thought this was cool:

So, for the layout/images, we are inspired by artist Evan Hecox (work pictured above). Using collaged prints of images and putting them together in Hecox's style. Its very similar to the images you guy's posted earlier. We also really like the color scheme you guy's chose, so we are going to stick with that.

For the size we had to make it bigger, to 5.5 in by 7in--it still has a small/not too bulky/ delicate feel to it.

For execution we are printing on brown construction paper (think paper bag material). Irina is going to try to wood cut the type for the cover. We are also going to include very sketchy-sketches (something like you posted--very simple and rough lines). We are going to handbind it and create a sort of claspe to close and open the book. We will keep you updated on the look.

Also if you could please send us all your files so we can begin setting up the layouts. That would be amazing.

If the ichat thing doesn't work out we can post images on the blog and talk to each other via phone about the work we posted and get feedback from eachother.
Here is Irina's number: 347-756-1647
Mine (Brittany) is: 626-975-8604

Let us know what you think and be sure to send us the files.
Thaank you and talk to you soon
Brittany

Hey guys,

so Jenn and I had a mini-meeting during our class this week and we came up with some basics regarding how the type/aesthetics might function. this is all a suggestion so feel free to interject with changes/etc.

size: 5 x 6.5in (small, intimate dimensions, a little more square than most books)

color palette: we were thinking straight black and white or a good use of bold but really desaturated colors. we're definitely thinking of printing the interior book pages on off white/beige paper and really like this exact palette:


like the beige paper would be the skate deck, the colors would be the colors of the buildings, and the type would be set in black.

if we choose color it has to be done quite succinctly to portray bukowski still, but with a little bit of lightness/life.

typography: we are thinking type on the front and poem titles would be a nice condensed like berthold azkidenz grotesk condensed mixed with the type set in a nice humanist bembo.




imagery: we were thinking we would like some illustration and less photography. we wanted to integrate the imagery into the text itself so we were thinking really abstract and divided into different categories:

1. graphic (like the skate deck examples, bold shapes, dynamic lines)


2. humanist lines (sort of like messy scribbles, sketching, contour drawing)


3. geometric lines (really strict, succinct, detailed and almost nervous line work) not the bird haha



4. watercolor (color bleeding off pages and sitting behind text, loose, messy) like the top left one)


so in any case, we wanted to show a lonely, human, but still gritty side of bukowski. being depressed as shit is pretty fucking human, i think. we any image treatment can be put together (like geometric lines on watercolor or wtvr)or whatever you think is best. we will throw some grittiness on it so it doesn't look too clean/polished. just not tacky/cheesy/predictable is all.

basically: abstract imagery/nothing obvious/cliche, condensed type w/ humanist serif text, muted/gritty color palette, beige paper.

i made these really terrible random image experimentations. Don't judge me, haha

I like all of these poems a lot. Right now I am working on different drawings overlayed on top of b+w photographs that go along with/relate with the poems--all mixed media. Its all pretty similar to the photos/inspiration photos you guys have posted. When I finish I can post them on the blog to get feedback/etc. I've been in California the past week with no internet for a majority of the time, so its been kind of hard for me to communicate via the blog. Talk to all you guys soon, Brittany

yeah, the shoe lace is good, think since you guys are doing the type, the pick is after you:) and since we r doing the visuals we ll sure come up with smth cool after we ll agree on the content:)
so tell me what u ll decide.
take care
p.s.: also i know i asked this a bunch of times, but is there anyway we can ichat? just in case if needed.)

okay we definitely need to include 'the shoelace'... maybe even first. hehehe

The Shoelace

a woman, a
tire that’s flat, a
disease, a
desire: fears in front of you,
fears that hold so still
you can study them
like pieces on a
chessboard…
it’s not the large things that
send a man to the
madhouse. death he’s ready for, or
murder, incest, robbery, fire, flood…
no, it’s the continuing series of small tragedies
that send a man to the
madhouse…
not the death of his love
but a shoelace that snaps
with no time left …
The dread of life
is that swarm of trivialities
that can kill quicker than cancer
and which are always there -
licence plates or taxes
or expired driver’s license,
or hiring or firing,
doing it or having it done to you, or
roaches or flies or a
broken hook on a
screen, or out of gas
or too much gas,
the sink’s stopped-up, the landlord’s drunk,
the president doesn’t care and the governor’s
crazy.
lightswitch broken, mattress like a
porcupine;
$105 for a tune-up, carburetor and fuel pump at
sears roebuck;
and the phone bill’s up and the, market’s
down
and the toilet chain is
broken,
and the light has burned out -
the hall light, the front light, the back light,
the inner light; it’s
darker than hell
and twice as
expensive.
then there’s always crabs and ingrown toenails
and people who insist they’re
your friends;
there’s always that and worse;
leaky faucet, christ and christmas;
blue salami, 9 day rains,
50 cent avocados
and purple
liverwurst.

or making it
as a waitress at norm’s on the split shift,
or as an emptier of
bedpans,
or as a carwash or a busboy
or a stealer of old lady’s purses
leaving them screaming on the sidewalks
with broken arms at the age of 80.

suddenly
2 red lights in your rear view mirror
and blood in your
underwear;
toothache, and $979 for a bridge
$300 for a gold
tooth,
and china and russia and america, and
long hair and short hair and no
hair, and beards and no
faces, and plenty of zigzag but no
pot, except maybe one to piss in
and the other one around your
gut.

with each broken shoelace
out of one hundred broken shoelaces,
one man, one woman, one
thing
enters a
madhouse.

so be careful
when you
bend over.

i like this one a lot too.
Bluebird

there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too tough for him,
I say, stay in there, I'm not going
to let anybody see
you.

there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I pur whiskey on him and inhale
cigarette smoke
and the whores and the bartenders
and the grocery clerks
never know that
he's
in there.

there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too tough for him,
I say,
stay down, do you want to mess
me up?
you want to screw up the
works?
you want to blow my book sales in
Europe?

there's a bluebird in my heart that
wants to get out
but I'm too clever, I only let him out
at night sometimes
when everybody's asleep.
I say, I know that you're there,
so don't be
sad.
then I put him back,
but he's singing a little
in there, I haven't quite let him
die
and we sleep together like
that
with our
secret pact
and it's nice enough to
make a man
weep, but I don't
weep, do
you?

Alone With Everybody

the flesh covers the bone
and they put a mind
in there and
sometimes a soul,
and the women break
vases against the walls
and the men drink too
much
and nobody finds the
one
but keep
looking
crawling in and out
of beds.
flesh covers
the bone and the
flesh searches
for more than
flesh.

there's no chance
at all:
we are all trapped
by a singular
fate.

nobody ever finds
the one.

the city dumps fill
the junkyards fill
the madhouses fill
the hospitals fill
the graveyards fill

nothing else
fills.

Trapped

don't undress my love
you might find a mannequin:
don't undress the mannequin
you might find
my love.
she's long ago
forgotten me.
she's trying on a new
hat
and looks more the
coquette
than ever.

she is a
child
and a mannequin
and death.
I can't hate
that.
she didn't do
anything
unusual.
I only wanted her
to.

I also agree with
Unblinking grief
And The Moon And The Stars And The World
gamblers all
confession
rain
finished?

i also really like this album cover


i guess we do have deadlines...i should check those out. haha

So under this post i put some of the works by him that we like.
me and brittany were thinking since you guys are in charge of the typography, you should pick the works that you liked. may be include some of the ones that we put.:)
as far as the layout, well after we ll pick the works that we ll do, i think there should be an image for every one, or every second one of the poems.
we were thinking of something like hand drawn type over some awesome black and white images. brittany is in LA right now, so she should be able to take some cool looking photos and we can pick lines from his poems and redraw then with interesting type.
tell me what you think

hey, so here are some of the poems that i liked:

what can I do?

it's true:
pain and suffering
helps to create
what we call
art.

given the choice
I'd never choose
this damned
pain
and suffering
for myself
but somehow it finds
me

as the royalties
continue to
roll on
in.

about competition

the higher you climb
the greater the pressure.

those who manage to
endure
learn
that the distance
between the
top and the
bottom
is
obscenely
great.

and those who
succeed
know
this secret:
there isn't
one.


unblinking grief

the last cigarettes are smoked, the loaves are sliced,
and lest this be taken for wry sorrow,
drown the spider in wine.

you are much more that simply dead:
I am a dish for your ashes,
I am a fist for your vanished air.

the most terrible thing about life
is finding it gone.


the joke is on the sun

as the game continues you
should seek to say ever more clearly
what you truly believe
even if what you truly
believe
turns out to be
wrong.

it can be a hazardous
and difficult
task.

but
if you can't laugh
at the impossible odds
we all endure as
we seek to understand
and know

then you will
surely sleep
restless
in the
coffin.


re-union

when you left I thought you'd never
return and finally I got to feeling good
about that.

now it's starting all over
again

right here
right now.

I watch
the pyramids stand by quietly as the monkey eats his
fleas.

somehow
once again
we seem to be as
content as a package of
peanuts

bleached by the sun
and then

caught like
a
ringing bell.


riots

I've watched this city burn twice
in my lifetime
and the most notable even
was the reaction of the
politicians in the
aftermath
as they
proclaimed the injustice
of the system
and demanded a new
deal for the hapless and the
poor.

nothing was corrected last
time.
nothing will be changed this
time.

the poor will remain poor.
the unemployed will remain
so.
the homeless will remain
homeless

and the politicians
fat upon the land, will thrive
forever.


Los Angeles

there is an old saying:
that those whom the gods wish to
destroy,
they first make
angry.

driving the freeways
each day
it appears to me
that
the gods are getting
ready
to
destroy the entire
City
of
Angels.

A Selection

Here are some poems I think go well together. I'm not sure how many poems we should use, probably not all of them
Also if there are any of these any of you don't like, or if there are any that you think might be better please post your thoughts.

I am also going to look into his short stories in case we want to go that route instead.

onto the poems...

And The Moon And The Stars And The World

Long walks at night--
that's what good for the soul:
peeking into windows
watching tired housewives
trying to fight off
their beer-maddened husbands.

Big Night On The Town

drunk on the dark streets of some city,
it's night, you're lost, where's your
room?
you enter a bar to find yourself,
order scotch and water.
damned bar's sloppy wet, it soaks
part of one of your shirt
sleeves.
It's a clip joint-the scotch is weak.
you order a bottle of beer.
Madame Death walks up to you
wearing a dress.
she sits down, you buy her a
beer, she stinks of swamps, presses
a leg against you.
the bar tender sneers.
you've got him worried, he doesn't
know if you're a cop, a killer, a
madman or an
Idiot.
you ask for a vodka.
you pour the vodka into the top of
the beer bottle.
It's one a.m. In a dead cow world.
you ask her how much for head,
drink everything down, it tastes
like machine oil.

you leave Madame Death there,
you leave the sneering bartender
there.

you have remembered where
your room is.
the room with the full bottle of
wine on the dresser.
the room with the dance of the
roaches.
Perfection in the Star Turd
where love died
laughing.


Friends Within The Darkness

I can remember starving in a
small room in a strange city
shades pulled down, listening to
classical music
I was young I was so young it hurt like a knife
inside
because there was no alternative except to hide as long
as possible--
not in self-pity but with dismay at my limited chance:
trying to connect.

the old composers -- Mozart, Bach, Beethoven,
Brahms were the only ones who spoke to me and
they were dead.

finally, starved and beaten, I had to go into
the streets to be interviewed for low-paying and
monotonous
jobs
by strange men behind desks
men without eyes men without faces
who would take away my hours
break them
piss on them.

now I work for the editors the readers the
critics

but still hang around and drink with
Mozart, Bach, Brahms and the
Bee
some buddies
some men
sometimes all we need to be able to continue alone
are the dead
rattling the walls
that close us in.

Anonymous submission.

gamblers all

sometimes you climb out of bed in the morning and you think,
I'm not going to make it, but you laugh inside
remembering all the times you've felt that way, and
you walk to the bathroom, do your toilet, see that face
in the mirror, oh my oh my oh my, but you comb your hair anyway,
get into your street clothes, feed the cats, fetch the
newspaper of horror, place it on the coffee table, kiss your
wife goodbye, and then you are backing the car out into life itself,
like millions of others you enter the arena once more.

you are on the freeway threading through traffic now,
moving both towards something and towards nothing at all as you punch
the radio on and get Mozart, which is something, and you will somehow
get through the slow days and the busy days and the dull
days and the hateful days and the rare days, all both so delightful
and so disappointing because
we are all so alike and so different.

you find the turn-off, drive through the most dangerous
part of town, feel momentarily wonderful as Mozart works
his way into your brain and slides down along your bones and
out through your shoes.

it's been a tough fight worth fighting
as we all drive along
betting on another day.


The History Of One Tough Motherfucker

he came to the door one night wet thin beaten and
terrorized
a white cross-eyed tailless cat
I took him in and fed him and he stayed
grew to trust me until a friend drove up the driveway
and ran him over
I took what was left to a vet who said,"not much
chance...give him these pills...his backbone
is crushed, but is was crushed before and somehow
mended, if he lives he'll never walk, look at
these x-rays, he's been shot, look here, the pellets
are still there...also, he once had a tail, somebody
cut it off..."


Confession

waiting for death
like a cat
that will jump on the
bed

I am so very sorry for
my wife

she will see this
stiff
white
body
shake it once, then
maybe
again

"Hank!"

Hank won't
answer.

it's not my death that
worries me, it's my wife
left with this
pile of
nothing.

I want to
let her know
though
that all the nights
sleeping
beside her

even the useless
arguments
were things
ever splendid

and the hard
words
I ever feared to
say
can now be
said:

I love
you.


Rain

a symphony orchestra.


A Radio With Guts

it was on the 2nd floor on Coronado Street
I used to get drunk
and throw the radio through the window
while it was playing, and, of course,
it would break the glass in the window
and the radio would sit there on the roof
still playing
and I'd tell my woman,
"Ah, what a marvelous radio!"
the next morning I'd take the window
off the hinges
and carry it down the street
to the glass man
who would put in another pane.
I kept throwing that radio through the window
each time I got drunk
and it would sit there on the roof
still playing-
a magic radio
a radio with guts,
and each morning I'd take the window
back to the glass man.
I don't remember how it ended exactly
though I do remember
we finally moved out.
there was a woman downstairs who worked in
the garden in her bathing suit,
she really dug with that trowel
and she put her behind up in the air
and I used to sit in the window
and watch the sun shine all over that thing
while the music played.


the great slob

I was always a natural slob
I liked to lay upon the bed
in undershirt (stained, of
course) (and with cigarette
holes)
shoes off
beerbottle in hand
trying to shake off a
difficult night, say with a
woman still around
walking the floor
complaining about this and
that,
and I'd work up a
belch and say, "HEY, YOU DON'T
LIKE IT? THEN GET YOUR ASS
OUT OF HERE!"

I really loved myself, I
really loved my slob-
self, and
they seemed to also:
always leaving
but almost
always
coming
back.


The House

They are building a house
half a block down
and I sit up here
with the shades down
listening to the sounds,
the hammers pounding in nails,
thack thack thack thack,
and then I hear birds,
and thack thack thack,
and I go to bed,
I pull the covers to my throat;
they have been building this house
for a month, and soon it will have
its people...sleeping, eating,
loving, moving around,
but somehow
now
it is not right,
there seems a madness,
men walk on top with nails
in their mouths
and I read about Castro and Cuba,
and at night I walk by
and the ribs of the house show
and inside I can see cats walking
the way cats walk,
and then a boy rides by on a bicycle
and still the house is not done
and in the morning the men
will be back
walking around on the house
with their hammers,
and it seems people should not build houses
anymore,
it seems people should not get married
anymore,
it seems people should stop working
and sit in small rooms
on 2nd floors
under electric lights without shades;
it seems there is a lot to forget
and a lot not to do,
and in drugstores, markets, bars,
the people are tired, they do not want
to move, and I stand there at night
and look through this house and the
house does not want to be built;
through its sides I can see the purple hills
and the first lights of evening,
and it is cold
and I button my coat
and I stand there looking through the house
and the cats stop and look at me
until I am embarrased
and move North up the sidewalk
where I will buy
cigarettes and beer
and return to my room.


The Icecream People

the lady has me temporarily off the bottle
and now the pecker stands up
better.
however, things change overnight--
instead of listening to Shostakovich and
Mozart through a smeared haze of smoke
the nights change, new
complexities:
we drive to Baskin-Robbins,
31 flavors:
Rocky Road, Bubble Gum, Apricot Ice, Strawberry
Cheesecake, Chocolate Mint...

we park outside and look at icecream
people
a very healthy and satisfied people,
nary a potential suicide in sight
(they probably even vote)
and I tell her
"what if the boys saw me go in there? suppose they
find out I'm going in for a walnut peach sundae?"
"come on, chicken," she laughs and we go in
and stand with the icecream people.
none of them are cursing or threatening
the clerks.
there seem to be no hangovers or
grievances.
I am alarmed at the placid and calm wave
that flows about. I feel like a leper in a
beauty contest. we finally get our sundaes and
sit in the car and eat them.

I must admit they are quite good. a curious new
world. (all my friends tell me I am looking
better. "you're looking good, man, we thought you
were going to die there for a while...")
--those 4,500 dark nights, the jails, the
hospitals...

and later that night
there is use for the pecker, use for
love, and it is glorious,
long and true,
and afterwards we speak of easy things;
our heads by the open window with the moonlight
looking through, we sleep in each other's
arms.

the icecream people make me feel good,
inside and out.

Submitted by Holt


finished?

the critics now have me
drinking champagne and
driving a BMW
and also married to a
socialite from
Philadelphia's Main Line
which of course is going to prevent me
from writing my earthy
and grubby stuff.
and they might be
right,
I could be getting to be
more like them,
and that's as close to
death as you can
get.

we'll see.
but don't bury me yet.
don't worry if I drink with
Sean Penn.
just measure the poems
as they come off the
keyboard.
listen only to them.
after this long fight
I have no intention of
quitting short.
or late.
or satisfied.

Hey so I haven't checked too much into the text but I did find some more visuals. We can either go bold and vengeful or subdued and lonesome. I kind of prefer the latter. We could especially have sort of a vintage feel to it. What do you guys think?

Anyways...

Bukowski it is

Hey, this Irina. So we think Bukowski would probably be a better pick, since Camus and Calvino are a little hard on the imagery, very abstract, at least from all the stories that i have read by both of them. And Bukowski will b interesting to work with :).
So I guess now we should select the poems we want to work with. I already started looking for some interesting ones, some of them are real freaking graphic, Im not sure if we want to have too many of those...or we can. I got the evil eye from a granny when i was reading his work on the train just now. haha
So our teacher told us that u guys have a closer deadline then we do. think your first part is due March 18th. for us its 24th. what do you have to show for the first presentation? so that way if needed we ll have some stuff ready for that date.
also i know i already asked that, but is there any way we could maybe do ichat from time to time? its spring break for us right now, Brittany left home to California, im in New York, you r in Canada. it be nice to have a visual way to communicate if there are any problems :)
well i think thats it...haha
take care

p.s. i ll start looking at some of the works by him, try to get some posted tomorrow.

Possible Texts (links & stuff)

Here's a selection of texts based on mine and Maggie's discussion.

Albert Camus

Exile and the Kingdom
(a collection of short stories) published 1957 (a couple of years off, but maybe still okay) I didn't read all of them, but I liked "The Guest"
-
Italo Calvino

Cosmicomics (pdf) (1965)
I only read the first story, but enjoyed it. These have a whimsical feel to them.

The Adventures of a Nearsighted Man (date unknown, though not likely before 1965)
(there are also the adventures of a poet & of a photographer)
-
Charles Bukowski

I don't have any specific examples for now but I do like the idea of a collection of his poems.
-
Alistair Cooke

Radio host for the BBC he had a show called Letter to America in which he would describe American life to his English audience. Peguin has collected all the broadcasts he wrote into a collection of essays. It has some nice descriptive pieces. It is non-fiction though, so maybe not as interesting as a nice short story.

This is it for now, I might search for more later. Have a look at some of texts see how you feel about them.

Hey this is Maggie. I had a mini-meeting with Jen yesterday and we agreed that our concern with the Edward Gorey/Tim Burton content is that it already has a pre-existing/already distinguished aesthetic for both the illustrations and type treatment. I'm not really sure what else we could do with the type and illustrations than going with the goth-vibe for the type and the quirky drawings for the visuals.

I was personally thinking of something a bit more literature based. I was originally thinking about A Clean Well-Lighted Place by Hemingway but I realized it was out of the 50 year mark. If you are into the more gritty approach maybe we could do some poetry by Charles Bukowski? I'm not sure if you are familiar with him... he's sort of the iconic drunken post-modern poet who writes about everyday life in the city. We could go with a bold, grittiness... or even with a subtle, understated and barren aesthetic to portray the loneliness of his work.

Our prof suggested Italo Calvino who is an Italian writer with a lot of sort of, existential undertones and whatnot. Then there's Albert Camus but I don't know which stories would be short enough for 16 pages. Our prof also suggested John Cheever who wrote for the New Yorker.

Anyways, the reason why I bring up literature is that is doesn't have any predetermined sigmas and leaves us open to interpret the type and imagery with more freedom and creativity.

Here's some random visuals I pulled. It isn't exactly what I want but it's sort of an idea. Sorry i wrote so fucking much. Haha.








I think it would be cool to have lots of hand-drawn elements as well as digital type. We could easily scan the hand-done work in and print the chapbook as a whole?

Hey you guys, this is Irina and Brittany (your Parson's buddies)
First we wanted to ask both of you if you have ichat, just incase we need to get in contact with each other or have online group discussions.
I guess we should come up with the subject and exchange some ideas.
So we were brainstorming and we came up with the idea of using short stories from dark children's books, such as Tim Burton or Edward Gorey. For this we were thinking we could take one of their stories and either illustrate them or find cool imgs for it.




(we can scan more detailed images with text by tomorrow--also if you search online you could probably find some of the actual pages from the books).
Another thing we were wondering is how do we want to make a book, handmade or all printed out. But i guess we should first decide on the txt, before we decide how to execute it.:)
Ok, tell us what you think and we would love to see some of your ideas. :)