Accommodatingly

We just came back from seeing Jessie’s mom and stepdad reenacting social dancing from the late 1830s at Old Sturbridge Village. We liked it. Nathan liked it, mostly because he saw his Grammy and Kevin, but also because he could watch a fiddler. War reenactors get attention all the time: how about some props for the people who learn some social history, make or otherwise acquire elaborate period costume, and re-enact the arts of peace?

I’m in the Sunday Book Review praising August Kleinzahler, whose new book you should read even if you have all the old ones, since some of the new poems in it stand among his best (especially the ones about his marriage– I couldn’t imagine him writing poems about married love at all, let alone good ones, until I saw that he had done just that).

I’m also in the new Believer praising Juliana Spahr, and on the Poetry Magazine website admiring A. R. Ammons, in a piece about Ammons’ superb book A Coast of Trees. Lots of praise, I know. Maybe I should attack something soon. Or not.

Here’s an attack worth reading, though not from me: Linh Dinh disembowels the commercially successful translations and adaptations John Balaban has been bringing into American English from Vietnamese. I hope Balaban responds.

I just finished Robert Markley’s good book about Mars in fiction and in popular science. I recommend it highly if and only if you read seriously academic books, either lit-crit or history or history-of-science, for pleasure. It is not a sexy exciting fast read. It is a fine book with multiple strong arguments and memorable discoveries in every chapter– and, since so much of the writing Markley deals with is not known for the verve of its style, it’s the sort of book (more commonly written by historians than by lit-crit types) that makes me glad he’s read all these books so that I don’t have to read them all myself. (He’s also got something to say about the usual suspects of quality sf– Wells, for example, and Kim Stanley Robinson.)

And speaking of Mars, the University of Arizona is going there. I can’t say I’ll follow the Phoenix lander’s descent live, but I will be reading about it with attention– and some anxiety. Imagine the life of a xenogeologist, or areologist: years and millions of dollars on each mission, and a serious chance, with each attempt at a landing, that it will all go away.

Mary Roach is a funny writer and, from the short time I met her at the Twin Cities Book Festival, a very nice person. However, she apparently does not know what a wampa is.

There is simply no excuse for not looking up that word. If she didn’t think to do so, I can’t imagine why the producer wouldn’t have. What kind of standards do they have over at NPR, anyway? SHEEEESH. I’ve already sent a correction request. I hope that they give it all due attention. (Which is to say, none. I feel kind of guilty for wasting some intern’s time on my Star Wars obsession, but WRONG is WRONG.)

…and also because the post ROCKS, I give you this link:

The Porning of Miley Cyrus

When I started working for Beacon, I never thought I’d have a Hannah Montana post on the blog, but there it is.