Internationally acclaimed for the hilarious and sublime Golden Days, which chronicles the survival of the human spirit after a nuclear apocalypse, Carolyn See has just written her fifth novel, Making History, which is just out on Houghton Muffin.

With songs that explored the darker sides of LA’s culture in the early ’80s, Exene Cervenka and her band X’s unique brand of folky punk rock has made them a permanent fixture in LA’s musical history.

“Perhaps because people have a short attention span you can get away with illogical developments if you make them unfold over a long period of time. People will assume that it is logical because they can’t remember what happened before.”

Fresh from recording a new album (Storyville), folk rock singer-songwriter Robbie Robertson discusses his love of New Orleans with John Sinclair.

Colm Toíbín discusses the power of the written word upon the completion of his first novel The South in conversation with Lynne Tillman from 1992.

Painter Valerie Jaudon positions her work between fine and decorative arts reconciling modernist and post-structuralist polemics with ease through open ended methods and interrogations that take on a uniquely seductive and feminine point of view.

Roland Legiardi-Laura invokes documentarian Barbara Kopple’s modesty as they discuss the extreme hardships and tensions involved in making Oscar-winning films such as American Dream and Harlan County, U.S.A.

A deftly crafted and mordant social drama set in Algeria during the last years of French Colonialism, Overseas (Outreamer), which actress Brigitte Rouan co-wrote and in which she co-stars with Nicole Garcia and Marianne Basler, marks a stunning debut for Rouan as a director.

Tremont Street

Who, when it had passed, would say

Hallelujah!
It works.

The week before the atom bomb dropped by accident on Mars Bluff, we’d made Plaster of Paris atoms in science class; with neutrons, protons, and electrons, that circled around on different color mobile strings tied to the overhead fluorescent lights. 

Another drop of sweat boiled off the curls of Gerrad’s armpit and, tickling slightly, coursed down his side.

Cut, cut each other with knives / Fall into one another’s arms

Your thumb hooked me going down Robertson.

I sit here. I sit here thinking hard about the smell of menstrual blood. 

Project for BOMB by Carter Hodgkin.

Two untitled works, by Charles Lahti.

A collection of photographs, prints, and paintings curated by Douglas Blau. Pictured are various kinds of collections through history from artists such as Jan Steen, Albrecht Dürer, and more. 

Pattern and instructions for a “wall tattoo,” titled Double-Num Wall Tattoo, by Gretchen Faust.

A mixed media collage of photographs and text, titled Minority Pin-Ups, by Hilton Als and Darryl Turner. Photo sources: Melodie McDaniels and others.

Two paintings, titled The Rules of Engagement and Dispensation by Richard Kalina.

Metal, wood, and glass sculpture, Mantle, by Tom Brokish.