THE BLOG @ TIR
-
November 8, 2012
Words Without Borders: The Online Magazine for International Literature recently published an interview with TIR Editor Russell Scott Valentino about his work as a translator of Italian, Croatian, and Russian. Read it here. One tidbit: "Lately I’ve been thinking about translation as a kind of adoption, as when one adopts a child. You take her from her home context, love and care for her, teach her what you know, and then, when she gets big enough and, you hope, has learned enough from you to live on her own, you introduce her to the world and hope she can thrive."
-
October 25, 2012
From our friends up the hill at the International Writing Program, this call for submissions:
For the forthcoming Norton anthology, Flash Fiction International, edited by Robert Shapard, James Thomas, and Christopher Merrill:
We are looking for contemporary very short stories in English or English translation, limit 750 words. We usually reprint works already published, but will also consider original manuscripts.
We would be very grateful for networking help, and leads to new work (names of authors, translators, books) with contact numbers if possible.
We also want quotes about or relevant to very short fiction (from writers in the form, or from any field—aesthetics, philosophy, physics, other arts, popular culture); we will be glad to acknowledge you and send a free copy of the book.
Send submissions or leads to:
Christopher Merrill, 100 Shambaugh House, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242
OR
christopher-merrill@uiowa.edu
Deadline: March 31, 2013
Photo credit: Niklas Morberg
-
October 23, 2012
"For the very real people in David Ebenbach's vivid and emotional stories, becoming a parent&emdash;as Judith, the single mother in four of the stories, says—is going 'into the wilderness.' A trip into the unknown, the primitive, the real. One single moment, the birth of a child, changes everything. It is the oldest human story and, in Ebenbach's sure hands, the truest and most moving."
—Jesse Lee Kercheval
Former TIR contributor David Ebenbach, author of "The Guy We Didn't Invite to the Orgy" (40/2), just released his new book of short stories, Into the Wilderness (Washington Writers' Publishing House 2012). Check it out!
-
October 18, 2012
Frequent contributor Katherine Soniat, published in TIR six (six!) times since issue 23/1, has a new collection of poetry out for your reading pleasure: A Raft, A Boat, A Bridge (Dream Horse Press)! Check it out here.
"A Raft, A Boat, A Bridge guides us through and beyond an ever-dissolving world's beauty and brutality. We enter the atmosphere of Katherine Soniat's brilliant, startling, and intimate poems, and we emerge shaken and re-newed." --Lee Upton
-
October 16, 2012
Most citizens of Iowa City recognize that our town has two passions: literature and football. So, in honor of both, a collective of writing programs will sponsor the first-ever "Writing Tailgate" at the Iowa City Public Library on Saturday, October 20, from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. in Meeting Room A.
Young children through adults can join in literary scavenger hunts, Scrabble scrambles, magnetic poetry, a haiku contest, twitter stories, digital storytelling, a Hemingway Challenge (six-word stories), post-it fiction, erasure/found poetry, and other writing activities. Football fans can stop by on their way to the game for free, tailgate-style food and writing-inspired door prizes. Join us the whole time or pop in for a quick writing respite.
Iowa Review authors including James McKean and Kim Lozano will read from their work between 3:00 and 4:00. Discoveries: New Writing from the Iowa Review is an anthology of stories, essays, and poetry selected from the Review archives for high school and introductory college classes. Inspired by the Discoveries selections, aspiring teachers from Professor Bonnie Sunstein's "Approaches to Teaching Writing" class will lead short writing exercises. From 4:00 to 5:00, we'll have an open mic segment for any writer, or group of writers, to share work with the audience.
This is the fourth year October 20 has been designated by the U.S. Congress as the National Day on Writing. "Writing is a daily practice for millions of Americans," claims the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), "but few notice how integral writing has become to daily life in the twenty-first century."
Sponsors of the event are the NCTE Student Affiliate of the University of Iowa, the City of Literature, the Iowa Youth Writing Project, the Derek Project, and the Iowa City Public Library.
