Burnside posted the recap of Church Hopping LIVE: St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Thanks so much for all who came out and to those who’ve been following along virtually!! I hope to come to your city or town one day to view the beautiful churches in your neighborhood and meet you.
Here’s the St. Bart’s recap in case you missed it.
Check out Burnside for a full recap on Church Hopping LIVE to St. Bart’s. Part 2 to St. Patrick’s will post later this week so keep your eyes peeled!
And, don’t forget: the next Church Hopping LIVE event is August 20. Details here.
A couple months back I had the opportunity to meet and interview a legendary photographer in his studio. It was such a fun and inspiring day. I mean, this photographer had shot all sorts of famous people — jazz musicians, a president, Allen Ginsberg — and had incredible and hilarious stories to share about his photography adventures.
My editor at Resource Magazine asked me to fictionalize an account of the photographer’s craziest day on the job. You can read the result in the summer 2011 issue of Resource Magazine, on newsstands now! It’s called “Industry Tales: The Tall Tales of a Russian Illusionist” (page 18). If you can guess who the photographer is (hint: he really is Russian), comment below!
You can’t read the article online (sorry!) but if you look real hard you can view a photo of me on the contributor’s page.
Hope you’ll check out Resource not just for my article alone. It’s a great photo mag. What I love about Resource is the way it breaks the mold for photography magazines. It’s so much more than a technical how-to photo magazine. It’s a lifestyle photography magazine, meaning Resource features cool restaurants to take clients, photographer profiles, and intriguing events and stories that a photographer might be interested in shooting.
Forgot to mention that Burnside posted by Boxhockey!!! article. Don’t know what Boxhockey is? It’s awesome, that’s what it is.
El Greco. The Crucifixion. 1596-1600.
Hope you had a lovely Easter! In case you missed my post last Friday on BWC on “probably the most intense and haunting collection of artwork I have ever witnessed,” you can check it out here.
The folks over at Broadcastr asked me to participate in the David Foster Wallace Appreciation Project. I’ve written a little bit about Wallace here on the blog as well as over on Burnside (also, check out my BWC editor, Jordan Green’s, piece on Wallace), so I was really excited to be part of the David Foster Wallace Appreciation Project on Broadcastr.
For anyone who doesn’t know, David Foster Wallace‘s novel The Pale King comes out today. This highly anticipated book is being published posthumously by Little, Brown and Company.
Broadcastr is compiling stories from fans to celebrate the release of The Pale King. In my appreciation story, I talk about resisting and embracing David Foster Wallace’s style in my own writing.
And when I say “talk,” I mean it literally. Broadcastr is a social-media platform that collects audio stories. Last year I was working on curricula for a documentary that involved oral storytelling so I was really intrigued by the idea of contributing audio. I’ve done a live reading here or there, but this is the first time I’ve ever done a recording. I hate the sound of my own voice when I hear it on answering machines so I was a bit hesitant, but in the end I really enjoyed the experience of recording something I’d written. It was a whole new way of viewing a story.
The name of my Broadcastr post is called “Accepting and Rejecting the Influence of David Foster Wallace.” I hope you’ll check it out and let me know what you think!
Image via Wikipedia
Hola! The latest entry in my Church Hopping column at Burnside Writers Collective is up, and it’s probably one of the most unique churches I’ve featured to date. It’s Don Justo’s “Trash” cathedral in Spain. A lot of my friends said the church is “interesting” in that tone that means “strange,” and while I agree it’s definitely not your traditional cathedral, I think the symbolism behind it is astounding. What do you think?
Had a great chat with my former editor last week. He told me about some great events at Cornelia Street Café; I told him about a reading by a political prisoner I attended at The New School.
He also let me in on some exciting news::: the ebook edition of A Lady’s Life in the Rocky Mountains—letters by Isabella Bird, introduction by yours truly—is currently one of his bestsellers!
Obviously, I’m happy on a personal and professional level, but I’m also happy because Isabella Bird’s story is so beautiful and inspiring and it deserves a wider audience. The short of it is that Bird left the comforts of home in Victorian England to travel by herself through the rough terrain of America’s Rocky Mountains. As I wrote in my introduction to the book, “Whether you’re interested in nature, the history of the Rocky Mountain region, travel writing, Christianity, or women’s studies, Bird’s simple yet provocative letters will entertain your imagination.”
I’d say that’s worth the $1.99 for the nook book!
In case you missed it, here’s the link to my most recent Church Hopping entry on Burnside Writers Collective. In this adventure, I bring you to Agia Lavra, the little church where the Greek revolution began. Long before Facebook organized citizens, the Church was a place of social change.
The New School’s Creative Writing MFA program mentioned me in “Newsletter 18—Spring 2011.” Special thanks to the “office heroes” for mentioning me alongside David H. Lippman (MFA ’01), William Rockwell (MFA ’11), and Laura Jo Hess (MFA ’12).
The newsletter also mentioned that Yew Leong (MFA ’07) launched a new literary magazine called Asymptote. The first issue features such esteemed writers as Mary Gaitskill, Yoram Kaniuk, and Gleb Shulpyakov. Asymptote is currently accepting submissions (March 15 deadline) on the theme of an “encounter between languages.”
Stephanie Nikolopoulos is a writer, editor, writing teacher, and speaker based in New York City.
She is the coauthor, with Paul Maher Jr., of "Burning Furiously Beautiful: The True Story of Jack Kerouac's 'On the Road.'"
You can email her at stephanie_701 {@} yahoo.com
Stephanie Nikolopoulos 
