TYPO 15 is now available from Black Scat Books! For this issue, I contributed translations of Alphonse Allais (“The Theatrical Crisis”) and Paul Valéry (“Beauty Is Negative,” “Test,” and “The Astonished Angel”) and a portfolio of my travel sketches.

As usual, I’m joined by a stupefying array of international writers and artists: mIEKAL aND, Erik Belgum, Steve Biersdorf, Terry Bradford, Geoff Cebula, G-O Châteaureynaud, Alex Cigale, Norman Conquest, Farewell Debut, S. C. Delaney, Shawn Garrett, Edward Gauvin, Vasilisk Gnedov, Daniel Y. Harris, Paul Kavanagh, Irene Koronas, Amy Kurman, Emilia Loseva, Louis Pons, Agnès Potier;,Bernard Quiriny, Jason Brandt Schaefer, Corinne Taunay, Igor Terent’ev, Froylán Turcios, Michel Vachey, Paul Verlaine, Tom Whalen, and Danny Winkler.

And as usual, the whole thing is designed and edited by Norman Conquest, and is available from Black Scat Books.

This rousing number teaches the importance of thrift. There aren’t enough songs about thrift. Here’s the first verse:

This little tale can be found in my collection Papa Bach and Other Stories. Here’s how it begins…

As the title indicates, this song laments life’s disappointments.

Hidden Door Journal 002, edited by Lewis Gittus, Sarah Jones, and Sarah Walker, is now available! I contributed an article on Project Hermes, the attempt by fans of the visionary writer Richard Shaver to build the telepathy machines described in his stories. The journal is published in a handmade edition of 40, and only a few remain.

It debuted at the Melbourne Art Book Fair, as you can see here.

In 1982, I was performing in The Regard of Flight, with Bill Irwin and Michael O’Connor, at Lincoln Center. To publicize the show, I was sent to be interviewed by Joe Franklin. As requested, I sang the old song “Pasadena,” which we used in the show.  Another of the guests was publicizing a tribute to Kate Smith, so Franklin, in his inimitable way, turned to me at one point and asked point-blank if I had any thoughts on Kate Smith. As it turned out, I didn’t, so I wittily stammered that she was great.

Some fooling around with scratchboard, from an old sketchbook.

Bill Ectric’s collection Themes, Dreams, and Weems includes a number of curious things, among them an interview he conducted with me about my translation of Pierre-Corneille Blessebois’s libertine novel The Zombie of Great Peru. Weems, if you were wondering, was the notorious Parson Weems, who concocted the story of George Washington’s antics with the cherry tree. Pick up a copy and enjoy what Bill Ectric has to say about him and about many other interesting things.

White Knuckle Sandwich, my old band with Jen Duffy-Perez and Anne Shapiro, now has an Instagram page. Check it out for many mementos from our checkered past!