From: Pitchaya Sudbanthad 
Sent: Monday, June 23, 2003 10:57 PM
Subject: Regarding Silent Reading II

You may wonder why I was not at the reading. Yes, it was on short notice. Yes, I had more pressing, important things to do. But I want you to know that I took the time of Silent Reading II to protest against its very idea. I was thinking how typical, to read silently. After all, isn't that what is usually demanded of us, that we become reverently engrossed in the written word with a craven, monastic silence? So I decided to hold Loud, Boisterous Reading Session I. I sat in the middle of Bryant Park, brought out my book, opened to the first page, and proceeded to scream at the top of my lungs, every single goddam word I could holler out before the Park Police got to me. The book I chose: Thoreau's Walden, now part of the NYPD evidence files. (I was up to Chapter 4, just as Henry was saying " I did not read books the first summer; I hoed beans. Nay, I often did better than this") 

Yes, time in the processing cell could seem quite long and sufferable, but I was glad I brought something to read. So there, you go. Have your quiet, mousy literary get-togethers with tea and crumpets. I'll have mine with dissent, rock'n roll, and a potential misdemeanor. (Know any good lawyers?)

Unsilently yours,
Pitchaya
 

From: Pitchaya Sudbanthad 
Sent: Tuesday, June 24, 2003 12:45 PM
Subject: Re: Regarding Silent Reading II

You mistake me for the ULA. If you want some superficially rebellious morons, there's a whole troupe of them already organized for quick injections of terror into nursing home and high school libraries. (You can even join them if you'd like; you know you want to Mr. Klein, ever since Rick "The Scratcher" Woodley, electrician's son and future Army Ranger, wouldn't let you on his kickball team in the third grade) You see, Mr. Klein, my efforts do not reflect any urge to congregate in such a fashion of bombastic and completely artless public display. My evocation of the themes of dissent and rock n' roll are shout-outs to my peeps out representing in the world of complete blah blah, snore, snore, and gs%$dbnfvxc79. My exhibition has its roots in the performances of the likes of Bruce Nauman and Marina Abramovic, with a little bit of Jim Carrey, Big Bird, and Prince mixed in there. 

I am not searching and reaching for the real, authentic, the gloss of blue-collar sweat and spilled PBRs. Like you, I'm trying to create the kind of wasteful spectacle that only luxury, privilege, and overeducation can afford. Mr. Klein, you and I are the same. We are spineless, defenseless, completely lackluster creatures whose hopes for the perpetuation of our genes can only come from creating events like these to lure potential mates. For example, yesterday, I met Lucinda, who was sitting on the bench across from me, eating her bag of Pirate's Booty. Although we did not exchange contact info (the handcuffs and "the right to remain silent" prevented that), I could tell that something was going on by her admiring glances (she seemed like a librarian; her favorite authors are probably Jeanette Winterson and Jane Austen; she doesn't eat red meat and probably lives in Inwood, where she has two cats --- sexy). You see, Mr. Klein, that's what it's really about isn't it? Admit it. It's OK, Mr. Klein. There, there.

Mr. Klein, we can work together. We can create a future of disharmony and restlessness in the literary world, and we will sweep in and take the spoils. There shall be fifty pea-eyed virgins for every silent or boisterous reader! Do you not see the beauty of this plan? Do you? 

And, Pitchaya can be a tripthong name, a very tripthong name. My, look at those vowels! 

Please return later in the afternoon or late tonight for Mr. Klein's rhetorical bitchslap -- Mr. Klein would provide the rhetorical bitchslap right now, but he is busy earning the $$$ that maintains this pissant website and his profligate "lifestyle." Now it is later. We signify later with roman text. Roman as opposd to italics. Yes. Pitchaya, I was a dominant kickball player. You couldn't have known that. An excellent dodgeball player, too. Always the first or second pick. A foot taller than everyone. Silent reading, for me, is about being smaller. Klein means small in German. It refers to the size of my . . . No. Not that. It refers to the size of my mindedness. And like my mindedness, silent reading is about being not so big. About disappearance. Did you know that?!? Not so much about creating situations that enable tiny stiffened parts of my lower midsection to disappear within other silent readers' dampy damps. I'm not so sure we can work together; your salacious focus forbids it. I don't want pea-eyed virgins. Not even almond-eyed girls with experience. I want nothing. But silence. I want you to hush your mouth. What I really want is for King Wenclas to wrestle Neal Pollack. That's what I want. I want to talk about the ULA. I want King Wenclas. He wants to publicize his people. Shake things up. He once said the following, on the record, about Neal Pollack: "I'll just say that Pollack is a blatant opportunist, but he's more on the order of a literary clown. The ULA, on the other hand, attacked Jonathan Franzen on matters of substance: the NEA grant fiasco. Nice to see the ultimate bandwagon jumper, Neal Pollack (one-time protege of Dave Eggers) copying from us. It shows that we're setting the direction." And how about ULAer Chris Zee on the estimable Mr. Pollack: "He wants to be punk rock. He doesn't understand that the punk ethic was born in an environment of anger and working class struggle (in the UK) and alienation and boredom (in the US). And he's got a couple books  published and successful, so what is he upset about? It's a pose. The ULA has concrete reasons for its insurrection. It has a vision for what literature should be. Pollack sees the validity of them and fears being churned under by them. So he moves to Austin and pretends to invent the "punk" rock stage in literature. There is nothing more embarassing than a man in his late thirties just discovering punk rock and the attitude. It means he didn't have the heart to rebel as a young man." And what's the great Mr. Pollack himself have to say when asked about wrestling King Wenclas: "I just don't think a battle between Wenclas and I would mean much. But if you want to organize a panel discussion or something, I would definitely appear on it with him, and with Dennis Loy Johnson of Mobylives, and you can appear on it too. You can call it Battle of the Embittered or something like that..." And what do I have to say about all this? I prefer the thousand-worded silence of the photo below that proves, once and for all, that Mr. Pollack and Mr. Wenclas are, quite obviously, identical twins:(*