Holiday Traditions
plus Lizzo as a future politician, Brooklyn's Biggie Smalls statue, Jesmyn Ward on Octavia Butler, and more
Thanksgiving is in the rearview window and the time has come to get ready for winter holidays.
Our holiday traditions center on food. Baking cookies. Thanksgiving lunch in Koreatown. Christmas dinner in Chinatown. This year my partner had the flu Thanksgiving week, so I cooked a vegan meal of stuffing, green beans, brussel sprouts, garlic mashed potatoes, and gravy. Vegan roasts were sold out withing a five mile radius, so Beyond Meat chick’n tenders served as the turkey subsitute. We may have started a new tradition.
We moved into a much smaller apartment last year, so our tree decorations stay boxed. Our holiday tree will be a plant with a string of lights in our large backyard, to be enjoyed by the birds and squirrels and probably the occasional mouse and rat. It’s a holiday, all are invited.
Time is compressed during December. My work at the bookstore and on Largehearted Boy keeps me busy, especially with compiling year-end book lists (often while my partner catches up on the latest Real Housewives of Salt Lake City and/or Below Deck kerfuffle). The hectic nature of this time of year is welcome, though. I feel alive, being forced to make time for friends and adjust my schedule on the fly. I appreciate my free time more.
I hope your holidays are filled with whatever you need and whatever fulfills your heart and spirit.
Largehearted Likes
Standing with the New School part-time faculty in their strike - As both an alumnus of and current MFA student at the New School, I am beyond disappointed at the university’s unwillingness to pay its part-time faculty a living wage and benefits, especially when 82% of its classes are taught by part-time staff.
Grimm Patersbier Quaffable Belgian-style Ale - One of the best new Belgian ales I have had in years, eminently refreshing and tasty.
Pierozik - A restaurant centered on pierogis used to be only a dream (perhaps only MY dream), but now actually exists. My north Brooklyn neighborhood gets better every day.
Handsold books this week - Mira Jacob’s Good Talk, Marie Myung Ok-Lee’s The Evening Hero, and Teju Cole’s Open City (among others).
Spring’s forthcoming books - While many of us recap our year in reading, Publishers Weekly looked forward and listed 2023’s most anticipated bopoks over many genres.
The Millions’ Year in Reading feature - The ever-fascinating series where writers discuss the books that moved them this year.
This interview with Erika T. Wurth on her brilliant novel White Horse
Jonathan Lethem on James Brown (a 2006 Rolling Stone piece)
Largehearted Links
Joelle Kid on how reading TV recaps helped her learn to write criticism
When I wanted to learn to write like a critic, TV recaps offered me a way in. They provided a kind of blueprint by showing the critical apparatus in a container transparent enough that I could start to understand the inner workings.
Elissa Gabbert’s interview with Lincoln Michel at Counter Craft
…for me prose requires these types of processized, almost superstitious rituals more than poetry does. I have to take a lot of notes, and usually I’ll start a document just for these notes and add to it over weeks or sometimes months or years before I decide I’m ready to do the writing proper.
Luke Dumas’s recommended novels about the devil
…in satanic fiction—and here we’re talking the Anglo-European Satan, separate from the demons and spirits that haunt other cultures around the world—the devil is often presented as something even more terrifying: an embodiment of the darkest parts of ourselves. These eight novels are proof of that.
Jesmyn Ward’s introduction to the new edition of Octavia Butler’s collection Bloodchild
This is how Butler finds her way in a world that perpetually demoralizes, confounds, and browbeats: she writes her way to hope. This is how she confronts darkness and persists in the face of her own despair.
Lizzie Borden’s preface to her anthology Whorephobia: Strippers on Art, Work, and Life.
Much has been written about strippers and sex workers by civilians, including feminist academics who, despite never having walked in their platform stilettos, feel entitled to argue for or against social and political programs that could have devastating effects on the lives of the sex workers they’re writing about. Watching strippers from the sidelines, I, like many observers, have been dazzled by their extraordinary confidence, enamored of their brave nakedness and sense of play. I wish I could catch it and internalize it by proxy.
Perfume Genius’s Mike Hadreas on his pop culture highlights of the year
Sarah McLachlan on 20 years of her School of Music
“Ensuring sustainability for our programs in Vancouver, Surrey and Edmonton is a top priority,” Sarah says. “Next, we believe we have a responsibility to share what we’ve learned with other organizations so we can reach more children and youth through the transformative power of music. We want to lead a national movement that brings awareness to the impact of music on childhood development and wellness.”
Zadie Smith’s play, “The Wife of Willesden,” will premiere this spring
Last Week’s Largehearted Boy Features:
Daniel Nester's Playlist for His Poetry Collection "Harsh Realm"
Hugh Sheehy's Playlist for His Story Collection "Design Flaw"
Jason McBride's Playlist for His Book "Eat Your Mind: The Radical Life and Work of Kathy Acker"
The Largehearted Boy List of Online "Best of 2022" Book Lists