"Super 8's" director, J.J. Abrams , discussed more "secrets" of the June thriller in an L.A. Times interview. The production was lensed last fall in Weirton, WV. The trailer (from You Tube) and stills are (c) by Paramount Pictures. Read more
For all those who believe that there is a inverse relationship between intelligence and religious belief, famed Los Angeles County prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi, provides ammunition in his sure-to-be controversial book on religion "Divinity of Doubt: The God Question" (Vanguard Press, 352 pages, $26.99).Read more
A poem of 1930 by the great C. P. Cavafy; it is translated from the Greek by Daniel Mendelsohn, who explores Cavafy's sense of beauty in his introduction to Collected Poems.
A poem for Easter morning, from Uproar: Antiphonies to Psalms, by Brooks Haxton. In his preface to these poems, which answer back to or jump off from the psalms he learned in childhood, Haxton reflects on "the challenge of letting the Psalms, like any art that matters, find us where we live."
Wars and rumors of war pervade the region, with democracy seekers and regime-changers threatening revolution. Entrenched regimes are doing their best to react to forces of change. No, it's not the Arab Middle East and North Africa of today, it's 1895 in Great Britain and Europe and Special Branch officers like Thomas PittRead more
One of Franz Wright's miniatures—those exquisite small poems which open up worlds. (This one originally appeared in his Entry in an Unknown Hand, 1989).
Jack Rollins, a native of Keyser, Mineral County, and a 2011 WV Music Hall of Fame inductee, - is one of the quintessential “unsung heroes” of the music business. While few know him by name, it’s not an exaggeration to say that everyone, young and old, is familiar with at least one of his songs. Read more
A poem of wild weather from Stan Rice (1942-2002), husband of author Anne Rice, a poet and painter whose concise songs of praise continue to fascinate. Read more
HUNTINGTON, WV (HNN) – Auditions for Huntington Outdoor Theatre’s “The Wedding Singer” will be Saturday, April 23 from 10 a.m.-2 p.m. and Monday, April 25, from 7 to 9:30 p.m. at Huntington High School.Read more
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. -- George Bernard Shaw, (1856-1950) from "Man and Superman"
HUNTINGTON, WV (HNN) – Three new flicks for the weekend and the demographics are varied. “African Cats” comes from Disney’s documentary unit. While there’s an elephant in the title, “Water for Elephants” emphasizes drama, at a circus, which centers on the performers not those in cages; and finally, Tyler Perry opens “Big Happy Family.”Read more
CINCINNATI, OHIO (HNN) - Save the $4.00 a gallon gasoline. You do not need to journey to the Queen City ,at least if you just want to see a peek of the internet sensation known as a purring penguin. The little tuxedo creature hatched about eight years ago according to zoo officials.The few seconds of video credit is to You Tube and kforrest. Read more
Back in 1996, writer Kevin Williamson and director Wes Craven brought us a unique horror film that was basically a satire of the slasher genre while at the same time being a pretty good slasher on its own. Due to the film’s success, a sequel was made immediately, and while it wasn’t quite on the level of the original, it worked pretty well as a follow up. The third film was where things started to go wrong.Read more
The titles of the poems in Kenneth Koch's New Addresses—"To Life," "To My Father's Business," "To World War Two," "To Kidding Around," "To Testosterone," "To Knowledge, My Skeleton, and An Aesthetic Concept," "To My Heart as I Go Along"—are almost as fun to read as the poems themselves,
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. – WMUL-FM 88.1, the student broadcast voice of Marshall University, will be host to an event to benefit Locks of Love Thursday, April 21, at the Marshall Memorial Student Center plaza on the Huntington campus. Read more
We offer a reading for the first seder of Passover tonight: a reflection on freedom and its mixed blessings by Julia Hartwig, born in Poland in 1921. (The poem is translated by John and Bogdana Carpenter.)
Pipestem, WV (HNN) – With summer fast approaching, Pipestem Resort State Park has lined up a variety of performances at the park’s outdoor amphitheater.
West Virginia film fanatics and moviegoers may be counting down the days until the J.J. Abrams/Steven Spielberg filed in Weirton, WV, flick, “Super 8” opens in June. However, the filmmakers have created a teasing viral campaign on the internet slipping a scene here and a plot ingredient there. It’s the same style of “interactive clues” that were dropped prior to the opening of “Cloverfield.”Read more
Emily Brontë was born in 1818. Along with her poems, her novel, Wuthering Heights, is considered a classic of Victorian literature. But she lived in obscurity, never having published under her own name—she wrote as "Ellis Bell"—and never having achieved the kind of critical or commercial success experienced by her sister, Charlotte (who wrote as "Currer Bell").
I'm always cheering on authors, especially those who have resorted to self-publishing because they haven't found a publisher willing to take a chance at a time when printed books are quickly becoming endangered species. The case of Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman's "Broken Promises: A Novel of the Civil War" (Ballantine Books Trade Paperback, 336 pages, $15.00),Read more
Today's James Merrill poem is from The Yellow Pages, a lesser known volume from 1974, published by the Temple Bar Bookshop rather than his regular publisher. This small grouping brought together, as he explained, "verses that gave blood to others and were thrust aside for their pains; others no less that went a flighty route their maker chose not to call his own;
HUNTINGTON, WV (HNN) – Scream IV and Rio in 3D are the wide movie releases slated for April 15 at many cinemas. In limited release, Atlas Shrugged Part I (exclusively at Pullman Square) and award-winning “The Conspirator,” directed by Robert Redford (Marquee Pullman, Marquee Galleria).Read more
We asked John Serio, the editor of Stevens's Selected Poems, to comment on today's selection. He writes, "Wallace Stevens once observed that the great poems of heaven and hell have been written and that now it is now time to write the great poem of earth.
At first look, “Rio” appeared to be another family-friendly movie for kids filled with bright colors and talking animals. To put it simply, it looked very generic as these are the elements that you would usually find in an animated film targeted for youngsters.
If you're an omnivorous reader, you've probably noticed a shortage of essay collections at the library or bookstore. One of our best essayists -- his output fills nine books -- John Updike, died in January 2009. I haven't seen much output from Gore Vidal these days.Read more
Though Emily Dickinson spent much of her adult life in familial seclusion, almost never leaving her father's house, a new Pocket Poets edition of her letters, edited by the poet Emily Fragos, reminds us of the way in which Dickinson remained involved in events and people outside her famous second story room.
Kevin Young's Ardency: A Chronicle of the Amistad Rebels, is an epic retelling in verse of the mutiny by fifty-three Africans, illegally sold in Havana, on board the slave ship Amistad in 1839. As Young reminds us in a preface, "The rebels, mostly men from the Mendi people of Sierra Leone, killed the captain and the cook but spared their masters to help steer toward the rising sun and Africa. Read more
Leonard Cohen, whose work as a songwriter transcends genres and appeals to listeners across the generations, comes before us as a poet in a new Everyman's Library Pocket Poets edition. Some of his songs are like poems, and some of his poems are like songs; his rebellious, tender, sardonic voice inheres throughout.
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