OMM (On My Mind) – April 2024 – #5

~ a curated selection of discoveries ~

::: The Open :::

Dear Reader,

I hope you enjoy this weekly newsletter (published on Sundays).

If you’re a subscriber, please consider reaching out to a friend you think may enjoy this newsletter and encourage them to sign up.

If you can, please consider signing up as a Paid Subscriber.

I’ll be just as happy if you donate to ONE ART: a journal of poetry.

Thank you for reading and for your time.

With Gratitude,

Mark

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::: Personal Notes :::

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Lit Mags Confront a Serial Plagiarist

Great article by Enma Karina Elias. I appreciated the opportunity to discuss this extremely important issue.

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My personal comments (and this substack) are mentioned on Becky Tuch’s LitMagNews. Specifically, regarding issues of antisemitism and Jews in the literary community.

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Workshops are forthcoming as a fundraiser for ONE ART’s 5-year print anthology.

Wonderful workshop leaders have already signed on!!

Details to follow in the near future.

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Last week on my Substack…

I shared a Guest Post by Carla Sarett on AI and what this could mean for the literary community.

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Consistent Recommendations:

Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters from an American – daily news with historical context

ONE ART: a journal of poetry – daily poems

Verse Daily – daily poems

Chill Subs – down to earth submissions resource

Becky Tuch’s LitMagNews – literary community news & essential resource

Trish Hopkinson – resource for the literary community

Erika Dreifus – resource for the literary community

The Poetry Space_ with Katie Dozier & Timothy Green (podcast)

Commonplace: Conversations with Poets and Other People (podcast hosted by Rachel Zucker)

The Gray Area with Sean Illing (podcast)

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::: Podcasts :::

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The Gray Area – Everything’s a cult now

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::: Music :::

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Upcoming Tours in 2024 (Pitchfork)

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The Get Up Kids Announce Something to Write Home About 25th Anniversary Tour (Pitchfork)

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NME: An Interview with Jack Antonoff

“Nick Cave put it perfectly when he said how boring it is to comment on things that are morally obvious. I think about that a lot, especially when I’m writing.”

“[It] is pretty vital to maintain dignity and our own human experience. Especially as more and more of our lives become like other people’s reflections.”

On feeling misunderstood:

“Most people I know who write do. It’s like this weird search for something inside you that is undefined. It’s the one thing that I can sort of sew between all of us – this, like, general feeling that you have to express something that’s urgent. You just have to get it out but you can’t really put a name to it. It’s this feeling, this thought, this distant thing that you’re constantly chasing after.”

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::: Taylor Swift :::

Pitchfork does… a pretty good job of reviewing Taylor Swift’s new album.

A harsh (but seems about right) rating of 6.6.

“Her melodies feel staid, like they are made to fit the music, rather than the other way around.”

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‘Taylor Swift’s ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ is here. Is it poetry? This is what experts say’ (AP News)

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‘Listen to Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department, Then Read These Books’ (Book Riot)

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‘Taylor Swift is a real poet, Shakespeare expert says as he compares her to the Bard’ (Independent)

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"Dr Clio Doyle is a lecturer in early modern literature at Queen Mary University and the author Dear Reader: Taylor Swift and the Idea of English Literature, due for publication in 2026." (Dazed)

“That doesn’t mean that Swift’s lyrics on Tortured Poets are failures. Debevec-McKenney, who also teaches poetry, says she feels that there’s “potential here for someone as a writer”. Swift is taking chances on this record, “but I feel like she can’t kill her darlings,” Debevec-McKenney adds. “There are fun lines in here that are very sweet and sound nice, but they don’t contribute meaning. Cutting things is one of the hardest things to do as a poet. But I was reading these words thinking of her as a poetry student, and I think she’s becoming a better writer, and it’s just a matter of figuring out what works and what doesn’t.””

“The problem is that Taylor Swift is both the subject and author of her work. “The thing I love about poems and writing poems is the distance between myself and the speaker of my poems,” Debevec-McKenney explains. “But Swift is forced to live her life as the speaker of her poems. She’s trapped in them.””

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NME gives TTPD a 3/5

“Frustrated lyrics permeate the rest of the record, which operates as a knottier, if inferior, sequel to ‘Midnights’.”

“Musically, it’s an album mostly devoid of any noticeable stylistic shift or evolution.”

“Lyrics like “I’m so depressed I act like it’s my birthday everyday” are almost too glaringly obviously written to be lip-synced into an iPhone 13 front camera.”

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It seems possible that Taylor has been, dare I say, happy in her relationship with Travis Kelce— and, sadly, life going all too well can be a death knell when it comes to the creation of good art.

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It’s behind a paywall… but there is a fascinating story about Taylor’s publicist, Tree Paine, in The Wall Street Journal. Taylor is her only client.

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“tree paine salary” is the top trending salary searched in the US this past week (google trends)

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::: The Literary Community & Beyond :::

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‘The Poetry Foundation Launches Small Press Bridge Fund’ (Poetry Foundation)

“To assist publishers impacted by the abrupt closure of Small Press Distribution (SPD), the Poetry Foundation has established a bridge fund for small presses to help cover unanticipated costs.”

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Rose Metal Press is running a GoFundMe. They are one of a vast number of presses who have been devastated by Small Press Distribution rapidly shuttering.

Shared once before, but… Presses Previously Distributed by SPD

It’s a long list.

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‘Is your submissions strategy intentional?’ (LitMagNews)

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Guernica “Moving Forward”

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PEN America cancels awards

Basically… everyone thinks everyone else is doing it wrong.

The literary community is in turmoil.

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Important statement about artistic freedom:

"Director Juan Antonio Bayona and his film The Snow Society have been the great winners of the Platino Awardsgala for Ibero-American cinema, held in Riviera Maya (Mexico) in the early hours of this Sunday in Spain. In a ceremony in which criticism of the situation of Argentine cinema was heard, Spanish films and series swept 16 awards out of the 23 award categories. Bayona's film won six awards in the seven categories to which he aspired, including best direction and best Ibero-American fiction film. The filmmaker, when he collected the award for best director, defended cinema as a “tool of expression” and said that being against cinema is “being against your own country,” alluding to the situation that is being experienced in Argentina. since the arrival of Javier Milei to the presidency." (El PAIS, trans.)

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‘Books don’t sell’ (Seth Godin)

“Books matter. Making them is a combination of craft and insight. Publishing them is a generous act of faith. Adding to the corpus of shared knowledge is important. Books change the culture when people act on them, even if they don’t sell many copies. And sometimes the backlist surprises the accountants.”

“But the economics of new books have nothing to do with any of these benefits. Scarcity made the book publishing world work as a business, and scarcity is gone.”

“Write a book because you can and because it might make a difference. But don’t listen to your publisher’s suggestions simply to sell more copies. You probably won’t.”

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‘The 9 Best Literary Festivals in the World, From Tucson to Jaipur’ (Condé Nast Traveler)

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‘Does mysterious painting prove blue denim was around 200 years before Levi’s?’ (Guardian)

Forget forgeries, in the age of deepfakes— you really have to wonder…

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‘This camera trades pictures for AI poetry’ (Tech Crunch)

“Instead of merely capturing images, the Poetry Camera takes the concept of photography to new heights by generating thought-provoking poetry (or, well, as thought-provoking as AI poetry can get) based on the visuals it encounters.”

“At the heart of this innovative device lies a Raspberry Pi, a credit card-sized single-board computer that packs a powerful punch. This tiny yet mighty component serves as the brain of the Poetry Camera, enabling it to capture images and communicate with OpenAI’s GPT-4 to generate poetry.”

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Author’s Publish is ‘Moving Away From the Weekly Publication of Manuscript Publisher Reviews’

“When we started out, our reviews made little impact on the number of manuscripts a publisher received. Over the years as our readership has grown, the submission influx from a review has grown truly massive. Some publishers don’t mind this, but for a lot of them this is overwhelming.”

“I will still be reviewing about 52 publishers and their imprints a year and I will use this information to update the Guide to Manuscript Publishers twice a year as well as special issues articles that round up 20 or more publishers. Our monthly list for underrepresented authors will still contain manuscript publishers as well.”

“These longer lists and the guide have never caused the same issues, because people do not use them to mass submit the same way and submissions tend to be dispersed over all the publishers, so it’s more like a heavy storm than a waterfall.”

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‘Hillary Clinton and Malala Yousafzai producing. An election coming. ‘Suffs’ has timing on its side’ (AP News)

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Near-Perfect Sci-Fi Movies You Might Have Missed

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Relatable. (sigh)

‘From Austen to Larkin: Why Writers Could Be More Prone to Hypochondria’ (LitHub)

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::: Health & Wellness :::

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‘Nearly 2 in 5 Americans have been living with unhealthy levels of air pollution.’ (The Washington Post)

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The Rise of “Bare Minimum Monday”

“Each person’s bare minimum Monday will look different, depending on their specific role. For some, the best way to ease into the week may be getting admin-related tasks out of the way, or scheduling meetings. For others, the day may be a heads-down working day. Or, it may look like networking calls or coffees with coworkers to touch base about ideas—look at your workload, and figure out how your first day back would best be spent.”

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‘What science is just starting to understand about periods’ (Vox)

“The connections between periods and mental health have started to get more attention in the last decade. Clinicians have long known that a small percentage of the population experiences a condition called premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD), characterized by severe feelings of anxiety, depression, or irritability in the days leading up to menstruation. PMDD was added to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) in 2013, and experts believe 3 to 8 percent of menstruating people have the condition.”

“The findings add to an area of study that’s still battling silence and stigma. People with PMDD still struggle to get a diagnosis; in a 2022 survey, around 40 percent of PMDD patients said their mental health care providers had no knowledge of the condition. The impact of menstruation on other mental health conditions, like depression, is even more poorly understood.”

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::: Small Explorations & Deep Dives :::

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Don’t worry, I haven’t fallen down a scary rabbit hole.

I'm continuing to explore alternative news sources that attempt to reveal bias such as AllSides and Ground.

I’ve read a little of what they’re publishing over at The Free Press, which appears to be “center”…TBD.

I’m mostly consuming mainstream news.

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‘Multiple bills introduced in Congress to defund NPR’ (Ground)

NPR should be fixed, not defunded.

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“Daniel Dennett, the neuroscientist and philosopher of science, died at age 82. His work dealt with the hardest questions, most notably free will, consciousness, and religion, and he was often misunderstood: The New York Times’ obituary described him as calling free will an “illusion,” but in fact he was a compatibilist, arguing that free will can and does exist in a deterministic universe. Others likewise said he thought consciousness was illusive, but Dennett said simply that it was made of smaller, simpler parts. One thing he definitely did think was imaginary was God: He was famous as one of the “Four Horsemen” of New Atheism, alongside Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins, and Christopher Hitchens. Now just two of the horsemen ride.” (Semafor)

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“Antisemitic incidents including harassment, vandalism and assault more than tripled in Pennsylvania last year amid tensions over the war between Israel and Hamas, according to a new report by the Anti-Defamation League.”

“The states with the highest number of incidents were California (1,266), New York (1,218), New Jersey (830), Florida (463) and Massachusetts (440). Combined, these five states accounted for 48 percent of the total incidents.”

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College protests have continued to escalate.

If you went to college, and remember college, then you know college protests are normal.

What is not normal? Protests becoming violent.

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‘Social Security Update Expands Benefits Nationwide’ (Newsweek)

“The government agency has announced it is expanding its rental subsidy policy for those who claim Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments. Under the new rule, published last week, rental assistance, such as renting at a discounted rate, will become less likely to affect a person's SSI eligibility or payment amount.”

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Not sure what was up with Microsoft in the 80s… but it’s possible someone in charge became a Metallica fan.

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‘100 Weird and Wonderful Medieval Dog Names’ (Mental Floss)

Bring ‘em back, I say.

(There are some… that should not be brought back… for obvious reasons.)

My votes: Ergo, Flame, Garlik, Monke, Thought

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A scientist communicates with an octopus.

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India to surpass Japan as 4th-largest economy in 2025, IMF says

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‘Do you have an ‘emotionally immature parent’? How a nine-year-old book found a new, younger audience’ (Guardian)

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America’s first “true” high-speed rail (speeds up to 200mph) hopes to be completed by 2028. Regular speeds will be around 115mph. By comparison, Amtrak’s Acela can reach 150mph but average 70mph.

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K-12 schools, in some states, across the nation are experimenting with four-day school weeks. I’m sure many parents are… less than thrilled.

On a positive note, this encourages a future generation to embrace the 4-day workweek as normative.

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“Just 56 companies are responsible for half of all branded plastic pollution.” (The Washington Post)

More from Science.org:

“The top five brands globally were The Coca-Cola Company (11%), PepsiCo (5%), Nestlé (3%), Danone (3%), and Altria (2%), accounting for 24% of the total branded count, and 56 companies accounted for more than 50%.”

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The ongoing debate concerning if “self-talk” and having an “internal monologue” is inherent as part of the human condition. (National Geographic)

I was surprised to learn a couple years ago, in Physical Therapy of all places, that this was up for debate. The PT person who told me this asked if I had an inner monologue, which I certainly thought everyone did, and was informed this was not the case. I found this news… distressing.

I appreciate the outshot of this Nat Geo article so I’d encourage checking it out. The takeaway is, partly, a reminder not to beat ourselves up for engaging with the world, or ourselves, in ways that are not status quo or considered otherwise normative or neurotypical.

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Truly cruel & unusual & predatory…

‘LOCKED IN, PRICED OUT: HOW PRISON COMMISSARY PRICE-GOUGING PREYS ON THE INCARCERATED’ (The Appeal)

“There are few consumer protections for incarcerated people and their families, with some states raking in double-digit commissions from products sold at prison commissaries.”

The Prison Industrial Complex is all too alive & well.

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Oh no, what’s next for The Onion??

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Debatable… but a cool list.

‘These Are the Most Gorgeous Botanical Gardens in the U.S.’ (Thrillist)

The North Carolina Botanical Garden, in Chapel Hill, might be the coolest one I’ve been too. Hard to say. The one in Asheville is amazing. It depends what you call a “botanical garden” too. Longwood Gardens, in Pennsylvania, is sometimes called this… even though it’s much more than your typical botanical garden… and is expensive to gain entry as opposed to free (which is the norm in my experience).  

What are your favorites?

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‘The new class war: A wealth gap between millennials’ (CNBC)

“Even as the vast majority of millennials struggle with student debt, low-wage service-jobs, unaffordable housing and low savings, the millennial elite are surpassing previous generations. According to the study, the average millennial has 30% less wealth at the age of 35 than baby boomers did at the same age. Yet the top 10% of millennials have 20% more wealth than the top baby boomers at the same age.”

“The study finds that millennials — typically defined as those between the age of 28 and 43 today — have faced repeated financial headwinds. Coming of age during the financial crisis, they have lower levels of homeownership, larger debts outweighing assets, low-wage and unstable jobs, and lower rates of dual-income family formation.”

“At the same time, the authors say the top 10% of millennials have benefited from greater rewards for skilled jobs. As they put it, “The returns to high-status work trajectories have increased, while the returns to low-status trajectories have stagnated or declined.””

“According to the survey, 41% of affluent millennials admit to funding their lifestyles with credit cards or loans, versus 28% of Gen Xers and 6% of baby boomers.”

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Took til 2024…

‘School lunches are changing: USDA updates rules to limit added sugars for the first time’ (USA Today)

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::: News of the Weird :::

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Well… this should be illegal.

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‘Smooch cabins’: German trains will soon have private cabins with frosted glass (Euro News)

Seems very German.

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