers about our books. Also, we compared notes and developed a number if ideas about the book industry--about making books, promoting books and art, about the people who buy books and what they look for, and so on.  We had such an enjoyable time that the day flashed by in a wink  Following the photographs, I have posted links to several press stories. Enjoy.

Brooklyn Daily Eagle
NY1
New York Times
The New Yorker
NYU Local

The Consolation of Music

Events this afternoon at the WAH Center have been cancelled--including my talk on Emanations: Third Eye.  The Brooklyn Book Festival is on, however, and tomorrow morning I will be at table 99 with International Authors.

Meanwhile, I am in Manhattan, and that means music at the Cloisters.  Click HERE for details.

Harvest Moon Tonight

Emanating Announcements

It's always interesting to see how other contributors and editors view a project.  Here are announcements from Dario Rivarossa, Horace Jeffery Hodges, Kristine Shmenco and Mike Chivers:

Tassonomia

Gypsy Scholar

Mirrors*Dooorknobs*Dreams 

Necronomania

Interview with Michael Butterworth

Philip Murray-Lawson has posted Part I of his interview with Michael Butterworth.

Michael Butterworth (l) with Michael Moorcock (r).

 

In the interview, Mr. Butterworth reflects on a number of  intriguing subjects, including his contribution to British New Wave science fiction in the 1960s,  New Worlds, Michael Moorcock, his work with Savoy Books and David Britton, the contemporary avant-garde, and Emanations.

Please click HERE for the interview.

Emanations: Third Eye is Now Available

On behalf of the International Authors Board of Editorial Advisors, I am happy to announce that Emanations: Third Eye, an anthology of fiction, poetry, criticism and art is now available through Amazon.

Click HERE to visit the Amazon sales page.

Emanations: Third Eye events at the Brooklyn Book Festival

As I reported in August, International Authors will have a  presence Sept 21-22 at the Brooklyn Book Festival.  Specifically, we will present Emanations: Third Eye, which will be available very soon.  

Saturday September 21:

12-6 PM Display of the Elephant Folio, plus the Gold Scroll and NEW large format full color drawing, Paradise Lost Re-envisoned

3 PM Admission $5  Refreshments Available.

3 PM Introduction by Yuko Nii, Founder and Artistic Director of the Williamburg Art & historical Center.

3:15 Bienvenido Bones Banez performs his renowned "Satanic Rhapsody" on our Grand Piano.

3:30 PM Dr. Carter Kaplan of International Authors discusses their new release, Emanations: Third Eye.

3:45 PM Audience questions and answers followed by book signings.

4 PM Terrance Lindall will sign his limited edition book about the Gold Folio and talk about the Paradise Lost Contemporary Art Collection that is being developed by the Yuko Nii Foundation, and the complimentary collection being developed by Dr. Robert J. Wickenheiser for the University of South Carolina, which will be on display at a grand conclave of artists, collectors and scholars at the U of SC in 2015 (info: milton@wahcenter.net).

 ...plus Special Antiquarian Book Exhibits including  Reynard the Fox, Boccaccio's Decameron, The second folio of Shakespeare's Macbeth and Hamlet (1632). etc.

Sunday September 22:

9:00 AM Volunteers meet at WAH Center to drive to Book Festival

9:30 AM Set up table #99

10-6 PM Meet people  Book Festival

Volunteers:

Terrance Lindall, WAH Center Ex.  Director

Sarah Cahill Marron, WAH Center Volunteer

Carter Kaplan, International Authors

Kristine Shmenco, International Authors

Visit the WAH Center:

WAH Center (Williamsburg Art & Historical Center)

Located at the corner of Bedford, next to the Williamsburg Bridge:135 Broadway, Williamsburg Brooklyn, NY 11211

Gallery Hours:
Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday 12–6 pm

(718) 486-6012
or
(718) 486-7372

wahcenter@earthlink.net

How to get to the WAH Center:

From Manhattan
When driving, just keep to your right when crossing the Williamsburg Bridge which leads you to Broadway. Turn right on Broadway. We are 2 blocks down on the corner of Bedford Avenue and Broadway in the landmark Kings County Savings Bank Building, 135 Broadway.

By Subway
L train to Bedford (one stop into Brooklyn from Manhattan) Avenue.
Walk thirteen blocks south and under the Williamsburg Bridge to Broadway.
Or J, M or Z train to Marcy Avenue (one stop into Brooklyn from Manhattan). Walk three blocks west on Broadway to the WAH Center.

Ancient of Days Interview Now in the Archive

The Highbrow community will recall my interview with Tessa Dick on her program Ancient of Days. I am happy to report the interview has been archived and can be listened to by clicking HERE.

A New Anatomy?

Chaos and Night

Terrance Lindall is engaged with a new set of color pencil illustrations for Paradise Lost. Here, in progress, is Chaos and his consort Night, who appears to be sprinkling stars into the arch-fiend's hand.  Suns from the material universe, perhaps, into which he will soon soar on those dreadful wings?

Bordering on light; when strait behold the Throne
Of Chaos, and his dark Pavilion spread
Wide on the wasteful Deep; with him Enthron'd
Sat Sable-vested Night, eldest of things,
The Consort of his Reign

       - John Milton, Paradise Lost  Book II, 959-63.

Dare, Suffer, Trust

 Emanations: Third Eye will be available soon.  Until then, dear highbrows:

Osa, soffri, confida. 

                            --Torquato Tasso, Gerusalemme Conquistata

Nobel Lecture by Harold Pinter

International Authors and Emanations: Third Eye at the Brooklyn Book Festival

Next month, I will give a talk on Emantions: Third Eye at the WAH Center:

Bookend Lecture

Lectures and a Display of Terrance Lindall's

Gold Illuminated Paradise Lost Elephant Folio

 

A Bookend Event of the Brooklyn Book Festival

 Saturday, September 21, 2013

12-6 PM Display of the Elephant Folio, plus the Gold Scroll and NEW large format full color drawing, Paradise Lost Re-envisoned

3 PM Admission $5  Refreshments Available.

3 PM Introduction by Yuko Nii, Founder and Artistic Director of the Williamburg Art & historical Center.

3:15 Bienvenido Bones Banez performs his renowned "Satanic Rhapsody" on our Grand Piano.

3:30 PM Dr. Carter Kaplan of International Authors discusses their new release, Emanations: Third Eye.

3:45 PM Audience questions and answers followed by book signings.

4 PM Terrance Lindall will sign his limited edition book about the Gold Folio and talk about the Paradise Lost Contemporary Art Collection that is being developed by the Yuko Nii Foundation, and the complimentary collection being developed by Dr. Robert J. Wickenheiser for the University of South Carolina, which will be on display at a grand conclave of artists, collectors and scholars at the U of SC in 2015 (info: milton@wahcenter.net).

 ...plus Special Antiquarian Book Exhibits including  Reynard the Fox, Boccaccio's Decameron, The second folio of Shakespeare's Macbeth and Hamlet (1632). etc.

Steve Aylett on the Quest for Originality

In a new interview (click here), British author Steve Aylett discusses his current project The Heart of the Original. 

Here are a few lines from the interview that I found particularly interesting:

What do you perceive to be the main obstacles to originality?

There’s a strange discomfort that people feel when confronted with an original idea, which is to do with the very fact that it didn’t exist before and so there’s no ‘place’ for it yet. It can be accommodated but many people aren’t willing to do that. There’s also some laziness involved and a need to stay with the familiar. That’s just in regard to original ideas coming from outside, so you can imagine how most people are in regard to coming up with original ideas themselves.

Do you believe people are becoming more, or less original in their ideas?

Less. The world is getting more conservative and fearful every day. People are willing to ‘buy’ one or other badge of individuality but the real thing is being starved out at a younger and younger age.

These observations serve as interesting points of departure for considering contemporary culture, education, and perhaps politics. What registers most strongly with me is the sense that culture is in transition, shifting into a mode where there is less originality and more conformity: in thought and institution (that is, in terms of the culture of social organization, and in terms of our cultural institutions--eg. entertainment, religion, marriage, what it means to be an adult or child).  Arguably, the internet is a source for greater diversity of thought and opinion, an open forum for the cosmopolitan exchange of ideas; however, in actual practice... I wonder. Do people use the internet to seek challenging new ideas, or rather use it as a place where they seek confirmation of their already established ideas, beliefs and prejudices?

Aylett's second point is somewhat chilling.  Coupled to the mitigation of behavior and thinking that is original early in life--"being starved out at a younger and younger age," to quote Aylett--I wonder if there is a tendency to cling to the more mundane and undesired "overt" behaviors and thinking patterns of childhood? On one hand people are at a younger age abandoning their rebelliousness, their desire to experiment with life and experience, while on the other hand people, to make up for this perhaps, are clinging to more archetypical core behaviors and attitudes that are simply immature. Are we exchanging risky patterns that are necessary for growth and learning in return for safe patterns of mock rebelliousness, i.e. childishness, and in so doing are we remaining children for longer periods, into our 20s, 30s, and beyond?

UPDATE

A new 2025 edition has been released. Click the cover image to view the Amazon description.

Reflections

Construction atop the "Freedom Tower" (One World Trade Center)
reflected in the face of Tower Four, with clouds from four angles in multiple panels and in open sky.

Ritual Purification of the Temple

"Or what harmony has Christ with Belial, or what has a believer in common with an unbeliever? Or what agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God..."  
(2 Corinthians 6:16)

The Fearless Earthworm Hunter!

Advanced IQ Test: Are you a Highbrow?

What should be the final shape in the sequence?

If you know, you know.   And if you know--you're a highbrow!

Variation on the Jorge Luis Borges Esoteric Conundrum Plot Apparatus

Cover art for Emanations: Third Eye

Kai Rob has done stunning work (yet again) preparing the cover art for Emanations: Third Eye.

An anthology of fiction, poetry, and essays from around the world,  Emanations: Third Eye will be available soon. Watch this space.