The man flapping out his Whitman-inspired glow at a recent event
THIS IS WHAT WE’RE UP AGAINST
by Ben Hersey
The Chuckwagon, 2008, $4 (postage included)
Ben Hersey came to Indiana for the last Vouched Presents Reading and read, no no silly, the right word is performed, or maybe exploded is an even better word, stomping around in a hockey jersey, doing some wild stuff with lettuce, chomping and sniffing and whatever, pulling this character, angry and afraid from Boston, unstable and shouting, from his body, and here in this book those words, those beautiful tragic scary scenes Hersey expelled from his body, are captured, quite remarkably, quite intact, as much as can be hoped, proving this shit can be shaking in person, but even on the page, man, his take on rattly emotion and fucked-up existence thrives.
An awesome excerpt at The Chuckwagon (where you can buy this wonderful thing for only four bucks!)
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