Versal is sold out! so we packed up to get a beer.
Thank you for another awesome trip to the USA.
Love,
The editors
February 05, 2011
Sold out
Dear lovely everyone,
Versal is sold out! so we packed up to get a beer.
Thank you for another awesome trip to the USA.
Love,
The editors
Versal is sold out! so we packed up to get a beer.
Thank you for another awesome trip to the USA.
Love,
The editors
February 04, 2011
"Anna, I want to wrap myself up in your warm Russian fur."
The best part of yesterday was yesterday.
Thank you to everyone for coming to our panel and our offsite. What amazing events, both of them. See what a little strategic flyering can do? I thought flyers were dead. But no. Though maybe next year we'll just print 1000 of them?
Usually when I organize something I'm too distracted to enjoy the thing I've organized. I'm just type-A that way. But yesterday was an incredible exception. After Journal Porn ended and the crowd mountain became just a crowd, we went to The Diner up the street and I had French Toast for (finally) dinner. I was jetlag-cold so Anna wrapped me up in her Russian fur coat, hmmmm. Then Shayna and I came back to the hotel and I went horizontal and slept like a baby.
Here's a picture of the panel yesterday. From left to right: Jen Woods from The Lumberyard Magazine, Matvei Yankelevich from 6x6, Sandra Doller from 1913 a journal of forms, Jodee Stanley from Ninth Letter, Shayna Schapp from Versal, and Travis Kurowski, our amazing moderator, from Luna Park Review.
As Travis said, "This is like being at a table with Spike Jonze and Sophia Coppola."
Thank you to everyone for coming to our panel and our offsite. What amazing events, both of them. See what a little strategic flyering can do? I thought flyers were dead. But no. Though maybe next year we'll just print 1000 of them?
Usually when I organize something I'm too distracted to enjoy the thing I've organized. I'm just type-A that way. But yesterday was an incredible exception. After Journal Porn ended and the crowd mountain became just a crowd, we went to The Diner up the street and I had French Toast for (finally) dinner. I was jetlag-cold so Anna wrapped me up in her Russian fur coat, hmmmm. Then Shayna and I came back to the hotel and I went horizontal and slept like a baby.
Here's a picture of the panel yesterday. From left to right: Jen Woods from The Lumberyard Magazine, Matvei Yankelevich from 6x6, Sandra Doller from 1913 a journal of forms, Jodee Stanley from Ninth Letter, Shayna Schapp from Versal, and Travis Kurowski, our amazing moderator, from Luna Park Review.
As Travis said, "This is like being at a table with Spike Jonze and Sophia Coppola."February 03, 2011
Hotel-room pow-wow
Jennifer, Anna and I are sharing a hotel room at AWP. It's HUGE. About the size of a large Amsterdam apartment. So, after a delicious meal in the nearby Lebanese Taverna (crammed with other AWPers), we all gathered in our room tonight for a talk about the future of Versal. It's going to be big and bright, of course. To my knowledge, we have no photo documentation of this meeting, so just imagine nine beautiful people engaged in deep conversation about all the amazing things possible for our lit mag.
Convergence
It's just fucking awesome.
Some of the coolest people on the planet make up the Versal team. You guys rock buckets.
February 02, 2011
Microblogs from AWP because we don't have time for else
Overheard tonight over the second annual Tuesday night sushi Versal dinner somewhere in Washington D.C.: "Enter my bubble if you want to be sex free." Note this overhearing comes from and is by Versal editors.We're here. Most of us, anyway. Here's a shot of Matt, Anna, and Robert tonight at an Irish pub.
Shayna and I endured a fairly bumpy ride between Ireland and Iceland (r/c). Go figure. Here's a dumb one of us between seatbelt constraints.
Does anyone else notice the incredibly high percentage of couches to floor space at the Marriott Wardman?
January 29, 2011
D8 / AWP / Washington, DC / USA
By now, if you're like me, you've gotten lost in the crowd of emails, blogs, status updates, event invites, and tweets (ugh, that word sucks) about AWP. Toggling between your Facebook event page and AWP's own mega-scroll lists is enough to make a poet develop a socialite ego. Hell, the conference has even gone mainstream.
So for those of you with Versal on your AWP radar (herewith referred to as "AWPdar"), here's a nicely compartmentalized program from the Versal angle.
WEDNESDAY
Versal editors field trip and pow-wow. Nine of us will be in the same place at the same time. This is like when stars align. Some of us have never met (though one of us has met everyone, aka me). So we're taking ourselves out. See you on the other side.
THURSDAY-SATURDAY
Drop by our table at D8 for some yummy Dutch flavors and other goodies (no, we're not bringing weed). And we don't have merch. We can't afford it. Would you really wear a Versal t-shirt anyway? But we will be selling issues 5 through 8 and subscriptions at drop-bottom (is that how you say it?) rates. Look for the Dutch flag.
If you see the French flag, that's us too.
THURSDAY
If there's any day at the conference to go Versal, it's Thursday. The journal and its editors are freakin' all over the place.
9:00-10:15am
Tearing Your Heart Off Your Sleeve: The Problem of Pathos in Creative Nonfiction
with B.J. Hollars, Re’Lynn Hansen, Marcia Aldrich, Marion Wrenn, Katie Jean Shinkle
Virginia C Room, Marriott Wardman Park, Lobby Level
How can nonfiction writers avoid the pitfalls of sentimentality and nostalgia while directly addressing them in the work? Join editors from Black Warrior Review, Fourth Genre, South Loop, Painted Bride Quarterly, and Versal as they discuss the problem of pathos in nonfiction while offering concrete strategies for how best to approach emotionally driven topics. Panelists will also explore how traditional and experimental forms lend themselves to packing an emotive punch within the genre.
10:30-11:45am
Things That Go Bump When You Write: Monsters, Myths, and the Supernatural in Literary Fiction
with B.J. Hollars, Bryan Furuness, Hannah Tinti, Laura van den Berg, Scott Francis
Thurgood Marshall South Room, Marriott Wardman Park, Mezzanine Level
What do Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, and ghosts all have in common? For one, over the past year, they’ve all managed to stomp, swim, and haunt their way onto the literary scene. Join writers as they discuss their experiences implementing supernatural elements into their fiction. Panelists will offer tips on how to add credibility to the incredible and humanity to the inhuman. They will also explore the evolving definitions of gothic and grotesque in the 21st century.
3:00-4:15pm
What’s Normal in Nonfiction?
with Steven Church, Debra Marquart, Ander Monson, Bonnie J. Rough, Bob Shacochis
Maryland Suite Room, Marriott Wardman Park, Lobby Level
Moderated by editors of the Normal School, the panel will feature a discussion of the polarizing questions concerning the ethics and aesthetics of nonfiction writing today. Is the nonfiction writer’s obligation to the art or to the subject? The audience? Can you conflate time, use composite or fictionalized characters, or borrow material from other sources without citing it? Panelists will consider what the role of the nonfiction writer is today and how that role is defined by ethical concerns for subject and audience, and/or aesthetic concerns for art, genre, form, and technique.
4:30-5:45pm
Beyond Times New Roman: The Literary Journal as Object
with Sandra Doller, Travis Kurowski, Shayna Schapp, Jodee Stanley, Jen Woods, Matvei Yankelevich
Nathan Hale room, Marriott Wardman Park
From curatorial art teams to the hand-bound letterpress, to pages upon which art and words are nearly indistinguishable, the literary journal is so much more than paper and font choice. Attention to design will turn a journal into an art object that sets it apart from the masses. Editors from five innovative journals share concrete strategies for incorporating art and design: getting submissions, working with an art editor, and how to redesign the literary journal from scratch. This is the panel we've put together our very own selves, and we're super excited about it.
7:00-11:30pm
A Pair of Teeth / Aperitif
IOTA Club & Cafe, 2832 Wilson Blvd.
Join Articles Press, Flying Guillotine, and SpringGun Press for an exciting evening of music and writing at IOTA Club & Cafe. With Joe Hall, J. Michael Martinez, A. Minetta Gould, Donald Dunbar, Matt Sadler, derrick mund, Sarah E Harris, Greenland, Laughing Man, Black Telephone.
7:30-?am
Journal Porn: Lit Mags You'd Sleep With
The Black Squirrel, 2427 18th Street NW
If you're super dexterous, you can catch Matt at the Apertif reading and still catch most of the amazing and incredibly wide-ranging line-up at Journal Porn, Versal's official offsite! We hope you'll come down to this (free!) fun-times offsite event with Versal, Trickhouse, Lumberyard Magazine, 6x6 and 1913 a journal of forms. With Lee Ann Brown, Katie Byrum, Julia Cohen, James Copeland, Brandon Downing (video storms!), Lucy Ives, Joanna Klink, Matthew Lippman, Sawako Nakayasu, Elizabeth Frankie Rollins. We've got the room all night so come hang out!
FRIDAY
6:30-9:30pm
Wide Night
Wonderland Ballroom, 1101 Kenyon St NW
Self-fulfilling plug: I'm reading at the Wide Night offsite with Pilot Books, who are publishing my chapbook later this year. Pilot's put the event together with other fantastic presses Bateau, Birds, LLC, Brave Men, Factory Hollow, Flying Guillotine, Immaculate Disciples, and Minutes. The current line-up includes Chris Martin, Lily Brown, Mark Horosky, Sasha Steensen, Emily Pettit, Dan Boehl, Sommer Browning, Jessica Young, Farrah Field, Guy Pettit, Kelin Loe, Alex Phillips, Luke Bloomfield, and Francesca Chabrier.
SATURDAY
Drop by the Versal table for last-day deals!
SUNDAY
Me and the missus are off to NYC for a week of R&R before heading back to Holland. See you next year in Chicago, jongens!
So for those of you with Versal on your AWP radar (herewith referred to as "AWPdar"), here's a nicely compartmentalized program from the Versal angle.
WEDNESDAY
Versal editors field trip and pow-wow. Nine of us will be in the same place at the same time. This is like when stars align. Some of us have never met (though one of us has met everyone, aka me). So we're taking ourselves out. See you on the other side.
THURSDAY-SATURDAYDrop by our table at D8 for some yummy Dutch flavors and other goodies (no, we're not bringing weed). And we don't have merch. We can't afford it. Would you really wear a Versal t-shirt anyway? But we will be selling issues 5 through 8 and subscriptions at drop-bottom (is that how you say it?) rates. Look for the Dutch flag.
If you see the French flag, that's us too.
THURSDAY
If there's any day at the conference to go Versal, it's Thursday. The journal and its editors are freakin' all over the place.
9:00-10:15am
Tearing Your Heart Off Your Sleeve: The Problem of Pathos in Creative Nonfiction
with B.J. Hollars, Re’Lynn Hansen, Marcia Aldrich, Marion Wrenn, Katie Jean Shinkle
Virginia C Room, Marriott Wardman Park, Lobby Level
How can nonfiction writers avoid the pitfalls of sentimentality and nostalgia while directly addressing them in the work? Join editors from Black Warrior Review, Fourth Genre, South Loop, Painted Bride Quarterly, and Versal as they discuss the problem of pathos in nonfiction while offering concrete strategies for how best to approach emotionally driven topics. Panelists will also explore how traditional and experimental forms lend themselves to packing an emotive punch within the genre.
10:30-11:45am
Things That Go Bump When You Write: Monsters, Myths, and the Supernatural in Literary Fiction
with B.J. Hollars, Bryan Furuness, Hannah Tinti, Laura van den Berg, Scott Francis
Thurgood Marshall South Room, Marriott Wardman Park, Mezzanine Level
What do Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, and ghosts all have in common? For one, over the past year, they’ve all managed to stomp, swim, and haunt their way onto the literary scene. Join writers as they discuss their experiences implementing supernatural elements into their fiction. Panelists will offer tips on how to add credibility to the incredible and humanity to the inhuman. They will also explore the evolving definitions of gothic and grotesque in the 21st century.
3:00-4:15pm
What’s Normal in Nonfiction?
with Steven Church, Debra Marquart, Ander Monson, Bonnie J. Rough, Bob Shacochis
Maryland Suite Room, Marriott Wardman Park, Lobby Level
Moderated by editors of the Normal School, the panel will feature a discussion of the polarizing questions concerning the ethics and aesthetics of nonfiction writing today. Is the nonfiction writer’s obligation to the art or to the subject? The audience? Can you conflate time, use composite or fictionalized characters, or borrow material from other sources without citing it? Panelists will consider what the role of the nonfiction writer is today and how that role is defined by ethical concerns for subject and audience, and/or aesthetic concerns for art, genre, form, and technique.
4:30-5:45pm
Beyond Times New Roman: The Literary Journal as Object
with Sandra Doller, Travis Kurowski, Shayna Schapp, Jodee Stanley, Jen Woods, Matvei Yankelevich
Nathan Hale room, Marriott Wardman Park
From curatorial art teams to the hand-bound letterpress, to pages upon which art and words are nearly indistinguishable, the literary journal is so much more than paper and font choice. Attention to design will turn a journal into an art object that sets it apart from the masses. Editors from five innovative journals share concrete strategies for incorporating art and design: getting submissions, working with an art editor, and how to redesign the literary journal from scratch. This is the panel we've put together our very own selves, and we're super excited about it.
7:00-11:30pm
A Pair of Teeth / Aperitif
IOTA Club & Cafe, 2832 Wilson Blvd.
Join Articles Press, Flying Guillotine, and SpringGun Press for an exciting evening of music and writing at IOTA Club & Cafe. With Joe Hall, J. Michael Martinez, A. Minetta Gould, Donald Dunbar, Matt Sadler, derrick mund, Sarah E Harris, Greenland, Laughing Man, Black Telephone.
7:30-?am
Journal Porn: Lit Mags You'd Sleep With
The Black Squirrel, 2427 18th Street NW
If you're super dexterous, you can catch Matt at the Apertif reading and still catch most of the amazing and incredibly wide-ranging line-up at Journal Porn, Versal's official offsite! We hope you'll come down to this (free!) fun-times offsite event with Versal, Trickhouse, Lumberyard Magazine, 6x6 and 1913 a journal of forms. With Lee Ann Brown, Katie Byrum, Julia Cohen, James Copeland, Brandon Downing (video storms!), Lucy Ives, Joanna Klink, Matthew Lippman, Sawako Nakayasu, Elizabeth Frankie Rollins. We've got the room all night so come hang out!
FRIDAY
6:30-9:30pm
Wide Night
Wonderland Ballroom, 1101 Kenyon St NW
Self-fulfilling plug: I'm reading at the Wide Night offsite with Pilot Books, who are publishing my chapbook later this year. Pilot's put the event together with other fantastic presses Bateau, Birds, LLC, Brave Men, Factory Hollow, Flying Guillotine, Immaculate Disciples, and Minutes. The current line-up includes Chris Martin, Lily Brown, Mark Horosky, Sasha Steensen, Emily Pettit, Dan Boehl, Sommer Browning, Jessica Young, Farrah Field, Guy Pettit, Kelin Loe, Alex Phillips, Luke Bloomfield, and Francesca Chabrier.
SATURDAY
Drop by the Versal table for last-day deals!
SUNDAY
Me and the missus are off to NYC for a week of R&R before heading back to Holland. See you next year in Chicago, jongens!
January 07, 2011
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