May 20th, 2020 · Comments Off on Pink and Apple-Green
Pink and Apple-Green is now available from Black Scat Books! By Alphonse Allais, translated, introduced, and annotated by Doug Skinner! This is the first English translation, and the first annotated edition in any language. It’s 261 pages: 44 stories, plus 5 extra stories. You can get one on Amazon.
Alphonse Allais (1854-1905) was France’s greatest humorist. His elegance, scientific curiosity, preoccupation with language and logic, wordplay, and flashes of cruelty inspired Alfred Jarry, as well as succeeding generations of Surrealists, Pataphysicians, and Oulipians. As Paul Verlaine said, “Who is fresh? Allais.”
Tags: *Words · P
May 8th, 2020 · Comments Off on Good Night
A song on the drawbacks of having to sleep. I often performed this with a viola obbligato, played by either Carol Benner or David Gold.
Tags: *Music · G
April 26th, 2020 · Comments Off on Make a Wish
We have here a song about urban life. When confronted with something unpleasant, simply close your eyes and make a wish. I don’t know if it works, but you might as well. It can be found on That Regrettable Weekend and in The Doug Skinner Songbook.
Tags: *Music · M
April 22nd, 2020 · Comments Off on We Are Not a Pretty People
There has been so much art and literature celebrating the human body. Here, for variety, if nothing else, is a song expressing disgust for it.
Tags: *Music · W
April 14th, 2020 · Comments Off on Up to the Summit
This story appears in Black Scat Review 19. Owen has rather a difficult time in it. Here’s how it begins:
UP TO THE SUMMIT
Owen slipped, and fell 25,000 feet to the jagged rocks below. Fortunately, he was unharmed.
“Whoa!” he exclaimed, as he staggered to his feet. “I’d better be more careful.”
A tall lean man arose from a dense thicket. He was dressed top to toe in bottle green, and wore a cap with his own photo pinned to it.
“Oh, it’s you again,” said Owen.
“It’s me again,” he chuckled. “Still trying to climb that mountain?”
“I am indeed,” said Owen, “if it’s any of your business.”
“Oh, it’s none of my business,” the man replied. “I was just being neighborly. You have the stupidest face I’ve ever seen.”
“Do you call that neighborly?” snapped Owen.
“Well, someone should tell you,” the man said.
“Many people have,” Owen replied. “I can’t help the way I look.”
“It would help if you didn’t keep your mouth hanging open,” the man observed.
“At least I don’t wear a hat with my picture on it,” said Owen.
“Wear one with mine,” the man suggested. “Give people something nicer to look at than your gaping pie-hole.”
“Fuck off,” barked Owen.
“There’s no call to be rude,” the man observed.
“Fuck off,” repeated Owen, but his interlocutor had already sunk again into the shrubbery. Owen kicked aside the bleached bones of his predecessors, and began his ascent…
Tags: *Words · U
The 19th issue of Black Scat Review is now available! This issue’s theme is “ecstasy.” I contributed “Two and One” (a story about a love triangle, told entirely in three-letter words), “Up to the Summit” (in which Owen’s daily mountain climbing is interrupted by his mother’s sudden wedding), and “C11H13NO2” (an alliterative consideration of a certain hallucinogen). Other contributors include Peter Ruric, Yuriy Tarnawsky, Eurydice, Catherine D’Avis, Galya Kerns, Tom Whalen, Bob McNeil, Nicole Scherer, Tom Bussmann, Paul Rosheim, William Minor, Norman Conquest, Adam Matson, Dynamic Wang, Alexandr Ivanov, Jim McMenamin, Rhys Hughes, Amy Kurman, and Emiliano Vittoriosi.
It’s available on Amazon, and there’s more info at Black Scat Books.
Tags: *Words · B
Here’s the beginning of a short story to appear, or so I’m told, in the next issue of Black Scat Review. It’s a rollicking tale of a love triangle. Although rather bawdy in spots, it uses no four-letter words.
TWO AND ONE
Ivy was the one for Ira, and Ira was the one for Ivy. “It’s tea for two ’til the two get old and die,” he’d vow. And she did too.
But one day, Max saw Ivy. And who was Max, you may ask? For now, all I’ll say was Max was the man who saw Ivy. And who did say, “Wow! Dig her red lip and doe eye! Her tan bod and dye job! I’ll nab the fox!” And Max was not shy, not one bit.
“Hey, sis!” Max did cry.
Ivy did eye the big lug, and was not put off. Max was her own age—not fit, yet not too fat. You can see she set the bar low. But she was coy, was our Ivy…
Tags: *Words · T
March 22nd, 2020 · Comments Off on Aftermath
A piano piece, in 9/8. The rest of it is rather syncopated.
Tags: *Music · A
A song about notary publics. They seem to have a pretty good gig. It can be found on That Regrettable Weekend and in The Doug Skinner Songbook.
Tags: *Music · N
March 8th, 2020 · Comments Off on Shorten the Classics: Prometheus Bound
Here’s another classic nipped in the bud, from Black Scat Review 18. This would save everyone a lot of trouble.
Tags: *Cartoons · S