The Blaireau Affair is now available from Black Scat Books! Alphonse Allais’s only novel, first published in 1899, has never been out of print in France, and has inspired four movies. It’s summer in the provinces, and Blaireau, the local poacher, is convicted of a crime he didn’t commit. There are futile political squabbles, a […]

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Here’s the beginning of a short story, “Baby Bay.” The whole thing will appear in The Doug Skinner Dossier, to be published next month by Black Scat Books. You can read this while you wait… BABY BAY High up in the treetops, old Mr. Stork shuffled into the Baby Bay, and peered over his specs […]

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Every year, I do a show around my birthday (January 7th). This year, I turned 60, and celebrated the aging at Brooklyn’s Jalopy Theater on January 10. Doug Roesch and Ralph Hamperian joined me, on guitar and tuba respectively. We played a program of my songs and instrumental music, with a couple of covers. I’m […]

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The eighth issue of “Black Scat Review” is now out!  It contains my short but unpleasant story “Hardwood Mulch,”  as well as seductive works by Suzanne Burns, Doug Rice, Steven Teref, Kurt Cline, Charles Holdefer, Paulo Brito, Jhaki M.S. Landgrebe,Tara Stillions Whitehead, Maria Morisot, Fox Harvard, Charlie Griggs, Monika Mori, and Tom Whalen.  You can […]

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The sixth issue of Black Scat Review is now out; and it contains my translation of “The Unicolorist” by Jules Moy, a monologue about monochromatic painting from 1897.  I also contributed an introduction about Moy, and about the history of monochromatic painting in the Belle Époque.  It also contains delightful work by Nin Andrews, Ivan […]

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Every year, I do a show around the time of my birthday, January 7.  This year it took place at Jalopy Theater on January 3.  Joining me were David Gold (viola), Ralph Hamperian (tuba), and Doug Roesch (guitar).  Despite snow, unusually low temperatures, and speeches from the mayor urging all New Yorkers to stay at […]

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  Black Scat Review 5 is now available from Black Scat Books!  This one contains “Captain Cap Plays a Trick,” an excerpt from my translation of Alphonse Allais’s  Captain Cap, also available at the same link.

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From the sketchbook, a hotel bathroom in Buenos Aires.

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Black Scat Review 3 is out!  I contribute a translation of Alphonse Allais’s story “Absinthes,” as well as translations of texts about Allais by François Caradec and Jules Renard.  You can purchase this desirable publication at Black Scat Books.

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