Articles by Sonya Chung
January 30, 2012
Nine Stories, 16 Years in the Making: Post-40 Bloomer Daniel Orozco 2
Orientation is not about “alienation,” modern-day or otherwise, nor about the effects of a particular cultural transition or economic decline; it’s about loneliness. About the awful, persistent distance between you and me, between me and me, between each of us and the spiritual-whatever in the universe; all of which keeps us wondering what the hell this life is about, and how we will survive it. This seems an important distinction to me, and what has allowed Orozco’s work – some of it 16 years-old – to debut with full emotional resonance.
January 24, 2012
Susie DeFord’s Dogs of Brooklyn 0
Poets, dog-lovers, urban-dwellers, and really, everyone — check out poet and dog-trainer Susie DeFord‘s heartfelt and keen-eyed new book of poems, Dogs of Brooklyn. Says Vijay Seshadri, DeFord’s collection is full of “wonderful poetic investigations into the life of Brooklyn’s dogs, into their habits, their idiosyncrasies, and their secret longings.”
January 10, 2012
Staff Writer Sonya Chung at Tin House 0
At the Tin House blog, I write about my literary education in independent bookstores Also, my piece about James Salter appears in Tin House‘s current issue.
December 30, 2011
Post-40 Bloomers: Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, The Last Leopard 4
One indisputable factor that deprived us of more opportunities to luxuriate in Lampedusa’s gifts was a diagnosis of lung cancer at the age of 60. The diagnosis came just a few months after he finished the novel, two publisher rejections already in hand, a third which would arrive weeks before he died in July of that year.
November 15, 2011
On Spinach and the National Book Awards 11
I want to live in a world – and I believe we’re closer than we think – where “the reading public” consumes, likes, and engages with many different kinds of literary nourishment; and where writers, teachers, and critics trust and even expect readers to do so.
November 5, 2011
Poetry Walk in the Bronx 0
Don’t miss Jon Cotner‘s “Poem Forest” at the NY Botanical Gardens Nov 4-5 and Nov 11-12, 12-4:30. It’s a self-guided tour that promises “a new kind of poetry experience, as well as a new kind of walking experience. Poet-walker Jon Cotner has fused lines selected from 2500 years of nature poetry with Thain Forest’s autumnal landscape.” [...]
