SUMMER 2001

Neil Gaiman, Joe Wenderoth, Kim Stanley Robinson, Richard Foreman, and more...

INTERVIEWS

The Obscenery of the Frosty: An Interview with Joe Wenderoth
Interviewed by Graham Foust
Is it obliteration of the self or the failure of the Frosty that feeds the poetics of Wenderoth's Letters to Wendy's?

Dreaming American Gods: The Expanded Interview with Neil Gaiman
Interviewed by Rudi Dornemann and Kelly Everding
Gaiman reveals his sleight-of-hand tricks while discussing absent friends, adapting comics, and his picaresque new novel, American Gods.

FEATURES

Utopic Fiction and the Mars Novels of Kim Stanley Robinson
Essay by Jeremy Smith
The history of utopia unspools in this engaging essay about the unmatched vision of Robinson's left-wing novels.

Richard Foreman: Essays and Plays
Essay by Aaron Kunin
The creator of the Ontological-Hysteric Theater is probed in these recent books showcasing his work.

Sputnik Sweetheart
Reviewed by Matt Dube
& Underground
Reviewed by Jennifer Flanagan
Haruki Murakami
A novel of thwarted desire and a gripping account of the gassing of the Japanese subway that ties into his own novelistic motifs.

Raymond Federman: Two Books
The Twofold Vibration
Reviewed by Lance Olsen

The Voice in the Closet
Reviewed by Rebecca Weaver
Reprints of these essential works reveal Federman's haunting Holocaust experiences in a postmodern aesthetic of uncertainty.

REVIEWS: FICTION

The Hesperides Tree
Nicholas Mosley
Mosley relates the difficulty of reconciling literature to science in the technology-obsessed world of his latest novel. Reviewed by Jason Picone

Indivisible
Fanny Howe
In this paradoxical world the invisible is also indivisible as Howe relates the story of Henny in poetic fragments and quandaries. Reviewed by Christopher Martin

Karlmarx.com
Susan Coll
Meet the commodification of Marxism in this farcical tale of disenfranchised youth. Reviewed by Julie Madsen

The Unknown Errors of Our Lives
Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
To err is human, but in these short stories, Divakaruni explores characters whose errors define their relationships with family and with their Indian heritage. Reviewed by Michelle Reale

The Hell Screens
Alvin Lu
Lu's debut novel flows according to dream logic as ghostly characters flit in and out of view in this noir tale. Reviewed by Peter Ritter

Ex-Libris
Ross King
The search of a missing manuscript fuels this bleak post-Cromwellian world in this Eco-like mystery. Reviewed by Kris Lawson

A Good House
Bonnie Burnard
Chronicling over fifty years of family life, Burnard's first novel makes you feel like part of this home. Reviewed by Kiersten Marek

A Heart of Stone
Renate Dorrestein
translated by Hester Velmans
A childhood tragedy haunts the pregnant protagonist of this story by one of Holland's best-loved novelists. Reviewed by Deborah J. Safran

REVIEWS: NONFICTION

M/E/A/N/I/N/G: An Anthology of Artists' Writings, Theory, and Criticism
edited by Susan Bee and Mira Schor
Taken from the journal that ran from 1986-1996, these writings give voice to the marginal artists disgusted by the '80s overblown arts market. Reviewed by Charles Alexander

The Sexual Criminal: A Psychoanalytical Study
J. Paul de River
Originally published in 1949, this new expanded edition provides more gory details of perversions along with salacious information about de River himself. Reviewed by Jon Carlson

My Day: The Best of Eleanor Roosevelt's Acclaimed Newspaper Columns, 1936-1962
Eleanor Roosevelt
The comfortable tone of these columns belies the imposing and incisive mind of this First Lady who served hotdogs to the King and Queen of England. Reviewed by Charisse Gendron

Loss Within Loss: Artists in the Age of AIDS
edited by Edmund White
This collection of essays celebrates the lives and work of artists, those famous and those struck down before fame could reach them. Reviewed by Thomas Fagan

Fabrication: Essays on Making Things and Making Meaning
Susan Neville
Nostalgia and grief fuel these meditations on manufacturing and meaning. Reviewed by Nicole Hamer

Comedy After Postmodernism
Kirby Olson
Olson explores the comedic writings of such authors as Edward Lear and Gregory Corso in the framework of post-structuralist theory. Reviewed by Brian Evenson

REVIEWS: POETRY

Louise in Love
& The Downstream Extremity of the Isle of Swans
Mary Jo Bang
More Bang for your buck: discover Bang's "language of tongue rolls and lip twists" in her two new collections of poetry. Reviewed by Bonnie Blader

Pen Chants or nth or 12 spirit-like impermanences
Lissa Wolsak
These prayer-like poems push vocabularic play to a heightened degree, until they "reach a place of speaking." Reviewed by Jen Hofer

The Penultimate Suitor
Mary Leader
In her second collection of poems, Leader engages the ecstatic human condition. Reviewed by Arielle Greenberg

Mallet Eyes
Jeremy Sigler
Sculptor Sigler's minimalist poems achieve a deafening silence of objectivity in which things win out over self. Reviewed by Daniel Sumrall

REVIEWS: DRAMA

Electra
Sophocles
This new translation matches acclaimed poet Anne Carson with Sophocles–guaranteeing a unique and original experience of Electra's woe. Reviewed by Justin Maxwell

REVIEWS: GRAPHIC NOVELS

The Book of Leviathan
Peter Blegvad
Welcome to the bizarre world of a faceless baby, his intelligent cat, and the postmodern circumstances that torment them. Reviewed by Gary Sullivan

Rain Taxi Online Edition, Summer 2001 | © Rain Taxi, Inc. 2001