Dan Kennedy Blog Thing: ReallySmallTalk.com

WELCOMING THE NEW MIKE TOPP BOOK

I don't know. I don't know how to go about this, because it's been a long day and to talk too much about why Mike Topp's work is important seems almost to hold it too close to the light, as I've heard it put -- even if the light in question is just the glow of the little 5 watt light of ReallySmallTalk.

A copy of Mike Topp's new book, "Shorts Are Wrong" showed up here in the mail. It is 128 pages long; I note this because any true fan of Mike Topp understands the rigors of trying to group together all of the pieces of his work into one place, trying to remember which chapbooks overlap with which web pieces, which ones have new stuff that you haven't seen yet, etc. So here it is, all in one place, although I'm pretty certain this isn't the definitive or complete Mike Topp.

I'll venture to say that if Larry David is a comedian's comedian, Mike Topp is a writer's writer's writer, bearing the blessed and cursed hallmarks of being the outsider's outsider. But that might be a bit of an illusion, since Topp is well known to anyone in the know, but at the same time, the outsider's outsider thing can't be too far off. To whit: Novelist, Distinguished Professor, and NPR Columnist Andrei Codrescu will go out of his way to blurb Mr. Topp's previous indie endeavors such as "Happy Ending" (Future Tense), while Jonathan Lethem -- to be fair, presumably at the the height of several big successes and being hounded by agents and editors for blurbs, probably hourly -- politely passed on doing so. Mike Topp includes both blurbs on the back of "Happy Ending", which, now that I think about it, is a Mike Topp piece in and of itself.

"Mike Topp's irreducible art consists partly of recycling expandable parts of speech and revealing their unused genius. Other parts are fixed, like the sly orthography. Topp is the Andy Warhol and Ralph Nader of literature." --Andrei Codrescu

"I'm sorry, Mike, you know I love your work, but I'm just not whoring myself out for anyone else's jacket copy anymore." --Jonathan Lethem

I saw Mike Topp read years ago at a place downtown you might remember as "Fez." He was in front of the mic for a total of maybe three and a half minutes, he read probably seven pieces in that time, back to back to back to back. No self-deprecating or charming ironic hipster chit chat in between. No MFA precious introductions laced with self referential insight and brainy gravitas -- just the title, the work, and then the next piece, and the next; fast and without lull or need. I recall each piece just nailing the audience into laughter and nods and applause, all of which was cut short by the start of the next piece. If you ever saw The Ramones play, it was kind of like that by my recollection -- a micro lit Ramones set. Anyway, I'm going on and on and on about the genius of Mike Topp's brevity, so if it's not already too late, I'll keep it short.

[buy a copy here]

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SOME OF MIKE TOPP'S PIECES FROM THE RST VAULT:

RECENT BUMPER STICKERS

EAST SIDE SUSHI SPECIALS

THEY'VE COME FOR THE TV

ASK THE WISE OLD OWL

THIRTEEN WONDERS OF MANHATTAN

LOVEBUZZ

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A MOST SOBERING PREMIERE

Went tonight to the New York premiere of the new Michael Moore film "Sicko" at the Ziegfeld. Never having been a huge fan of Michael Moore, I went mostly for the sake of catching up with a friend of mine. Okay, and the oddly pleasurable rush I get from anonymously drinking diet soda garnished with a wedge of complete obscurity next to really wealthy, powerful, famous Hollywood people who are drinking complimentary champagne chilled by diamonds and eating money-stuffed mushrooms warmed by flashbulbs.

While I'm not a huge fan, I've always thought that, almost certainly, Michael Moore is a good guy with his heart in the right place, but the couple of movies of his I've seen left me feeling like the creative license he takes undermines what could have been larger points to his work -- like there was almost a journalistic irresponsibility (albeit in the name of good intentions) that left me with a feeling of, like, "Damn, that's why the conservatives dismiss the left so easily." Although, in fairness, I'd have to say that's a handy/lazy point of view for me to come up with so conveniently, since I think the fundamentalist right and altruistic left piss me off about equally on any given day. Anyway, my point -- and I won't indulge myself any further in making it, I promise -- is this: see this film!

Right, but here I go breaking that promise I just made:

Equal parts absolutely chilling, sobering, heartbreaking, even oddly entertaining at turns without veering into journo-101 stunts. Simple in its power, intelligent, moral, honest and nuanced -- it's work that is bigger than Michael Moore and it is unbelievably stirring and moving to see him in the frame of it, seeming to slowly realize that.

You can honestly count on me to be a pretty sturdy cynic in the most so-called moving moments; a very sober accounting is always running through my head at every turn of anything "designed" to move me -- and I came to this movie ready to find exactly how it was trying to work on me. But, Jesus, the evidence of everyday people just trying to take care of themselves and their loved ones in the bind of what has become the American middle class, so plainly presented -- it put a lump in my throat and an apology in my heart for everything our Grandfathers fought for and what we've somehow let it become.

The message in "Sicko" is even bigger than the subject matter of a failing so-called health care system; I was sitting there struck with this really simple and dumbfounded realization that we've learned to become the kind of people who, for a price (and there is a price -- have you ever received a $50,000 bonus at work? Have you ever received a $100,000 bonus at work? Plus a raise?) will look each other in the eye and deny a policy payment for the ambulance ride from one's head-on automobile collision on the highway on the grounds that one didn't call ahead to the 800 number for pre-approval for an ambulance ride. Or scour your policy looking for a way to deny paying for your chemotherapy even though you were insured and your cancer was not a pre-existing condition.

The compassion and humble decency Michael Moore showed in making this movie is amazing -- especially in a time when the country is filled with powerful wealthy men giving an obscene amount of self-aggrandizing lip service to God and Family Values, while somehow never getting around to doing the kind of work that resembles the influence of either.

And you know, I feel I did my part tonight by not handing Harvey Weinstein a galley of my next book at the after-party then hugging him, weeping, and refusing to let go unless he agreed to make it into a movie.

So, yeah...we all do what we can.

That's my point, really.

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PHOTO: GOOD RULE OF THUMB

AND GOD SPOKE AGAIN