Raymond Roussel does seem like the kind of writer who would write acrostics.  His works are steeped in wordplay.  The procédé is based on homonyms; “Parmi les noirs” throws in a rebus and a cryptogram; there’s a sonnet with a hidden message in La Poussière de Soleils; and so on.  Acrostics seem inevitable.

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Unfortunately, Jules Verne’s nephew, Gaston, was mentally ill. In 1866, Gaston tried to murder Verne, leaving his uncle lame for life. While recuperating, Verne wrote a sonnet in praise of morphine. I don’t blame him. A LA MORPHINE  Prends, s’il le faut, docteur, les ailes de Mercure Pour m’apporter plus tôt ton baume précieux! Le […]

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“To be popular, one must show interest in persons and things that do not interest one and simultaneously conceal the interest that one has in persons and things that do interest one.  One must always side with the prejudices and emotions of the person one happens to be with, however idiotic… “One must be humorous […]

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Admirers of Jean-Jacques Rousseau may be unaware of his musical interests.  He wrote a great deal of music, compiled a musical dictionary, and paid bills by copying music.  The dictionary is a neglected treasure, as passionate and eccentric as anything else he wrote; the entry for “copyist” fills 13 pages (at least in the 1839 […]

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On April 1, 1897, the remarkable French humorist Alphonse Allais published his Album primo-avrilesque.  It was a slim volume, containing seven monochromatic paintings (such as “Apoplectic cardinals picking tomatoes by the Red Sea”) and a silent funeral march (because the greatest sorrows are mute).  The march was the first silent piece, preceding similar works by […]

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(Posted by Doug Skinner)

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The “King James Version” of the Bible gives every indication of a garbled text.  Some words are omitted (for example, that curious hapax legomenon, επιουσιος, in the Pater Noster); some words seem to be approximations or guesswork (particularly the names of animals and musical instruments).  Much of it simply makes little sense. We encounter similar […]

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In addition to his stories and his paintings, Shaver also regularly wrote poetry.  It was often published in a wonderfully unpredictable little magazine called Ray Palmer’s Forum, published by Shaver’s long-time editor, friend, and occasional adversary. I believe this one, though, was unpublished. (Posted by Doug Skinner)

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Our eighth event, “Remembering Keel,” took place on a sunny Sunday afternoon.  We had somewhat of a small crowd, thanks to the World Cup (which we certainly didn’t anticipate when we reserved the space months ago). Doug opened the ceremonial ullage: for this occasion, we chose John’s favorite drink, a diabetic protein shake.  Lisa read a piece John […]

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I’m happy to inform you that you can now savor that notorious lipogrammatical curiosity, Gadsby, simply by following this link.  Gadsby has long had an almost mythological status among linguistic buffs (and Oulipo fans); most of its original printing was lost long ago, but luckily a microfilm proof copy still sits in a public library (in California, I […]

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