Cover Image by Diana Magallön
Welcome to the Interdependency Issue, our first special issue under the Unlikely Stories: Episode IV banner! As a United States citizen living in the US, I do not meet the qualifications to be included in this issue, so I'll be "brief."
The 2012 US presidential election "season"—here called by its traditional name despite the fact that it has been a heavy part of the US news cycle since April of 2011 and has been monitored for spending by the New York Times since January of 2011—involved about $1.81 billion dollars in advertisements, bolstered by endless free attention in all major worldwide media outlets. It is also bolstered by the obsequiousness of social media and the Internet in our daily lives—and while the democratization of culture has many advantages, this journal being one of them, we can see clear disadvantage here, as the season spreads its toxicity throughout the world, with a speed and enthusiasm not previously possible.
The Interdependency Issue, then, is simply an attempt to use the Internet for something else, for stories not related to the US election season, coming from elsewhere and meaning other things. There is no unifying theme to the material in this issue, and there is no attempt to comprehensively or authoritatively explore a certain aspect of existence. There's just a little taste of "something else."
Dear g-d, anything else.
To the degree that Internet journals have a nationality, Unlikely Stories and its various incarnations would have to be regarded as [an] US journal[s]. But the label would be somewhat sketchy: a quick glance at our stories section, as of October 2012, shows 29 stories from the US and 11 stories from elsewhere since Episode IV began in March 2012. To create a non-American issue, we simply put out a call for submissions, requesting work from:
- Anyone, any where in the world, who is NOT a United States citizen, OR
- Anyone who is a citizen of one of the tribal governments within the U.S., OR
- U.S. citizens CURRENTLY living outside of the U.S., specifically writing (or creating art) about their experiences outside of the U.S.
...on any subject EXCEPT U.S. elections, past or present.
Responses were enthusiastic and exciting. We received a wealth of great material, and present our favorites here. We were particularly assisted by Gui.ra.ga7 and Tom Bradley, who hooked us up with new artists that we're very happy to now know, and Diana Magallön, who defied our disorganization to deliver a great cover image. And we, to be clear, is defined not as "me," but as Jeremy Hight, Joseph Rose, Frankie Metro, and myself—we all worked very hard to make this issue possible. Countries represented now include Australia, China, Greece, Iceland, Hungary, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Macedonia, Mexico, Palestine, South Africa, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates and the United Kingdom. We also cheated a few times, including a Greek/US collaboration, a staff interview of an UK musician, translations of French poetry by a US poet, and six cantos from Andreas Morgner's epic poem on Rwanda—Andreas spent decades working for the US Government investigating African war crimes, but as he is now stationed permanently in Washington, D.C., we broke the rules by allowing him into this issue. Sorry, everybody!
Then there's this stupendously short introduction, which will serve as the permanent table of contents for the Interdependency Issue, after the issue has rotated off our main page. Please distribute http://www.unlikelystories.org/12/penton1112.shtml as this issue's permanent introduction.
Enjoy!
Why I Never Walk through a Chinese Park during Spring Festival: a novella-sized excerpt from Calliope's Boy by Tom Bradley
The Rains of Ramghat: Short Fiction by Radha Bharadwaj
Charnel House Lover: Short Surreal Fiction by Cassandra L. Atherton
Psychonautic Metaphorphosis with Franz: Short Less-Real Fiction by Petra Whiteley
Next Year in Jerusalem: Creative Non-Fiction by Newamba Flamingo
I want to be hip: Chapter One of The Magic Window by Helena Joshee
The High Point: A Short Story by Aryan Kaganof. Let's agree to never find out if it's true.
Brain Meat for Naked Lunch: Pornographish Sound and Textual Art by Kenji Siratori
Three Songs from World News Vision by Jude Cowan Montague
Frankie Metro interviews Jude Cowan Montague
Qua Insurrection: An Audiovisual Cinépoem by Mayakov+sky (a.k.a. Nicholas Komodore) and Brian Ang
Seven Images by Gui.ra.ga7
Four Paintings by Sana Arjumand
Four Sculptures by Mick / Mtz
Three Images by Diana Magallön
Six Cantos from Kinyamaswa, the epic poem by Andreas Morgner
Four Poems by Nicholas Karavatos
Four Poems by A. D. Hitchin
Four Visual Poems by Márton Koppány
Three Poems by Marc Vincenz
Sigerson translates Louis Aragon, Blaise Cendrars, and André Breton
Desert Empire: A Poem by Stephen Nelson
The G-point of the Unknown: A Poem by Ali Znaidi
Treatment of Japan's Internatioanl Residents: Problems and Solutions for a 21st Century by Arudou Debito
Alarming Changes to Macedonian Mentality by Sam Vaknin
Arab Rites of Spring: Arturo Desimone considers the Arab revolutions and Western delusions
Gaza Youth Breaks Out: Two Years Later:Abu Yazan asks himself about the state and fate of the movement
Renewable vs. Nuclear energy for Africa by Ebenaezer Appies
A report on the student strikes in Italy
Jonathan Penton is the Martyr Alpha at Unlikely Stories: Episode IV. You can learn less about him at his bio page.
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