Here’s another story from my 2023 collection The Potato Farm. Nevil reads a detective novel, amid trouble at work and his growing curiosity about its elusive author. There are 13 chapters of 250 words apiece; here’s the first one. NEVIL READS A NOVEL CHAPTER ONE Nevil settles into his armchair, setting the glass on the […]
Entries Tagged as '*Words'
Nevil Reads a Novel
December 29th, 2025 · 2 Comments
The Flotation Device
November 26th, 2025 · No Comments
This affecting tale of roommate conflict can be found in TYPO 12. Don’t worry; it has a happy ending.
A Lipogrammatic Crossword
November 11th, 2025 · No Comments
This lipogrammatic crossword appears in TYPO 12. It excludes the letter E from all of the words and clues. The photo is of that master lipogrammist Georges Perec. The solution can be consulted after the break.
Reader Survey
November 3rd, 2025 · No Comments
From TYPO 12, here’s a reader survey for an imaginary novel. This is only the first page; there are 100 questions.
Papa Bach
October 21st, 2025 · No Comments
From TYPO 11 comes this tale of the Bach family, in which Johann Sebastian kicks out his many children so there will be enough roast duck for himself. They have to find musical positions themselves, which isn’t easy in a field with so many Bachs.
TYPO 12
October 5th, 2025 · 3 Comments
TYPO 12 is now available from Black Scat Books! For this one, I contributed a short story (“The Flotation Device”), a “Reader Survey” for an imaginary novel, and a “Lipogrammatic Crossword”–a crossword puzzle shaped like the letter E, in which that letter is excluded from all the words and clues. My extraordinary colleagues in this […]
Temporarily Indisposed
September 25th, 2025 · No Comments
For TYPO 6, I wrote an article on the Indisposizione di Belle Arti, a satirical exhibit organized by the Famiglia Artistica Milanese in Milan in 1881. It included conceptual pieces, parodies, monochromes, ready-mades, and other techniques later exploited by the IncohĂ©rents and Dadaists. Very little has been written about it in English. My article presented […]
“Music From Elsewhere” in London and San Francisco
July 22nd, 2025 · Comments Off on “Music From Elsewhere” in London and San Francisco
I’m pleased to report that my book Music From Elsewhere is now available at Watkins Books, London’s oldest esoteric bookstore. You can see it here. You can also pick up a copy at San Francisco’s fabled bookstore City Lights. And you can see it here.
TYPO 11
June 30th, 2025 · 1 Comment
TYPO 11 is now available from Black Scat Books! For this issue, I contributed a short story, “Papa Bach” (about Johann Sebastian Bach and his many children), short articles on the NY street artist Pantuso and on the Elizabethan polymath John Dee’s “Groundplat of Mathematics,” and a translation of Alphonse Allais’s short story “A Sensitive […]
Considerations on the Death and Burial of Tristan Tzara
May 12th, 2025 · Comments Off on Considerations on the Death and Burial of Tristan Tzara
Considerations on the Death and Burial of Tristan Tzara is now available from Black Scat Books! Isidore Isou, the founder of the artistic movement Letterism, was a great admirer of the Dadaist Tristan Tzara. So, when Tzara died in 1963, Isou disrupted the funeral to give the great provocateur a properly raucous sendoff. Isou’s lively […]