Table-Talk of Parkus Grammaticus for July 28, 2008

I. Short-story wizard Deb Olin Unferth's first novel, Vacation, is coming out soon (the unofficial prequel to Personal Days?!)—and there's already a nifty trailer for it:



There is a plan for Deb and I to read together at KGB in December, along with the mysterious Heidi Julavits........and speaking of HJ—she and I will be introducing something Believer-y at Symphony Space in November.

No need to mark your calendars now—I will remind you about these things constantly in the intervening months!

II. Wait—speaking of KGB—I'll be reading there this Thursday! More reminders soon...

III. Dzyd Mollie wonders:

[S]ay you were to construct a speculative Venn diagram of 'People who are familiar with the movie Once and/or independent Irish rock band the Frames' and 'People who are familiar with Mary Worth (in a nonironic fashion).' You would probably project a very, very small overlapping space..."

(That's an exceptionally limiting Venn diagram...but can it match this one?)

IV. There should be a flip-book about...the making of a flip-book.

V. Rounding out today's Table-talk, a note from Dzyd Luc:

"Here's an interesting variant on the Ouroboros. It's an emblem by Maurice Scève—the viper's suicide: 'to give you life I give myself death'—and I found it on the excellent blog A Journey Round My Skull."


Hard to tell exactly what's going on here, but: Is the serpent spilling its own blood to provide nourishment for its spawn? Eagle-eyed Dzyds, please call in.

(Speaking of Luc: new post—at last!—up at his Pinakothek.)