FOR US, that’s the big question, as we’re a forward-looking literary project out to decipher how the literary art will change– how it must change to retain any place in this crazy noisy society. Or in any society. (One criterion we look for in new fiction is universality: Is it enough of a tale to appeal to anyone anyplace?)
We’ll take, in our mad quest, pieces of ideas from anytime in the past– if we believe they’ll work with readers today. For instance: the yarn. The kind of Mark Twain Bret Harte Jack London story told at night around a campfire, or under an urban streetlamp, or in a dorm room. Something maybe over-the-top, often imaginative, and definitely so compelling you couldn’t stop listening– or reading– if you tried. Three months ago, New Pop Lit’s two editors (we hope to add others) were sitting around a coffee shop discussing this very notion. We’d presented several terrific tales in the past, but we wanted more. Give us stories! we shouted (not really), but wanted to, whether propelled by the love of literature and art or from too much caffeine. Lo and behold, arriving into our Inbox that very day was a wild story– definitely a yarn– set in New York City, that maddest, wildest, most ambitious of all cities. The story: “Give the People Guns” by Bela Seitz. Please click on the title and read.
Bela Seitz anyway seems wildly talented. Perhaps one of a phalanx of new prodigies prepared to bring fresh imagination and excitement into today’s literary game? One never knows. Idealists that we are, we hope so. We also hope you enjoy the story.
Grey billowing clouds rushed across the sky, as though someone had a high-powered fan propelling them across the vast blue expanse so that the weather could match the demeanor of the collected reporters. They used to have passion in their eyes, but now their faces were taut, stretched with the gravity of the situation and an innate understanding that the news was no longer something to look at on your phone and laugh about – but was something to be taken seriously.
New Pop Lit 
Hey, Karl. This is just a shot in the dark, but, if youre looking for different things to publish, how about a movie review Heres one I sent out to some of my friends the other night. Nick Gallup.
For those of you who are reading-challenged, I watched a thought-provoking morality movie on Netflix called Hostiles the other night. Its a western, set circa 1878 just after Custer was killed and the Indian wars were ending. An Army captain, hardened by years of fighting and days away from retirement, is ordered to escort a group of Indians back to their sacred grounds in Montana. He hates Indians and is not happy about the assignment. The movie makes no attempt to disguise how abysmally the Indians had been treated, so its not your typical John Wayne fare. Along the way they pick up a woman whose family has been massacred by renegade Indians. Wont tell you any more than that, other than to say that there are some very graphic fighting scenes which will probably turn off squeamish or possibly more discerning viewers. Beautiful photography, shot mostly outdoors. Slow moving, but in an enticing way, as it takes its time for character development. Battle scenes were very realistic, as there was none of that quick draw pulp fiction and the captain misses more shots than he makes. A beautiful English actress, Rosamund Pike, plays the massacre survivor. I fell in love with her when she played Jane, the eldest sister in the Kierra Knightly version of “Pride and Prejudice. (Its one of my favorite movies. If you havent seen that version, then you haven t seen the best version of P&P ever made.) Rosamunds a little out of place at first, but shes such a good actress she makes it believable. Christian Bale is the captain, and he does a credible job portraying a weary, lonely soldier who realizes too late he may have been on the wrong side of the fight. And, yeah, amidst all the adventure and chaos theres a predictable, but satisfying love story. Aint movies great? Reading is better, though.
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Hi Nick. We can use it at Fast Pop, will post it some time late December/early January. I’ll keep you posted.