The literary journal Spork is durable, with cardboard covers, stiff paper and stitching as strong as marlin line. Unfortunately its toughness is a gross overcompensation for the sugar-crystal writing inside. Two professors could tug-of-war with it all day and get nowhere. The journal starts on page 1,647, because, you know, it’s all a part of the endless continuum, dude. Richard Siken, the editor, opens with a post-modernist interpretation of Hansel and Gretel, and what a trail of crumbs it is.

If you want you see what writers are really like inside, go onto a small press forum and criticize the local icons. In or out of academia, doesn’t matter.  Even in communities that sing about open-mindedness, dissidence, freedom of expression, individualism and love, they will kick you like a Mexican dog.    

I think titles are important, for books and for individual pieces.  Titles such as “untitled”, “Poem”, “*” or “#3906026” make me growl.  The title is the first thing you see, and is an indication of what will come, but so often the title seems to be an afterthought or a limp appendage to a trendy marketing strategy.