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literary events

By Erica Schwiegershausen 6/28/12 12:00pm

literary events

Rebecca Mead and Janet Groth.

Former New Yorker Receptionist Discusses Misogyny, the Condé Nast Cafeteria and Her New Memoir

“Twenty-one year flat-line” was the way that Janet Groth, receptionist at the New Yorker from 1957-1978 described her aforementioned career last night at the reading of her memoir The Receptionist: An Education at the New Yorker at Greenlight Bookstore.

Ms. Groth recounted a time of William Shawn, E.B. White and Joseph Mitchell with a slightly nostalgic but none too romanticized air. She recalled telling the man who first interviewed her for the position that she wanted to write. “Can you type?” was his response. Not professionally, she told him. He reviewed her resume and inquired about a short story prize she had won while in college. “Did you type that?” Read More

By Erica Schwiegershausen 6/25/12 9:00am

literary events

Will Patton, left, and Denis Johnson.

Denis Johnson Says His Novel Tree of Smoke, a Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, “Shouldn’t Have Been Published”

“I’m here to sell books. That’s why I came,” Denis Johnson informed the audience after reading from his recently released book of plays, Soul of a Whore and Purvis: Two Plays in Verse, at BAM Thursday night. Despite this early disclaimer, Mr. Johnson appeared to thoroughly enjoy performing.

The crowd was about what we would have expected for an event series entitled “Eat, Drink & Be Literary” with a $50 ticket price—a mix of sweet-looking bespectacled couples with haphazardly tucked button downs and more seasoned residents of Park Slope who dressed in summer whites and chewed slowly. Not, in other words, stereotypical Denis Johnson fans. Read More

By Erica Schwiegershausen 6/18/12 10:00am

literary events

Bagpiper Garry Cheddy flanked by Bloomsday participants.

Many Who Have Read (and a Few That Actually Understood) Ulysses Gather in Park Slope for Annual Bloomsday Pub Crawl

“June 16 is one day in the life of Leopold Bloom in Dublin and that’s about all I understand,” Kings County District Attorney Charles “Joe” Hynes told The Observer on Saturday at the annual Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick’s (FSOSP) Bloomsday pub crawl.

Two years ago, FSOSP members John Burns, Declan Walsh and Jimmy Ryan decided Brooklyn needed to participate in Bloomsday—an international celebration that takes place on June 16, that date of the often-drunken exploits of Leopold Bloom chronicled by James Joyce in his novel Ulysses.

“We thought, this is preposterous that Brooklyn doesn’t have [a Bloomsday],” said Mr. Ryan. And who better to organize the day of revelry than the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick, a membership group devoted, rather vaguely, to “promoting the spirit of Saint Patrick.” Read More