a blog that investigates the imaginary, fabulist, surreal, and strange in literary cultures and beyond
Fantastical, fabulist, fantasmatic, magical, magical realist, surrealist, science fictional, speculative, just plain weird, or what? — the agenda for 2016
There’s a lot of talk about literary borders these days: what is and is not something or something else.
My friend R, who is a poet and performer and video artist says he’s HAD it with those boundaries and those arguments. “Who cares?” he says “whether it’s gothic or haiku or a prose poem?”
On one hand, as a writer, I totally agree. I make what I make and it is what it is and the most fun is when I don’t know and the reader doesn’t know either and it gets to feel a little fresh and different.
But I also think it’s interesting to think about those boundary crossings and the degree to which the unreal has become very visible and very important for us here in the US and elsewhere too.
Over the next year, I’m going to blog about these issues and I’ll share work that crosses my path that I think is interesting along these lines. I invite you to ask questions, agree, disagree and share texts, sites, practices, discussions, video, and whatever else that’s pertinent here.
If you would like to do a guest blog post here, please email me at stephaniebarbe.hammer@gmail.com and let’s discuss.
Wishing you a surprising and surprisingly happy 2016.
Stephanie Barbé Hammer is a magical realist prose fiction writer, novelist, occasional essayist, and a committed, intermittent poet, as well as a passionate instructor of writing. A 7-time nominee for the Pushcart Prize she has published work in Hayden's Ferry, Pearl, CRATE, Rhapsoidia, NYCBigCityLit, the East Jasmine Review, Apeiron, Inlandia, Literary Alchemy and the Bellevue Literary Review among other places. She is the author the fabulist novel THE PUPPET TURNERS OF NARROW INTERIOR (Urban Farmhouse Press), a novelette, RESCUE PLAN (Bamboo Dart Press), a prose poem chapbook collection, SEX WITH BUILDINGS (dancing girl press), and a poetry collection, HOW FORMAL (Spout Hill Press).
Stephanie's new novel PRETEND PLUMBER is available for order from your favorite bookstore, and her poetry chapbook CITY SLICKER appeared in July 2022. Stay tuned for her novella, JOURNEY TO MERVEILLEUX CITY, coming out in 2023!
View all posts by Stephanie Barbé Hammer