I spent Sunday morning reading



...the best edition of Harper's magazine for the 2006 year. I finally picked up a copy of the Spiegelman edition in my neighborhood mag store (since it's been pulled from the shelves of Chapters after being there for 2 weeks. Good job, fellahs!) The article on the Muhammad cartoons is fabulous. Of course, I like Maus a lot, and enjoy political cartoons a fair bit in general. I suggest anyone with an interest in the whole cartoon affair go get the article. Really, it's wonderful. Spiegelman is as good a writer as he is a cartoonist - something those of you who read Maus already know.

The same edition includes some great fiction, a cool piece on Eastern European Internet/mail order brides, and the usual polemics on the Bush administration in some way or another. There is also an interesting article on the Super Bowl. Not something I would normally read, but it is put together -conceptually- in the most amazing way. I actually read the whole thing. Facinating portrail of America.

The first section, Readings (my immature favourite element of the magazine), contained an excerpt from a play that I am now dieing to read and see performed titled "Tragedy: a tragedy" by Will Eno. Eno is a playwrite from Brooklyn, known as "a Samuel Beckett for the John Stewart generation". Read the publisher's blurb on the play:

The sun has set over the neighborhoods, government buildings and American backyards everywhere. A news team is on the way. Their report: someone left the lawn sprinklers on; someone's horse is on the loose; a seashell is lying in the grass; dogs run by. The Governor appeals for calm. Everyone doesn't know if the sun, once down, will ever rise again. But there is a witness, and the witness will speak.

I am so buying this baby, and maybe the rest of Eno's stuff too (is everyone with the last name Eno a genius? Will. Brian. Anyhoo...). My favourite quote from the Harper's bit comes from the character of Michael, the legal adviser on the team of reporters:

"I am reminded of a favourite uncle. He gave me a dictionary, which I mistook as the long, sad, confusing story of everything. But he taught me many things about many things."

Ach, it's great.

Oh, and speaking of profiling great writing, there is even a blurb in the mag about Christian Bok's Eunioa. The word "Eunoia" means "beautiful thinking", and is the shortest English word to contain all five vowels. The book is a tribute of sorts to the word, as it also contains all the vowels though each vowel is the focus of a chapter. It is considered "avant garde" literature - whatever that means, other than fun, thoughtful, and fabulous. I have the book - the first edition came out in 2001 - should anyone want to borrow it. Bok is a Toronto sound poet. I discovered him for myself a few years back. I also own his first book, Crystallography.

Go Harper's!