Thursday, February 17, 2005
(neuro)logical
they said it was too pretentious.
they said it was too elusive.
they said it was too complex.
then, I smiled.
I didn't win. instead, I stood and listened to the winners read their works and the editor politely mumble as to why the five judges weren't feeling my work. but, he told me to keep writing. and he's going to try to get me a job at The Austin Chronicle.
this entire contest, as far as the judges go, is why literature is in a weird state relative to the other arts (music, painting, film, etc). people shy away from anything that is remotely complex (unlike the editor, which was the reason he chose my shit as a final contestant). regardless, I just wish I lived in France.
everyone wants to be Dave Eggers, Charles Bukowski or Jonathan Lethem 'round these parts. no one aspires to be Carlos Fuentes, James Joyce, Ishmael Reed, William Gibson or Zora Neale Hurston. the winners, in my humble opinion, collectively committed the worst trangression a writer can ever make: they were dull. and in retrospect, they were all older folks (there were entries from as far as Columbia and England) who had been churning out stories for years. I'm a scruffy-headed twenty-three year old who hasn't written that much prose, yet. eh.
(small post-racial notes: there were no hispanic of black folk on the jury, none of the finalists were of color and there was only one black dude and me at the actual event).
eh.
anyway, without further ado, here is the first place story. which I havent thoroughly read yet, but sounded achingly dull when I heard it last night.
for some stupid reason the comments section is hidden on here (the pound sign by my name is how you access it). feel free to dig in. I can't possibly here anything worse than I already have about my story or anyone elses. and when I figure out how to do it properly, I'm going to post my story up here.
p.s. a big fuck you to the five judges who were too scared to show up after they had the audacity to select the stories they did.
(new fiction being written/televisions humming)
