The KGB Bar nonfiction reader / edited by Mark Jacobson.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Jacobson, Mark.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

American literature--New York (State)--New York.

American literature.

American literature--20th century.

American literature--21st century.

New York (State)--New York.

Physical Description:

xviii, 414 pages ; 21 cm

Place of Publication:

New York : Nation Books, [2004]

Summary:

The iconic KGB Bar on New York's Lower East Side is home to America's most diverse and exciting series of nonfiction literary readings. Over the years, luminaries such as Jimmy Breslin, Budd Schulberg, David Remnick, Jack Newfield, Natalie Angier, Joyce Carol Oates, Susan Orlean, Luc Sante, and many others have held forth before awestruck, if bleary-eyed, audiences in the bar. The KGB Bar Nonfiction Reader reflects the mix-and-match, whiplash mood-swing atmosphere of the series' best evenings. Arranged thematically around topics such as "Sex, Politics, and the Ineffable," "East Side, West Side, Weird Side," and "Lo, Cultureland!," this diverse collection includes country singer/rabble-rouser Steve Earle's moving eyewitness account of a Texas execution, a treatise on freight train-hopping by Lucius Shepard, Budd Schulberg on the making of On the Waterfront, and Pulitzer Prize-winner Mike Wallace on New York City's draft riots.

Contents:

Journalism and Justice Begin with the Same Letter

A Death in Texas / Steve Earle 3

You are Cordially Invited to My Funeral / Marcelle Clements 17

In the Land of the Fischer King / Ivan Solotaroff 23

Shadows of a Room / Teddy Atlas 47

The Single-Mom Murder

February 4, 2002 / Vanessa Grigoriadis 57

My Cocaine Museum / Michael Taussig 77

Up the River / Patrick Symmes 91

Traintime / Lucius Shepard 99

Lo, Cultureland!

Yodeling: Velvet Throats and Leather Pants from German Proto-Hippies to Jugend SS / Bart Plantenga 137

Rebel Music / Fred Brathwaite, Fab S Freddy 143

Willem De Kooning 1904-1997 / Peter Schjeldahl 157

From Will You Miss Me When I'm Gone? / Mark Zwonitzer 161

Atlantic Records: The Introduction / Darius James 173

Jazz and Boxing / Matthew Shipp 189

Letters from Anne Bourbon-Levinsky to Sophie Bourbon / As Channeled, Jon Langford 191

Weird Science / Ada Calhoun 197

From the Dream Life: Movies, Media, and the Mythology of the Sixties / J. Hoberman 207

East Side, West Side, Weird Side: Unrestrained Urbanity

Braving the Heat / Chris Smith 221

"God Bless Paddy Brown," We Cried as We Tossed His Ashes into the Air / Michael Daly 225

Karaoke Nation

Or How I Spent a Year in Search of Glamour, Fulfillment, and a Million Dollars / Steve Fishman 229

Karmandu / Mark Jacobson 241

Fun, Fun, Fun / Daniel Jeffrey Ricciato 249

The Unknown Soldier / Luc Sante 253

Talking Dot.com Inferno Blues / Bruce Stutz 257

The Battle for New York / Mike Wallace 267

On the Waterfront / Budd Schulberg 279

Sex, Politics, and the Ineffable

Dark Matters / Neil de Grasse Tyson 299

The Nudie Cuties (1950-1969) / Legs McNeil 307

Youth Vote / Danny Goldberg 327

Riff on Rio / Douglas Daly 351

The Rubaiyat of Alfred J. Prufrock, MBA / Ian Williams 355

Dust Radio / Greg Tate 359

A View from the Bridge / Terry Bisson 369

Caught up in the Mix: Some Adventures in Marxism / Marshall Berman 377

From RFK: A Memoir / Jack Newfield 395.

ISBN:

156025601X

OCLC:

56411820