Marcopocast: The Frank Marcopolos Podcast, with Frank Marcopolos

A performance by Frank Marcopolos of the short story "Cat in the Rain" by Ernest Hemingway. From Wikipedia: "Ernest Miller Hemingway (July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American author and journalist. His economical and understated style had a strong influence on 20th-century fiction, while his life of adventure and his public image influenced later generations. Hemingway produced most of his work between the mid-1920s and the mid-1950s, and won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1954. He published seven novels, six short story collections, and two non-fiction works. Additional works, including three novels, four short story collections, and three non-fiction works, were published posthumously. Many of his works are considered classics of American literature. Hemingway was raised in Oak Park, Illinois. After high school he reported for a few months for The Kansas City Star, before leaving for the Italian front to enlist with the World War I ambulance drivers. In 1918, he was seriously wounded and returned home. His wartime experiences formed the basis for his novel A Farewell to Arms (1929). In 1921, he married Hadley Richardson, the first of his four wives. The couple moved to Paris, where he worked as a foreign correspondent and fell under the influence of the modernist writers and artists of the 1920s "Lost Generation" expatriate community. He published his first novel, The Sun Also Rises, in 1926. After his 1927 divorce from Hadley Richardson, Hemingway married Pauline Pfeiffer; they divorced after he returned from the Spanish Civil War where he had been a journalist, and after which he wrote For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940). Martha Gellhorn became his third wife in 1940; they separated when he met Mary Welsh in London during World War II. He was present at the Normandy landings and the liberation of Paris. Shortly after the publication of The Old Man and the Sea (1952), Hemingway went on safari to Africa, where he was almost killed in two successive plane crashes that left him in pain or ill health for much of his remaining lifetime. Hemingway maintained permanent residences in Key West, Florida, (1930s) and Cuba (1940s and 1950s), and in 1959, he bought a house in Ketchum, Idaho, where he committed suicide in the summer of 1961."

As you might expect, this episode opens with a discussion of Pyrrhonean Skepticism and its ancient Greek opponent, Dogmatism. The group discusses the parallels between that dynamic and the current dynamic between Modenism and Postmodernism. We then discuss the short (very short) story, “Why I Transformed Myself Into a Nightingale” by Wolfgang Hildesheimer. We then tear to shreds a short story by a group member. Good times and good wines had by all. Further details and approximate time stamps are below. Please purchase INFINITE ENDING: TEN STORIES by Frank Marcopolos as an e-book, paperback, or audiobook by clicking this very link. Thank you. 0:00 Frank’s introduction to the podcast 1:47 Group discussion of Philosophy, including Pyrrhonean Skepticism, Dogmatism, Modernism, Postmodernism, epistomology, Socrates, the Sophists, corrupting the youth, being a contrarian, the Socratic method, arguments being as good as your questions, knowing or not knowing what reality actually is, putting people to death for knowing truth, Margaret Sanger, anarchists, the true meaning of anarchy, decentralization, and democracy vs. anarchy. 7:16 Group discussion of “Why I Transformed Myself Into a Nightingale” by Wolfgang Hildesheimer, including not hating it, being intrigued by the narrative, animals keeping your attention, turtles, plot summary, the superiority of animal life to human life, the Self, wanting to changing others and changing yourself, Egotism, waiting on line in the supermarket, Laertes, Ophelia, Polonius, Gildenstern, Romeo & Juliet, William Shakespeare, changing things back to their original form, sparrows, suspension of disbelief, Moralism, the purpose of art, Ayn Rand, Ghandi, Up with People, Pay It Forward, Abe Lincoln, Sentimentalism, David Foster Wallace, YouTube, academia, carnival barkers, the postmodernist’s dilemma, suicide, hating one’s boss and employee, fairy tales, comedy, toy fox terriers, animation, aesthetic preferences being incorrect, rotoscoping, Keanu Reeves, Spirited Away, a 15-year-old’s approach to art, Kafka, Metamorphasis, Adam 12, plotless postmodernistic stories, left-brained and right-brained, fantasy, Kafka on the Shore, Haruki Murakami, Schenectady, Lost in Translation, American academia and postmodernism, The Yellow Wallpaper, public domain, German translation, annoying neighbors, flying away, Neo, Conrad Lorenz, caging different kinds of animals, Metamorphasis as political, rule-based systems, speciesism, stpry arc, Richard Ford, Rock Springs, the Goldmine, the Monkey, the ethics of animals, extolling the choices of non-agencies, total and complete natural freedom, Thoreau, living in nature, absolute power, packing a lot into 4 pages, numenal-phenomenal Kantian drawings, the writing group’s forthcoming Facebook page, Margaret Atwood, Hair Jewelery, adding dimension to the story, Raymond Carver, and magic realism vs. real life. 38:30 Group discussion of a member’s story, including Frank Marcopolos’s “fans” who don’t actually exist, the habits of strippers, court-reporting school, too much going on, where the story begins, simplification, everything being based on a true story, Story Bible, confusing the story Bible with the story itself, Victorian novels, plot summary, too much telling, not enough showing, novel pacing vs. short story pacing, the sound of stories, “Conversing” – Story #2 in INFINITE ENDING by Frank Marcopolos,

On this episode of the podcast, we discuss how to determine if something is art or entertainment, the main philosophical points of Immanuel Kant, the differences between the literary genres of modernism and postmodernism, “Conflation” by Frank Marcopolos, and “Peter Elroy: A Documentary by Ian Casey” by Elizabeth McCracken. “Conflation” is part of the 10-story collection entitled INFINITE ENDING, which can be purchased by clicking this very link. Approximate time stamps and general topics of discussion are listed below: 0:00 Frank’s intro to the podcast, including a clever pitch to entice you into buying INFINITE ENDING: TEN STORIES 2:39 General group discussion, including an experience with an Austin-loving woman, themoth.org, oral storytelling, different art forms, Spaulding Gray, spoken word, poetry being too subjective, what it means to do art, what it means when a society doesn’t know the difference between entertainment and art, review of the stories performed recently in Austin Texas, professional storytelling and art, Story Core, objective rules of art forms, Bruno Kirby’s oratory skills, Howard Stern, Wallace Shawn, Bill Hicks, stand-up comedy, Synanon, therapy, being a show-off, art vs. entertainment (again), genre writing, expectations of the performances, Austin vs. New York art scenes, story about female rights and China’s cultural attitudes toward women, Christmas cake, sentimental crap, Duchamp and the urinal in a museum, Campbell’s soup can as art, Crabby Appleton, complaining about the complainable, the craft movement, Hobby Lobby, Michael’s, academics’ ability to judge the rules of art, sentimentality vs. emotionality, melodrama, mawkishness, maudlin, marriages breaking up, more on the China lady’s story, Raymond Carver, Richard Ford, David Eggers, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, driving on the Pacific Coast Highway, and Serial podcast. 30:46 Group discussion of article on Modernism and Postmodernism, including the confidence of modernism, materialism, numenal, phenomenal, Kant, phenomenology, this bottle is apprehended phenomenologically, Kant’s argument for God, objectivism, subjectivism, Socrates, the Socratic method, killing Socrates, Lacan the French neo-Freudian, the subconscious reaction to the unknowable, Nietzsche, Western and Eastern philosophy, gnosticism, Elphius Levi, Martin Buber, Spinoza, Swindberg, Thomas Aquinas, Kierkegaard, John Stuart Mill, Einstein, Foucault, structuralism, post-structuralism, Passion of the Western Mind, Sophie’s World, Will Durant – The History of Philosophy, Swerve by Greenblatt, Terence McKenna’s podcast, getting out of the limits of our 5 senses, DMT, ayahuasca, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Hunter S. Thompson, mescaline, Buddhists, transcendental meditation, science as a way to understand reality, Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, science as a narrowing down of philosophy, The Matrix, reality as everything being an illusion, Hume, “Nothing is 100% true,” Ayn Rand, pragmatism, heart transplants, epigenetics, Jules Verne, higher consciousness, Robert Heinlein, The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, Childhood’s End, autistic children, TMI, modernism (again), making it new in art, postmodernism is a recycling of old things, postmodernism acknowledges this recycling, going to the moon, Stanley Kubrick, what art truly is, wasted genius, practice and flow, being a craftsman, flash mobs, Roland Barthe, deconstructing, social objects, Heraclitus, the relativity of time, Heigel, World War 2, technology in culture, Starbucks, making the world smaller, and impatience. 1:11:21 Group discussion of

A sample from the story “Eroticoffica” by Frank Marcopolos, from his new collection, INFINITE ENDING: TEN STORIES.

This episode features a group discussion of whether writers should go independent or take the academic route to achieve success; plus, the subjectivity and objectivity of art and life, including how to properly judge works of art via objective rules. More specific topics of discussion are listed and time-stamped below: 0:00 Group analysis of “Peter Elroy: A Documentary by Ian Casey” by Elizabeth McCracken, including mood of the story, triteness, story depth, complexity of the story’s issues, Grad School, kissing people’s asses, academia, pissing the chair or dean off, a crazy anecdotal story from the world of Academia, The Emporer Has No Clothes, the value of being independent in the literary world, going straight to the readers, long-term plans, books about dogs, Marley and Me, following trends, Annie Dillard, trying not to die before achieving success, David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest, magnum opus, military discipline, Ernest Hemingway, everyone in Texas having a gun, shooting dogs as literary deadline motivation, guidos from the block, table dances, DisneyWorld, cruises, good dialogue, ridiculous attitude of the main character, sentence structure, pretentiousness of the story, cleverness, experimental writing, Hemingway again, Chuck Palahniak, coming to grips with existentialism, taking postmodernism too far, flashbacks, remarkable characters, likeability of narrative voice, profundity, The Hunger Games, Hemingway again, lack of plots in postmodernism, the more free you get the more enslaved you are, sitting-in-bars stories, lack of goldmines and monkeys and bank robberies, Annie Hall, postmodernism as a freedom-enabling genre, objective criteria vs subjective judgments, ayahuasca, Hunter S. Thompson, Pacobelle’s cannon, F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby, World War II soldiers, singing in church, good and bad relationships, Philosophy Live!, depression, everyone is going to die–or are they?, brain in a jar, John Lennon, going from one car to another, Ancient Aliens, objective rules for art, Natalie Portman, Mikhail Berishnikov, the thing in itself, Plato, the essence of table vs. a table, first cause arguments, Monads, materialism, thinking about philosophy as a kid, being trained into cultural aspects, and risk management. 41:45 Group analysis of “Conflation” by Frank Marcopolos, including the writer being in trouble, double-spacing, dissing the author in absentia, looking like a teacher, trying to write poetry, the Valhalla story, ruining this story, hiding the good story in the bad one, stylization of the story, experimentalism, fragmentation, practicing with exercises, real life as an adventure, realism, aesthetics as ONLY aesthetics, Phillip Levine, poets making themselves popular, the lack of standards in poetry, Chuck Palahniak again, mind/body/spirit/other, Jacob’s Ladder, subjective v. objective again, right-brained thinkers, emotionality, the good aspects of the story, Tim O’Brien, Hemingway again, Texas State University, The Things They Carried, vernacular crap, “the monkey in the story,” Richard Ford, the story as a sculpture, anecdotes about stalkers, gold-digging, and Kurt Vonnegut. 1:11:14 “Promotion” for INFINITE ENDING: TEN STORIES.

In this episode of Saturday Show, the Austin Writing Workshop discusses the short story “Scheherazade” by Haruki Murakami, plus a member-submitted story entitled, “Automobile Days.” An audiobook-like performance of “Automobile Days” is included. From the Wikipedia: Haruki Murakami (村上 春樹 Murakami Haruki?, born January 12, 1949) is a contemporary Japanese writer. Murakami has been translated into 50 languages and his best-selling books have sold millions of copies. His works of fiction and non-fiction have garnered critical acclaim and numerous awards, both in Japan and internationally, including the World Fantasy Award (2006) and the Frank O’Connor International Short Story Award (2006), while his oeuvre received among others the Franz Kafka Prize (2006) and the Jerusalem Prize (2009). Murakami’s most notable works include A Wild Sheep Chase (1982), Norwegian Wood (1987), The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (1994-1995), Kafka on the Shore (2002), and 1Q84 (2009–2010). He has also translated a number of English works into Japanese, from Raymond Carver to J. D. Salinger. Murakami’s fiction, still criticized by Japan’s literary establishment as un-Japanese, was influenced by Western writers from Chandler to Vonnegut by way of Brautigan. It is frequently surrealistic and melancholic or fatalistic, marked by a Kafkaesque rendition of the “recurrent themes of alienation and loneliness” he weaves into his narratives. He is also considered an important figure in postmodern literature. Steven Poole of The Guardian praised Murakami as “among the world’s greatest living novelists” for his works and achievements.

The Austin Writing Workshop discusses “The Tryst” by Joyce Carol Oates. From Wikipedia: Joyce Carol Oates (born June 16, 1938) is an American author. Oates published her first book in 1963 and has since published over forty novels, as well as a number of plays and novellas, and many volumes of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction. She has won many awards for her writing, including the National Book Award,[1] for her novel them (1969), two O. Henry Awards, and the National Humanities Medal. Her novels Black Water (1992), What I Lived For (1994), and Blonde (2000) were nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. Oates has taught at Princeton University since 1978 and is currently the Roger S. Berlind ’52 Professor in the Humanities with the Program in Creative Writing. Oates was born in Lockport, New York. She is the eldest of three children of Carolina (née Bush), a homemaker of Hungarian descent,[3][4] and Frederic James Oates, a tool and die designer.[3][5] She was raised Catholic but is now atheist.[6] Her brother, Fred Jr., was born in 1943, and her sister, Lynn Ann, who is severely autistic, was born in 1956.[3] Oates grew up in the working-class farming community of Millersport, New York,[7] and characterized hers as “a happy, close-knit and unextraordinary family for our time, place and economic status”.[3] Her paternal grandmother, Blanche Woodside, lived with the family and was “very close” to Joyce.[7] After Blanche’s death, Joyce learned that Blanche’s father had killed himself, and Blanche had subsequently concealed her Jewish heritage; Oates eventually drew on aspects of her grandmother’s life in writing the novel The Gravedigger’s Daughter (2007).[7] Oates attended the same one-room school her mother attended as a child.[3] She became interested in reading at an early age and remembers Blanche’s gift of Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland (1865) as “the great treasure of my childhood, and the most profound literary influence of my life. This was love at first sight!”[8] In her early teens, she devoured the writing of Charlotte Brontë, Emily Brontë, Fyodor Dostoevsky, William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, and Henry David Thoreau, whose “influences remain very deep”.[9] Oates began writing at the age of 14, when Blanche gave her a typewriter.[7] Oates later transferred to several bigger, suburban schools[3] and graduated from Williamsville South High School in 1956, where she worked for her high school newspaper.[citation needed] She was the first in her family to complete high school.[3] Oates earned a scholarship to attend Syracuse University, where she joined Phi Mu.[10] Oates found Syracuse “a very exciting place academically and intellectually”, and trained herself by “writing novel after novel and always throwing them out when I completed them.”[11] It was not until this point that Oates began reading the work of Franz Kafka, D. H. Lawrence, Thomas Mann, and Flannery O’Connor though, she noted, “these influences are still quite strong, pervasive.”[9] At the age of 19, she won the “college short story” contest sponsored by Mademoiselle. Oates graduated from Syracuse University with a degree in English as valedictorian in 1960[12] and received her M.A. from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1961. She was a Ph.D. student at Rice University when she made the decision to become a full-time writer.[13] Evelyn Shrifte, president of the Vanguard Press, met Oates soon after Oates received her master’s degree. “She was fresh out of school, and I thought she was a genius”, Shrifte said. Vanguard published Oates’ first book, the short-story collection By the North Gate, in 1963.[14] Career The Vanguard Press published Oates’ first novel,

For more from the great Kelly Link, please click here. From Wikipedia: Kelly Link (born 1969) is an American editor and author of short stories.[3] While some of her fiction falls more clearly within genre categories, many of her stories might be described as slipstream or magic realism: a combination of science fiction, fantasy, horror, mystery, and realism. Among other honors, she has won a Hugo award, three Nebula awards, and a World Fantasy Award for her fiction. Link is a graduate of Columbia University in New York and the MFA program of UNC Greensboro. In 1995, she attended the Clarion East Writing Workshop. Link and husband Gavin Grant manage Small Beer Press, based in Northampton, Massachusetts. The couple’s imprint of Small Beer Press for intermediate readers is called Big Mouth House. They also co-edited St. Martin’s Press’s Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror anthology series with Ellen Datlow for five years, ending in 2008. (The couple inherited the “fantasy” side from Terri Windling in 2004.) Link was also the slush reader for Sci Fiction, edited by Datlow. Link taught at Lenoir-Rhyne College in Hickory, North Carolina, with the Visiting Writers Series for spring semester 2006. She has taught or visited at a number of schools and workshops including Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York; Brookdale Community College, Lincroft, New Jersey; the Imagination Workshop at Cleveland State University; New England Institute of Art & Communications, Brookline, Massachusetts; Clarion East at Michigan State University; Clarion West in Seattle, Washington; and Smith College, near her home in Northampton. She has participated in the Juniper Summer Writing Institute at the University of Massachusetts Amherst’s MFA Program for Poets & Writers.

More Kelly Linkness? Kelly’s website can be accessed by clicking this very link. From Wikipedia: Kelly Link (born 1969) is an American editor and author of short stories.[3] While some of her fiction falls more clearly within genre categories, many of her stories might be described as slipstream or magic realism: a combination of science fiction, fantasy, horror, mystery, and realism. Among other honors, she has won a Hugo award, three Nebula awards, and a World Fantasy Award for her fiction. Link is a graduate of Columbia University in New York and the MFA program of UNC Greensboro. In 1995, she attended the Clarion East Writing Workshop. Link and husband Gavin Grant manage Small Beer Press, based in Northampton, Massachusetts. The couple’s imprint of Small Beer Press for intermediate readers is called Big Mouth House. They also co-edited St. Martin’s Press’s Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror anthology series with Ellen Datlow for five years, ending in 2008. (The couple inherited the “fantasy” side from Terri Windling in 2004.) Link was also the slush reader for Sci Fiction, edited by Datlow. Link taught at Lenoir-Rhyne College in Hickory, North Carolina, with the Visiting Writers Series for spring semester 2006. She has taught or visited at a number of schools and workshops including Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, New York; Brookdale Community College, Lincroft, New Jersey; the Imagination Workshop at Cleveland State University; New England Institute of Art & Communications, Brookline, Massachusetts; Clarion East at Michigan State University; Clarion West in Seattle, Washington; and Smith College, near her home in Northampton. She has participated in the Juniper Summer Writing Institute at the University of Massachusetts Amherst’s MFA Program for Poets & Writers.

Live recording of the Austin Writing Workshop, a grad-level fiction writing meet-up held in Austin, TX. Approximate timestamps and topics are below. 0:00 Excerpt from “CivilWarLand in Bad Decline” written by George Saunders, performed by Frank Marcopolos 1:56 Frank’s introduction to the podcast 5:21 Workshop analysis of a draft of the short story, “Eroticoffica” by Frank Marcopolos, including the theme of Rules, rules of storytelling and postmodern literary fiction, comedy of the story, accuracy of the sound of the dialogue, coffee rules, Austin’s coffee culture, the cult of the Castle, rules of the writing cult, erotica, pure enjoyment derived from the story, purpose of the footnotes (Track Changes), “hawt,” funny elements of the story, David Foster Wallace, “Infinite Jest,” explanation of words via Track Changes, options for using Track Changes, “The Place,” definitions of postmodernism, flatness, blending together of the two main characters, dialogue accuracy, writing in the style of an erotica story, sidebars, teasers of really good things, need for more conflict, white eyeshadow and lipstick, facility of the author with a change in writing style, understanding the narrator, enjoyable style, re-writing, sentence clarity and readability, flow, self-indulgence, winning over a non-postmodern audience, “trite” as an unfair criticism, gimmicks, surface theme, constriction of rules, the creative freedom, length of the piece, developing the right details of the story, the guy with his dick in the board, sex in the 1960s, side-notes as real stories, lack of clarity about setting, sci-fi, Kindle Millionaires, Joe Konrath, Amanda Hocking, characters with opposing characteristics, the intro, setting up a bunch of mistakes, experimental techniques, genre of postmodernism, relativism, flippy language, dry realism professors, Richard Ford, theme, Ernest Hemingway, pop and literary genre, George Saunders, short story classes in college, accepted academic stories and ones that are not, hating the story less the second time through, the thing that stands out being the dick in the board, story lacking hope or emotion, alt lit, Tao Lin, traditional techniques, blanching of the story, defending Frank as opposed to tearing him down, “trite” dialogue, gangster dialogue, “Whatevs,” story being easier to critique, unnecessary dialogue, being the bearer of good news, Michael Ward, Frank’s other stories, adventure stories, tarboosh, Track Changes coming in late, setting up expectations and then upsetting expectations, anything goes for postmodernism, the carrot of the marsh mallow at the end, discursiveness, rules for reasons, researching the origins of marsh mallows, Egypt, socially-enforced rules, juxtaposing two different positions, subtlety, foil for the marsh mallow, throw-away thoughts, the masculine principle and the feminine principle, subconscious ideas, authentic dialogue, too-authentic dialogue, fictional dialogue, and talking noises. 43:08 Workshop analysis of another member’s story, including huffing, Bukowski, Huffington Post, brain cells, enjoyment of the story, theme of class warfare, isolation and loneliness, understanding the era of the story, 1963, narrator ages, obsession with old money, Hawaii, the Hamptons, character empathy, shadows of grief, religion, hula shows, Nancy Drew quotes, Sherlock Holmes, gatekeepers, depth of the story, plot summary, boredom, getting felt up, variation of sentence length, confusing syntax, MLA Style Guide, fragments, The Elements of Style, Strunk and White, Chicago Manual of Style, editors, grade school in the 1800s, baronnesses, Hawaii as a state, Tahiti, rich people, old-money islanders, 1960’s airline-flight clothing, pilots, wearing wings, cookies, stale peanuts, and comedians on the P.A. 1:02:41 Workshop analysis of “CivilWarLand ...

Saturday Show Podcast is a live recording of the Austin Writing Workshop, a graduate-level fiction writing workshop focused on literary fiction and led by a former professor of literature and philosophy. In this episode, the group discusses the methods of unwrapping layers of truth to get to the “REAL” through the work of Charles Bukowski and a member-submitted short story. Fans of Dave Eggers, David Foster Wallace, Haruki Murakami, Margaret Atwood, Jennifer Egan, and Charles Bukowski would probably enjoy this podcast. 0:00 Excerpt from “Women” by Charles Bukowski 5:32 Frank’s intro to the podcast 6:23 Group discussion of “Women” by Charles Bukowski, including a brief discussion of the movie “Bliss,” waiting for the amazing plot turn, the theme of customs being bad, Portlandia skits about the devil, some plot summary, keeping track of all the women, repitition, broader questions about what the project is trying to do, Bukowski’s fame, fiction vs. poetry, comparison to Henry Miller and Ernest Hemingway, intentional lack of poetry, size of words, slippery salamanders of fate, popularity in Europe, tolerance of offensive materials, lewdness vs. art, American prudeishness, what is art?, Arthur Danto, aesthetics in art, Jasper Johns, the urinal piece of art, Duchamp, objective rules and criteria of artworks, measuring experiences of visual art, relativising, core of themes, Hunter S. Thompson, unreliable narrators, interviews with Bukowski, “Born into This” documentary, filtered realism, the tape recorder method, character arc of Chinaski, “Spring in Fialta” by Vladimir Nabokov, “Farewell to Arms,” Jim’s novel written for Texas State University, theme and surface events, universality of art, vomiting as a symbol, Chinaski’s blackheads, outting the real inside of Bukowski onto the page, literary decadence, Celine, Bukowski defending the novel, the screwed up moral culture, Friedrich Nietzsche, vulnerable and undercut characters, defining “undercut”, remembering Theresa, talking about how bad Chinaski is in bed, oral sex, the use of alcohol to get to the true Chinaski/Bukowski, George Martin,high-functioning alcoholics, being anti-Disney and Mickey Mouse, identity revelation, skin comfort, Bukowski’s upbringing and physical handicaps including grotesque ugliness, acne vulgaris, not trusting men with clean houses, recognizing insanity, Liza Williams, Elton John, hooking up with millions of women, German or Swedish twins, traits of childhood violence, Cory’s therapy session, getting tiresome, Thomas Pynchon, yeast infections, Henry Miller and his bicycle, the elitism of punctuation and rules, The Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy O’Toole, the influence of Bukowski, David Sedaris drunk vs. David Sedaris sober, writing 4-5 stories a week, the theater version of Confederacy of Dunces, Steven Soderberg, Harold Ramis, John Belushi, Edward Zick, Will Ferrell, Zach Galifaniakis, suicide as an awards strategy, Jack Black, “Bernie,” porking up for a role, depressing movies, Melacholia, Ayn Rand Reference #1, and research mavens. 47:51 Group discussion of the member story, including loving the story, “The Crying of Lot 49” by Thomas Pynchon, artificial lakes, “Slaughterhouse 5” by Kurt Vonnegut, modern cities and commerce, Texas-bashing, hating Austin, tigers and Mike Tyson and tattoos on your face, moving to rural Illinois, East Saint Louis, going back to New York, Nero, green dust, the lake that sucks people under, black humor, second draft, awkward grammar, confusing narrative style, logistical issues, Thomas Pynchon, Cory’s dirty mind, realistic parts of the story, “Infinite Jest” by David Foster Wallace, “Idiocracy,” the historical figure of Nero, the symbolism of marrying one’s horse or the Eiffel Tower...

Saturday Show is a live recording of the Austin Writing Workshop, a grad-level fiction-writing workshop led by a former professor of literature and philosophy. The group aims to improve their craft of writing literary stories, within which can be explored profound themes of philosophic and existential importance. Also, too, much wine is consumed and merriment had by all. To add to the merriment, please contribute a buck or two to the Cheap Wine Fund on frankmarcopolos.com. A listing of the topics covered along with approximate timestamps are provided below. 0:00 Excerpt from a draft of “Valhalla House” by Frank Marcopolos 2:38 Frank’s introduction to the podcast 5:48 Group discussion of the movie “Bliss,” including being able to stay with the movie the whole way, happy endings, Netflix, other Bliss movies, two cartoon squirrels, subtitles, Merlot, message-based movies, Nietzsche, morality is slavery to custom, the movie changing, defying customs, the YUPPIE professor, waiting for the great plot twist, the story not turning quickly enough, checking out of the movie, drab cinematography, The Wizard of Oz, Gilligan’s Island, the professor’s boat, Turkish Gilligan’s Island, almost hanging herself, knowing the whole movie in 5 minutes, struggling with the customs he grew up with, character development, intuitive narration, flash forwards, changing the pacing of a story, Momento, The English Patient, linear storytelling, predictable stories, lack of need for dialogue, real acting, heavy-handedness, cardboard characters, surprise ending, the number of characters trying to have sex with the main character, flocks of sheep, hurdles, different perspectives and cultures, random fish jobs, sailing around the world, suddenly deciding to become philosophy majors at University, Scottish independence, screen formatting, the lack of Hollywood glam, and female frumpiness. 26:55 Group discussion of the novel “Women”by Charles Bukowski, including guiding the group with weekly topics, “Born Into This” documentary about Charles Bukowski, autobiography, reality TV, the crazy crap of Chinaski, Harvey Pekar, American Splendor comic book series, R. Crumb, Ralph Steadman, Hunter S. Thompson, specific sexuality, grossness of the narrative, graphic nature of the novel, Marie Calloway, Marla Singer, Tao Lin, recycling Charles Bukowski material, gross and good parts of sex, lizard-beings, descriptions of the vagina and clitoris, the fact that there are no lines, blackheads and pimples, God, drinking like mad, voyeuristic quality of the novel, Barfly, capturing drunkenness on film, likeability of Charles Bukowski/Henry Chinaski, iconoclasticness, sympathetic quality of Chinaski, characters being open with their bodies, double standards, toxic relationships, misandry, stabbing a guy right in the face, managing your main character, undercutting of the character, alcoholism, Woody Allen, stand-up comedy, Muhammad Ali, Michael Jordan, Sherlock, Chinaski undercutting himself, audiences laughing at the wrong places during readings, humor, darkness, throwing up every five minutes, Barf-ly, Leaving Las Vegas, the absurdity of character vs. believability, truth stranger than fiction, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, round characters, vicarious living, Trainspotting, Requiem for a Dream, Vanilla Sky, Obre Los Ojos, Aronovsky, The Fountain, Jennifer Connally, rewatching movies, visceral stories, Almost Famous, brilliant minds, the tree of knowledge and the tree of life, Black Swan, meth ads, Werner Herzog movie on texting, laws against driving, Austin City Council banning everything including plastic bags, Austin traffic, the trappings of fame, fame as a character’s problem, mundane or trite situations, Chinaski’s ugliness, the Olson twins, Cory’s perversions and many husbands, Elizabeth Taylor, serial monogamy, co-dependence,

Saturday Show Podcast is a live recording of the Austin Writing Workshop, which is a grad-level fiction writing workshop led by a former professor of literature and philosophy. In this episode, the group examines the issue of autobiography in fiction as a technique to engage the reader. This topic is examined via the first 20 pages or so of the novel “Women” by Charles Bukowski. The movie “The Fountain” and a group member’s submitted story are also critiqued. A more detailed topic list (along with approximate timestamps) is provided below. 0:00 Excerpt from “Women” by Charles Bukowski 1:56 Frank’s introduction to the podcast 5:01 Group discussion about the format of the writing workshop, including expanding to include critiques of novel submissions, elements of the novel, Jorge Luis Borges quote on short stories, plotting, discursiveness, pathways of the novel, importance of details, sublime choices, building character, Ernest Hemingway, depth of personality in character, setting as character, Victorian novels, Dostoyevsky, solipsism, synopses, taglines, expectations of the scope of the novel, participation of the writer, intertextuality, the baseball guys and military stories of Frank’s work, “Almost Home,” the next novel in Frank’s series, and Jenny Drama not making it into the next novel. 15:35 Group discussion of the movie “The Fountain,” including not watching the movie with the group, hating the last two movies the group has had to watch, letting the haters hate, the movie taking itself too seriously, plot summary, Rachel Weisz’s face, Hugh Jackman’s attractiveness, Carrie’s coldness, arty acting, pretentiousness, postmodern techniques of the film, excellent cinematography, theme infused throughout the movie, triteness, tree of life vs. tree of knowledge and making a choice between the two, eternal wisdom, Pan’s Labyrinth, fairy tales, intimate moments, Wolverine, buckles and zippers, history defining reality, fake British accents, the father of the land, facades, true natures, eternal love stories, The Matrix, Sideways, merlot, what a film can do with postmodern techniques, Momento, Synochdoche, Frank’s pronunciation etiquette, Schenectady New York, The Fountainhead, Gary Cooper, movie suggestions, and computernerdz.com. 34:10 Group discussion of “Women” by Charles Bukowski, including “Buke” vs. “Buck,” plot review, real life in fiction, Hemingway, Henry Miller, likeability, reality, getting tired of all the throw-up, wine tasting, McDonald’s cups, roman-a-clefs, dictionary reading, sexiness descriptions, diagramming of a woman’s vagina, absurdity of character, dry realism, quality of the techniques used in the novel, vague descriptions, getting away with vague descriptions, Hunter S. Thompson, reflecting of real life in art as a thematic structure, poetry, Bukowski treating women badly in his life and fiction, women running around naked and throwing things, naivete of the narrator about women, undercutting of character, dialecticals, dog poop dropping on characters’ heads, the hero being RIGHT and everyone else being WRONG, Googling information perceiving one’s opinion of the narrative while reading, Bukowski’s self-awareness, ad hominum attacks on Bukowski, autobiography in the narrative and the ability to critique the story knowing it is based on real life, story separate from the author, judging a lover’s poetry, the status figure and the student, Confederacy of Dunces, not knowing the author of a work, underground magazine publishing, people-first language, misandry, being overly autobiographical, the Internet living forever, Mad Max, the aliens, reading online, confirming misandric beliefs,

The Austin Writing Workshop is a fiction-writing workshop led by a former literature and philosophy professor. Listen in as the group discusses literary techniques, philosophy, and more on Saturday Show #70. Detailed topics and approximate timestamps are below. 0:00 Excerpt from “Mother and I” by Dave Eggers 1:25 Frank’s introduction to the podcast 2:35 Group analysis of “Mother and I” by Dave Eggers, including the authenticity of authorship, Eggers’s taking of the crown of postmodernism from David Foster Wallace, If I Were in Charge of the World stories, Eggers’s exploits in San Francisco, drinking wine, dogs getting drunk, criticising and using aspects of popular culture in fiction, one-piece swimsuits, older people sharing inappropriate details with younger people, decorative fill-ups, Andy Rooney from 60 Minutes, curing genocide, stealing criticisms, stretching the genre of postmodernism, first-person vs. second-person points of view, seeing theme vs. feeling it and being unable to fully describe it, political commentary, truth of events, concrete action, understanding who the main character actually is, Wallace Shawn, Dennis Kucinich, Richard Ford, Transformers, Peter Joseph (a.k.a. “P.Jo”) and the Zeitgeist objectives, tasting home-made wine during the workshop, I Pencil by Leonard Reed, the ludicrous idea of being able to accomplish all of the objectives mentioned in the story, bringing certain elements into the potential theme, alternate endings to the story, having the surface and philosophy of the story match, llamas, banning or loving billboards, the awfulness of bicycle shots, mixing up the stories, the story lacks depth of knowledge, lobbyists in cages, the tourism of Cleveland and Detroit, LeBron James, Johnny Football Manziel, Cleveland Browns, Cleveland Cavaliers, Was the story disappointing or satisfying?, multi-linguality of the world, bad Spanish puns, triteness and lack of depth, entertainment value of the story, the lightness of Eggers’s fiction, and A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. 28:21 Group analysis of a member’s story, including discussion about what a daguerrotype camera is, comparison to previous stories, using the name “Bertha,” plot review, wine spritzers, “winos,” cleverness of language, word-playing on the title of the book “Confederacy of Dunces” by John Kennedy O’Toole, use of the word of “illegaller,” reading prose as a run-on sentence, reading in different accents, the attractiveness of fame, unmucosey-ness of this writer’s prose, providing synopses with longer submissions, pitching stories, cheating on the writing group, broad discussion about how the workshop should function moving forward, the year of the novel, Kurt Vonnegut, Catcher in the Rye, Madame Bovary by Flaubert, Citizen Kane, Tolstoy, Doestoyevsky, moonshine, Cory’s dating preferences, absurdity of character, tropes in literary fiction, triteness of the narrative, literary environments as sex-fests, writing conferences, Sherlock Holmes, Charles Bukowski, Phillip Roth, Brautigan, and drunken dog kidnapping. 1:07:40 Group analysis of the movie, “Only Lovers Left Alive,” including the fact that the title of the movie may be its best part, a review of published critical reviews of the movie, style over substance, no plot or point of the movie, feeling like being on heroin while watching the movie, quantum entanglement, the question of whether immortality is desireable, Interview with a Vampire by Ann Rice, the director as musician, Guardians of the Galaxy, Lives of the Monster Dogs, male prostitute rings, green coffee beans and self-roasting coffee, Joan Rivers, Robin Williams, John Belushi, Bill Hicks, Bill Maher x 100, George Carlin, the Texas Outlaw Comics, Sam Kinneson, American: The Bill Hicks Story, Jimmy Pineapple,

Can Stephen King write anything well besides horror? What lessons can studying the literary techniques used in King’s story, “That Bus is Another World” yield? The Austin Writing Workshop debates and discusses these issues and more, including analysis of a member’s story and a breakdown of the movie “Zeitgeist.” Fans of Dave Eggers, Jennifer Egan, Haruki Murakami, and David Foster Wallace would enjoy this podcast. More detailed information about the podcast is outlined in the approximate timestamps below. 0:00 Excerpt from “That Bus is Another World” by Stephen King 1:22 Frank’s introduction to the podcast 6:05 Group analysis of “That Bus is Another World” by Stephen King, including the story’s publishing history and King stretching out into literary fiction, history of Esquire magazine and its publishing of short stories, naming of real-world details in the story, lack of subtlety, theme vs. message, dialectics in literature, real-world details as a hook for the reader, the story as a moral quandary and the purpose of that attempt, metaphors in the story and the parallels to real-world events, the authenticity (or lack thereof) of the details and the descriptions in the story, British Petroleum advertisements after the Gulf of Mexico oil-spill disaster, moral philosophy and the ought-is fallacy and how that plays out plot-wise, the inability to determine the nature of reality, complicity of everyone in society for using oil and oil-based economic systems, character likeability, contract with the reader in the beginning of the story, real-life anecdotes, trying and succeeding in literature with regard to theme, string theory, Neil deGrasse Tyson, the possibility of humans having 25 senses, the sixth sense and empiricism, Stephen King taking too many risks than necessary for writing a successful story, literary stories by Stephen King, hypergraphia, inventing words, and the 1010 WINS jingle. 32:15 Group analysis of “Fighting Chaos” by Frank Marcopolos, including discussion of chaos theory and the theme of the universe’s chaotic nature, societal structure to fight against chaos, mixing up of characters, pursuit of joy as a social end, effective detail description at the end of the story, enjoyable and clear details of character description, burying the best part of the story at the end, flat spots in the descriptions of places, inconsistency of narrative tone, kissing Frank’s story, romantic elements, bromantic elements, comedic elements, narrative confusion, comparison with the movie “Zeitgeist: The Movie,” inconsistent voice, background on the history of the 2 main characters, the “Ladies Love Frank’s Fiction” fake Internet meme, latent homosexuality, too many similes, having sex in the face of danger, using the word “trite” as an objective criticism when it actually is a subjective opinion, real vs. magic in the storytelling, character differentiation, military vernacular and jargon, likes and dislikes of the setting descriptions, vague writing, haymakers, brevity, visible philosophy in the dialogue, changing it to a frame story, and comparison to “The Hangover.” 1:19:46 Group analysis of the documentary film, “Zeitgeist,” including its tendency to put viewers to sleep, summary of the movie, big social impact of the movie, the solution of socialism as a horrible idea, choices of the people used in the movie to provide information, George Carlin, Bill Hicks, Bill Hicks’s Jesus jokes, the faking of social revolutions as opposed to real historical revolutions, the fundamental ideas of Karl Marx, modernist thinking, the documentary as propaganda, Ayn Rand, child vaccination, Medicare costs, philosophical inconsistencies, human nature, liberty, differentiation from Marx, manipulation of financial markets,