A Brief Foray at The New Yorker Festival Headquarters

Last weekend was The New Yorker Festival in Manhattan (hereafter "NYF"). It had been several years since I attended any festival events.

I did not know what to expect, really. The last NYF signing was at Barnes & Noble, Union Square, and basically featured a signing table and some sponsors milling about.

This year was a complete upgrade from 2 years ago. It was in a separate space, on West 18th Street. There were greeters and gift bags with swag in them (a book, a cd, a t-shirt, chocolate, and other promo items).

I came into the city on Sunday, dragging Jolee and Shayna with me. We stopped at my office to load up with books. I had skipped seeing Salman Rushdie on Saturday, in lieu of Shayna's soccer game, but her Sunday game did not start until 3:30, so we had time to hit the 12 Noon signing and make it back to Brooklyn before the game.

It just so happened that both poets signing were ones I had never seen before. Both Katha Pollitt and Robert Hass are well-travelled and renowned poets, but I had not had the chance to catch them in person.

Correction, by chance I had stumbled into a Berkeley bookstore on a trip to the Bay Area in June 1999. Hass was reading but I was unprepared (book-wise) and he literally finished within five minutes of my walking in.

So here I was, no reading, just pure signing, and I was dragging my bag full of books and two kids.

It was a hot day, and though the a/c was on in the space, it wasn't on high enough. It was tolerable if you were sitting still, but the slightest movement produced perspiration.

The poets were seated at two different tables, next to one another, with a winding queue leading away in a maze of nylon and plastic posts. Hass' line was full. Pollitt's was half-full, or half-empty, depending on your perspective.

In another section of the space, cartoonist Jack Ziegler was set up with chairs around him and people got to watch him draw. Jolee was hanging with Ziegler, watching him draw for people. Shayna clung to me. I got in Pollitt's line. There were 6 or 7 people ahead of me. They all appeared to have her new book, Learning to Drive. I self-consciously stood with a quartet of anthologies. My stomach turned.



In all honesty, I did not go straight into the line. I hesitated. Looked at the makeshift store selling all the books, t-shirts, and New Yorker covers, enlarged and framed and weighed down with hefty price tags. The line for purchases was long. I was not in a position to buy Pollitt's book. It was a book of essays, not even a tome of poems to tempt me.

So I hit the line feeling guilty, watching everyone get their hardcover book signed. They were all one-shot deals. Then the guy ahead of the woman ahead of me was up. He was bookless, he had four or five New Yorker issues bookmarked for Pollitt to sign. She did. No copy of her new book appeared.

Next, the person ahead of me came and went, and then it was my turn.

Immediately she must have noticed I was bookless. Or at least Pollit-less. I had in my possession four poetry anthologies: The Best American Poetry (BAP) 1991, The KGB Bar Book of Poems,

Two Decades of New Poets, and The Future Dictionary of America (this is actually not a poetry anthology, but as the title suggests, an imagined and humorous volume of words, phrases, and expressions in a U.S. Around the corner).

The BAP came first and she signed her poem, "Night Subway".

Next was the Two Decades book, a small, scarce publication by the 92nd
Street Y, featuring winners of the '"Discovery" / Poets poetry contest from 1964 to 1983. Her poems "Ballet Blanc" and "A Turkish Story" were anthologized within. Pollitt looked at this inquisitively and asked "What's this? I've never even seen this before!" I always get a huge kick of presenting a writer a book that he or she is unfamiliar with. I told her this, yet she didn't seem to share my enthusiasm.

The other two books were presented as well. There was some small chit-chat when I thanked her for taking the time to sign these books. She looked at me and asked, "Why do you do this?"

I assumed she meant collect poetry anthologies and get poets to sign them. I gave her my standard response: "I don't realy know. I enjoy it. J.D. McClatchy referred to it as the 'mania of the collector' once when he signed a whole stack of my books. I'm not doing it to profit financially, as signed poetry books aren't really hot commodities unless your name is
Robert Lowell or Charles Bukowski."

"Well," Pollitt stated coolly, "if you don't want to wait five years, you can buy my book here." Oh, okay. I wasn't quite sure what she meant exactly, but one thing was clear to me: she wasn't happy that I didn't have a copy of her book. Fair enough, I guess, but I hardly seemed in a position to profit from her signatures.

I checked in on the girls. Well, girl, really, as Shayna had been hanging back while I had been annoying Pollitt. Jolee was still sitting watching Jack Ziegler. She told me he was asking for themes. I gave her some ideas. She raised her hand. She and Shayna were among the only kids in the whole place. Ziegler approached her and Jolee asked, "How about a singing cat?" He groaned but he went to the easel and started to draw.

I went over to the Hass line, with only five items. I had another 5 volumes of BAP and an additional anthology in my bag, but I left them there. I didn't feel that he would have been open to a huge stack like that. Not without my purchasing his new book.

I had never experienced Hass before but I remember a fellow book collector bemoaning him a few years back because the poet had been signing with a ball-point pen and autographed so forcefully that he had torn through the title page, and showed no remorse.

Digression, from my friend Brian:

...at the Lannan reading series in LA, in 97, I believe. H. & I both had anthologies for Hass and I had only one of his solo books (a later pbk ptg from/for the store). I don't clearly recall his role but I think Hass was there interviewing someone. Anyway, afterwards we went up to him in the aisle of the auditorium (he was not at the signing table) and he agreed to sign some books but was kind of gruff (no idea why, maybe the interviewee had said something?). He signed my Milosz anthology so hard that his pen went thru the paper partly; I thought this deliberate and a puzzling small act of hostility but didn't say anything to him. Later H. said that Hass had done the same thing with his books & that he too, felt it had been deliberate.

I was in line for ten or fifteen minutes when Jolee and Shayna walked over, Jolee had a giant sheet of paper upon which Ziegler had drawn the following cartoon:


I was exceptionally happy. A New Yorker cartoonist had drawn Jolee a cartoon! In fact, he had drawn a lot of people cartoons! Incredible! What generosity!

And it was funny too! "How about 'How Much is that Doggie in the Window?' again - and this time sing it like you mean it!" Very clever. But more on this later...

I turned my attentions back to the line ahead of me. I had 4 books and this Poetry in Motion poster.

Mr. Hass was not seated behind the table, but was standing in front of it, in what is known as the open, receptive signing pose. It's great for the one-book request, but a little awkward when you have a stack.

Fortunately, I was less nervous about Hass than I had been with Pollitt. Because, even though I didn't have his just-published, just-nominated-for-a-National-Book-Award book Time and Materials: Poems 1997-2005,

I did have an older book, Now and Then: The Poet's Choice Columns, 1997-2000.

I also had the volume of the BAP '01, for which Hass was the Guest Editor,

A Book of Luminous Things, edited by Czesław Miłosz

and The Language of Life, by Bill Moyers.

Hass kindly inscribed the copy of Now and Then. He was very gracious and even complimented both Shayna and Jolee, who were hanging about, telling me I was fortunate to have such lovely daughters.

I thanked him and we packed up and got ready to depart. Jolee and Shayna were arguing about who got what in the gift bags, so I asked the gift bag folks if we could get a second one to avoid a crisis in our family. They gave me 2 more, so all three of us had our own bag o' swag, which included The New Yorker Book of Art Cartoons.

I still marveled at Jolee's acquisition of the giant Ziegler cartoon. But I started to wonder. If it was funny, why give it away? Couldn't he sell it? To The New Yorker??

And still I pondered....then it all clicked together. Jolee googled Ziegler and got to the Cartoon Bank website, which has every cartoon ever published in the New Yorker, or close to it at least. "Look," she exclaimed, "he did one just like that for some lady at the festival." I knew it was too good to be true. "Jolee," I instructed, "in the search field type 'doggie' and 'window'." She did and here is the result. He recycled old cartoons. This one appeared in a different form in the January 16, 1989 issue of the New Yorker. It makes sense, and I'm not complaining. Jolee got a cool cartoon signed by the artist. It just was presented as an original idea.

In all, my brush with this year's NYF was brief, but still noteworthy. Thanks for slogging through this account.

Classic Appreciation

So I posted here earlier this week about that John Ashbery book ad earlier, from the Paper Cuts blog, and I got to thinking. The first of the dozen or so ads they included in the slide show was for Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. The blog noted that a signed first edition of the book, which sold for $4.95, runs as high as $18,000.00.

Nice.

But that got me to thinking about the others in the series. Since all of them have prices listed, I thought I would do a little research on a book search engine and see how these books compare to the Kesey appreciation. Because of the vast range for book prices based on condition and other factors, I chose the top prices for signed copies. If I won the lottery and wanted to buy these books, these are the copies I'd choose.

Here goes. I ordered them from those with the least value to the highest. Kesey's book will round it out.


Making It by Norman Podhoretz
1968
[No price in ad]
Signed 1st edition: $33 (1 of only 2 copies available online) from Truepenny Books, Inc., AZ

~~~



Do You Sleep in the Nude by Rex Reed
1968
$4.95 (3rd printing)
Signed Edition: $45, Curio Corner Books, TX

~~~

Hanoi by Mary McCarthy
1968
$2.45 (pb)
No signed copies available, First British Edition: $50, Wayward Books, MA

~~~

An Education in Georgia by Calvin Trillin
1964
$3.95
Signed 1st Edition: None available for sale
Unsigned 1st Edition: $55 from MW Books, Ltd., New York, NY

~~~

Play It as it Lays by Joan Didion
1970
$5.95 (4th printing)
1st Edition (No signed 1st editions available): $60, Warwick Books, South Pasadena

~~~

Sadness by Donald Barthleme
1972
$5.95
Signed British edition, $90, Joseph the Provider, Santa Barbara

~~~

August is a Wicked Month by Edna O'Brien
1965
$3.95
Signed 1st Edition: $95 from Jeffrey Bergman Books, Fort Lee, NJ

~~~

The Eye-Beaters, Blood, Victory, Madness, Buckhead and Mercy by James Dickey
1970
$4.95 (hardcover), $2.45 (paperback), $15.00 (limited edition)
Limited Edition: $110, George S. MacManus Company, Bryn Mawr

~~~

We Are Everywhere by Jerry Rubin
1971
$4.95 (hardcover)
$1.95 (paperback)
No signed 1st editions available, $125 hardcover 1st edition, Black Dog Books, NJ

~~~

The Bat-Poet by Randall Jarrell, pictures by Maurice Sendak
1965
$2.75
Signed 1st Edition: $200 from riverrun bookshop, NY
This is signed by Sendak only. No Jarrell-signed copies on the market.

~~~

The Benefactor by Susan Sontag
1963
$4.50
Signed 1st Edition: $250 from Royal Books, Inc., Baltimore

~~~

The Pump-House Gang by Tom Wolfe
1968
$5.95 (4th printing)
Signed first edition: $429, Flatsigned Books, Nashville

~~~

Three Poems by John Ashbery
1972
$5.95 (hardcover)
$2.25 (paperback)
Signed 1st edition, $500 (hardcover), Compass Rose Books, Kensington, CA

~~~

Naked in Garden Hills by Harry Crews
1969
$5.95
Signed first edition: $682.50, Vagabond Books, L.A.

~~~

The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe
1968
$5.95 (5th printing)
Signed first edition: $700, Contact Editions, Toronto

~~~

The Third Life of Grange Copeland by Alice Walker
1970
$5.95
Signed First Edition: $1320, Bella Luna Books, CO.

~~~

Outer Dark by Cormac McCarthy
1968
$4.95
Signed 1st Edition: $5000, Waverly Books, Santa Monica

~~~

Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72, by Hunter S. Thompson
1973
$7.95
Signed First Edition, with additional signature by Ralph Steadman, $6500, Ken Lopez, Bookseller, MA

~~~

The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
1970
$5.95
Signed 1st Edition: $7475, Charles Agvent, Bookseller, PA

~~~

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
1962
$4.95
Signed 1st Edition: $17,758.27 from Adrian Harrington Rare Books, United Kingdom

~~~

So there you have it, a total exercise in fantasy and wondering. Hope you enjoyed it as much as I did putting it together.

Vallejo Posts Done

O.K. folks, I finished my multiple-post narration of the Cesar Vallejo tribute. Best place to start is the beginning here. Or just scroll down.

Vallejo Tribute - The Signing, part 1

Continued from this post.

I loathe long posts. I think they can be tedious. I generally avoid them. Then there's a poetry reading. I like to be thorough. And I go off on tangents. I am who I am. Hold on for a ride. If my antics bore you, skip it.

A disclaimer for any of the poets who may chance upon this blog. I am a collector, not a dealer. The pursuit and attainment of an autograph or inscription is a cherry on top of an already delicious sundae. I may sound methodical, but that's because, like the fisherman, the more I catch, the better the experience. I can catch nothing, I will be disappointed, but at least I witnessed a reading. A fishless fisherman will complain that he didn't catch anything, but he still loved trying.

Anyway, when I got to work on Thursday, I didn't think I would be having to bother Sam Shepard. My pal Brian, in Toronto, who mentored me as a book scout and collector, is a huge Shepard fan. Alas, he e-mailed back, none of the books that he sent me in the late 1990s that I have yet to get signed for him, were Shepard books.

I have several boxes of books under my desk at work, at least a box of which is Brian's, along with the accumulations of a decade of scouting and collecting. Each box is labeled and cross-referenced on an Excel spreadsheet. I also have a Microsoft Access database of all the poets that appear in any anthology I have. Those who know me may recognize that this level of organization is entirely inconsistent with the rest of my life, but this system was founded on the trauma of coming back from a reading only to discover that I could have brought a book that I had forgotten I owned.

A pragmatist would point at that and say it is a sure sign that I have too many books. Guilty, I concede, stipulating it is a far better predicament to be in, to have too many books, as opposed to too few.

Sorry for the digression, folks. But it is back story necessary to set the stage for seeing that the poet Edward Hirsch was in a copy of The Paris Review which was in one of my boxes.

Upon locating said journal, I opened it up to see if I could find Hirsch's poem. I opened it up, instead, to an interview on theater with none other than Sam Shepard. "Well," I thought to myself, "isn't that nice!" I then realized that, of course, Shepard was not in my poet's database. I figured I'd check the rest of the box. Just in case.

This box also contained several of Brian's books, including an old, 1972 drama anthology entitled The Off-Off-Broadway Book: The Plays, The People, The Theater.

Brian had sent it to me with 6 or 10 other books that I have managed to not get signed by the poet/playwright AmiriBaraka. I scanned the table of contents, turned the page, there! A one-act play by Sam Shepard! it was The Unseen Hand.

This build-up is necessary to understand what I felt when, by virtue of my choice of seat in the second row, I found myself sitting directly behind Anne Waldman, Ed Hirsch, and Sam Shepard.

And it was the high premium that Brian paid with his professed jealousy of my seeing Shepard, along with the fact that this was my first encounter with the man that, when the reading had ended, I had the two books out for Shepard to sign before anyone had moved.

Another digression, dear readers: long before the birth of BillyBlog, my experiences at readings were chronicled in my journals and in e-mails to Brian and our mutual book chum Hubert. Those avenues of expression were pretty much killed by BillyBlog (although the journals are on life support, barely holding on). Thus, BillyBlog and its readers, get the benefit/burden
of this aspect of personal history.

Jump to "Vallejo Tribute - The Signing, Part 2"

Vallejo Tribute - The Signing, part 2

Continued from this post.

So the reading has ended and I do what I do best in these situations and politely intrude into the post-reading chitter-chatter. Shepard inscribes (boldly, as they say) Brian's book for him. And he follows with a signature in The Paris Review (Spring 1997, #142) for me, on the front page of his interview in "The Art of Theater XII". Brian had asked me to see if Shepard would be amenable to Brian sending him more books to get signed for his collection. Shepard regarded me with steely eyes and politely but chillingly told me "Don't send me any books." No prob, Sam, I thought, wouldn't know where to send 'em anyway.

Had the night ended there, I think, it would have been regarded as a success. But I had only just begun.

This was Eshleman's party, so I figured he could wait 'til last, as he was most likely to stay around the longest. I pounced on Shepard so quickly because I didn't know if he'd duck out immediately or not.

By virtue of proximity, I approached Hirsch next, having him sign his poem in The Paris Review (the same issue Shepard signed). The poem, entitled, "The Lectures on Love", had a section called "Marquis de Sade". Hirsch noted that when the poem was placed in his book, On Love, his editor cut it because he thought it "too much". The poem was also anthologized in The Best American Poetry 1998.

Next, he signed his entry in The Future Dictionary of America, a marvelous book from McSweeney's imprint, that features made-up words and definitions from an imagined American lexicon in the imaginary future. Hirsch's word was:

soracious [sohr-ay'-shus] adj. a desolate wit; intellectual humor fuelled by desperation. Our foreign policy could use a few more soracious wonks.

He also looked at the book interestedly, as he had known about it, but never seen it, a phenomenon that you would imagine to be strange, but is fairly common. He also signed his poem "Man on a Fire Escape" in the Best American Poetry 1992 (Charles Simic, ed).

I reminded Mr. Hirsch where I had met him, most notably the 2004 Dodge Poetry Festival, where he had inscribed an uncorrected proof of his first book, For the Sleepwalkers, to me. "That's right! I remember you now," Hirsch remarked, "And I offered to buy it from you!" We laughed and parted amicably.

Next I looked for Anne Waldman.

Jump Ahead to "Vallejo Tribute - The Signing, Part 3"

Vallejo Tribute - The Signing, part 3

Continued from this post.

I approached Anne Waldman and asked her if she wouldn't mind signing a couple of things. "Not at all," she replied, "I just want to get a drink first." She gestured to the door at the back of the sanctuary, which led to the Parish Hall, the large space where the reception was. She had been chatting with folks and grabbed her things, when she saw someone she needed to speak with, and switched directions. Another conversation ensued. I waited.

I'd say I waited patiently for a good five minutes for her to finish talking and walk into the next room, with me tagging behind.

We settled into the new room, she got a drink, and then signed, very coolly, a photo of her in Christopher Felver's Angels, Anarchists & Gods.



She also signed her contribution in a critical survey of Gary Snyder, a book edited by Jon Halper called Gary Snyder: Dimensions of a Life.



I thanked her and explained that I had last seen her at the Ted Berrigan Sonnets reading there in 2000 and that she had signed several of her books for me. She suggested I look up a hard to find Berrigan tribute book she had edited called Nice to See You: Homage to Ted Berrigan.



I headed back to the sanctuary where I had last seen Forrest Gander. He was there speaking to a woman about a book they couldn't quite figure out the title for. When he turned his attention to me, I introduced myself and asked him to sign three books. The first was his poem "Carried Across" in The Best American Poetry 2002. He remarked that he hadn't seen any of these volumes in hardcover. I told him that I collected them and had the whole series going back to '88. He seemed impressed.

I then presented him with an anthology called Home: A Collection of Poetry and Art. He cooed over it and said (yet another example) he had never seen this anthology. As he signed his page with an excerpt from his poem "The Ark on His Shoulders," he remarked at what a beautiful collection it was. At which point, I told him I had an extra copy at home and I would send it to him if he wanted it. He told me he'd pay for it, but I insisted that wasn't necessary, that it would be a gift. He said okay, but he would send me back one of his books. "Deal," I said.

And lastly he signed his editorial page on Laura (Riding) Jackson (1901-1991) in the amazing audio anthology Poetry Speaks. "If there was one poet I would have loved to meet," he sighed, "it would have been her." I thanked him after he signed the third book and he reached into his pocket and handed me a business card. I promised to send him the book in the next few days.

Remember that, dear reader. I offered up a book when I had no obligation to do so. But I believe in karma, and I didn't need that extra copy, and I have been on the receiving end of poets' generosity in the past. Mr. Gander was a true gentleman, and a pleasure to meet.

So my sights were set, finally, on the man of the hour, Clayton Eshleman. I prepped in the sanctuary, stacking five books on my arm. Two Best American Poetry volumes (2002 above and 2005), a 1971 copy of the literary magazine Sumac, the Snyder book that Waldman had signed, and an anthology called Thus Spake the Corpse : An Exquisite Corpse Reader 1988-1998 : Volume 1, Poetry & Essays.


I considered ditching one of the books, but the Sumac was small, and I've had writers sign more for me, and the worst he could do, I thought, was refuse to sign all and just pick one or two.

Vallejo's Complete Poetry..., by the way, lists new at $49.95. And even though they discounted it for the reading at $35.00, that's still a hefty chunk 'o change. So I decided consciously that I would approach Eshleman without it.



I recognize, incidentally, that, in general, it's always good form to have the author's book at a signing. But I've been down that road and have bookcases full of poetry to prove it. This has influenced the amount of readings I attend, and also the type I attend (another reason I gravitate toward multiple-author readings, the focus is on the many, as opposed to the individual).

So I stood, devoid of anything resembling an Eshleman title, five volumes cradled in my right arm. He was standing near the wine table, dapper and smiling, talking to two people, a man and a woman. The gentleman had a notepad and a name tag identifying him as press, as part of the PEN World Voices festival (which co-sponsored this event).

I heard the interviewer apologize for arriving late. He asked a question and Eshleman sounded frustrated, "Well I spoke about it in the introduction..." They discussed whether the book would increase Vallejo's popularity in the States. Perhaps I am reading too much into it, but Eshleman looked annoyed, "Well my translation of Cesar Vallejo's The Complete Posthumous Poetry won the National Book Award in 1979...." It was then that I saw him quickly glance over at me, standing by patiently. His eyes dropped to the books in my arms, back at my face, and then back at the interviewer. It was then that I heard him quoting how well the new Vallejo book was selling (alluded to in an earlier post).

The interviewer thanked him and walked away. Eshleman turned to me, looked at the books and I spoke, "Mr. Eshleman, these aren't your books, but . . ."

Mr. Eshleman cut me off, snapping, "If they're not my books, I'm not signing them."

"But," I protested, "they're anthologies with your poems . . ."

He didn't hear me, or he did but chose to ignore me, as he had turned his back and was striding away.

I was dumbfounded. I tried to recall if I had ever been so flatly rebuffed by a writer before. The answer: no.

I have had writers tell me they'll only sign one or two things. The writer T. Coraghessen Boyle will sign a box of books if you put them in front of him, but he will not sign proofs ("I'll sign all commercial editions, but decline only to sign advance readers' copies because those are given away free and then become objects of greed for certain sellers and collectors."), but he is totally cool about it. It is in extremely bad taste to go to a bookstore signing and not buy the book that is being promoted. But most writers will be polite in their denials, or just sign. It's easier often to scrawl one's name than deal with a pushy fan/dealer/collector who persists in their requests for signatures.

Someone told me that they tried to get Seamus Heaney to sign a journal once and he refused, as well. But, with all due respect to Mr. Eshleman, Heaney won a Nobel, and has earned the right of refusal, in my mind.

My initial reaction (not one signed item! Wah!) was that of a spoiled brat. The demonic inner voice said, "Ooh, wait 'til I blog about what a jerk Clayton Eshleman was...". But cooler heads prevail.

It's any writer's right to decline to sign books. John Irving is famous for it. Ironically, in so doing, he has inflated the value of signed copies of his books, and made collectors pursue him even more doggedly.

Perhaps the interviewer rubbed him the wrong way and he was grumpy.

And I'll fess, it is bold and arguably uncouth for me to expect a writer to sign a bunch of books that they are only a small part of, and not have the courtesy to offer up one of the writer's own books. Maybe it's a sore spot.

Maybe something else was bothering him. Maybe he's had bad experiences with book dealers/collectors before. Maybe that night. There were other collectors and dealers there, and I had devoted my time to pursuing the other writers. I may have missed an interaction in which Eshleman had words with one of my predecessors. I've seen a book collector or dealer or fan be overly aggressive with a writer, spoiling it for those people behind him in line.

There are many explanations. All viable. All excusable. I wish no ill will toward Mr. Eshleman. But I would counter the profiteering argument with the following tidbit from one of the best poetry book dealers in the country, Jett Whitehead. If you check out Whitehead's online catalog, especially the page with Eshleman's items here, one thing you'll notice is that Eshleman's titles are not running at a premium. If you were going to profit off of a poet's autograph, Eshleman is not on the "A" list of highly-collected writers.

So there you have it. I picked up and left. It was a good night, despite being rebuffed by Clayton Eshleman. I'm sure I was a blip on a rather wonderful night for the man. A cloud that passed over the full moon on a windy night. I was an afterthought before he could take two strides. Or maybe not.

But I did promise myself one thing. Next time Mr. Eshleman comes to town, I'll be there, with at least two anthologies. And maybe, just maybe, a copy of one of his own books. Just to see what happens.

How I Got that Signed, Doodled Vonnegut and How the Book Gods Shown Down on Me

Ok, just a few days ago, I showed off my Vonneguts, including the awesome signed, doodled, Hocus Pocus. In the original post, I stated how I did not recall what I traded for it. I did some research and found my journal entry for the day. Let's see how time has treated my book collection efforts for October 23, 1996:

Wonderful bookday, everything bought on credit so I paid no cash for anything today. Book Time - [paperback] 1st [edition] of [Charles] Bukowski's Ham on Rye and War All the Time: Poems, 1981-1984, both $5 each & the War...was signed! Also: 1st of Gabriel Garcia Marquez' Love in the Time of Cholera. Then, library sale where I picked up for 50 cents, 1st of [John] Irving's Hotel New Hampshire.

Then, an untitled bookshop where I traded my signed 1sts of Elmore Leonard's Get Shorty and Bandits, a signed [by the translator] Farewell My Concubine [I had picked up this copy 2 days earlier at Vroman's for $3.98, a signed 1st of John Barth's Sabbatical & an old edition, but not 1st [book scout friend Brian says "book club ed.(?)"] of William Maxwell's 2nd book ALL for $75 value Hocus Pocus signed and doodled by Vonnegut!Yay! Then, at Bookman, lots of trade credit got me Neil Simon's new book, a collection of his comedies, a [Richard] Brautigan pb, Vonnegut's Fates Worse than Death in hardcover, Clive Barker's In the Flesh ($50 at Book Alley, $9.95 here) and the coup de grace: 1st edition of [Salman] Rushdie's The Satanic Verses.

Ah, what a day! Touched all my favorite authors except [T.C.] Boyle & I had one in my hands briefly, but passed. And Jolee [at 2 months, 9 days old] slept throughout [in a car-seat].....

The following day I had the Neil Simon's signed, in case you were wondering why I bought some Neil Simon books.

Anyway, in hindsight, the Vonnegut deal was a steal. I don't regret not having any of those items traded away, except maybe the Barth. I don't think many of you may find this interesting, but I do, and this is BillyBlog. So there.

What's amazing to me is that I still have those Bukowskis, the Rushdie, and the Garcia Marquez. A great day indeed.

Monday Links

As National Poetry Month approaches, PBS' Online Newshour has a great feature on Israeli and Palestinian poetry here.



Pearl Jam fans who have enjoyed the cover of Victoria Williams' "Crazy Mary". May find the original version, as heard in this video, interesting. "Crazy Mary" opened the first Pearl Jam concert I attended on July 9, 2003. It's often interesting to hear a favorite cover in its earliest form, even if personal tastes lend themselves to favoring the newer version.

Here's Pearl Jam's version, in concert, on July 8, 2003, at Madison Square Garden. Look for the great solo at the end by "Boom" Gaspar on the Hammond B3 organ:



Happy Prince Kuhio Day!



An interesting article on high-end book dealer/collector Glenn Horowitz here.
(New York Times registration may be required)

Holy Sheep! Check out this trailer for Black Sheep, a New Zealand film:



If you think it's a joke, visit this site.

I discovered that The Complete New Yorker is on sale at the magazine's website for only $29.95 (compared to $63.00 at Amazon). I was fishing my credit card out of my wallet when I realized, I'm behind on my 2006 issues, why add another 80 volumes of pressure?