In this essay, Air/Light editor David L. Ulin talks with Christos Ikonomou and Karen Emmerich about writing and translation, particularly Ikonomou’s story “A Dreadful Consolation,” which appears in Air/Light this week. Ikonomou is among Greece’s pre-eminent contemporary fiction writers, the author of four collections of short stories, including “Something Will Happen, You’ll See” and “Good Will Come From the Sea,” both of which Emmerich has translated into English. Emmerich is an Associate Professor of Comparative Literature at Princeton, and a translator of modern Greek poetry and prose. She received her Ph.D. from Columbia University in 2010. Ikonomou will be the inaugural recipient of the Chowdhury Prize in Literature, a new annual international mid-career prize for writers, presented at the University of Southern California through the auspices of the Subir and Malini Chowdhury Foundation and in collaboration with Kenyon College and The Kenyon Review. The prize seeks to identify authors who are at an inflection point, with a body of work already behind them, but also with significant future potential. It is this future work the prize means to encourage; it is not a retrospective award but rather one that is intended to actively assist writers on the creative cusp to push ahead into new territories. Ikonomou, Emmerich, and Ulin spoke together on a Zoom call from three different time zones: Athens, New York, and Los Angeles.

We're thrilled to welcome two powerhouses of Los Angeles literature onto The Air/Light Podcast. Vickie Vértiz and Alex Espinoza were both born and raised in Los Angeles, and they also make the city, its people, and its communities the center of their poetry and fiction. Vickie and Alex use their writing as both a means of artistic expression and as a process of social justice, helping to redraw the cognitive maps of Los Angeles, to orient them toward a more equal city and society. Vickie and Alex are public writers in the sense that they do so much more than write: they are also teachers, activists, and organizers.  Vickie Vértiz is a native Angelena and the oldest child of an immigrant Mexican family. Her poetry and essays have appeared in the New York Times Magazine, the Los Angeles Review of Books, KCET Departures, and the San Francisco Chronicle. Her book Palm Frond with Its Throat Cut (University of Arizona Press) won the 2018 PEN America Literary Prize in poetry. A VONA, Macondo, and CantoMundo Fellow, she teaches at UC Santa Barbara. Alex Espinoza earned his MFA from UC Irvine and is the author of the novels Still Water Saints (Random House) and The Five Acts of Diego León (Random House). His most recent book is Cruising: An Intimate History of a Radical Pastime (Unnamed Press). He’s written for the Los Angeles Times, The New York Times Magazine, Virginia Quarterly Review, and NPR’s All Things Considered. The recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the MacDowell Colony, as well as an American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation, he is the Tomás Rivera Endowed Chair of Creative Writing at UC Riverside.   In our conversation, we discuss the history and present of literature in Southern California, how art intersects with community, and more. And keep listening after the closing theme music to hear Vickie and Alex reading from new work. We hope you enjoy the episode!

We are thrilled and delighted to have Lilliam Rivera and Mark Haber join us. Lilliam’s story, “The Undercurrent,” was published in Issue 1 of Air/Light and Mark’s story “Tegucigalpa” published in Issue 3. Lilliam Rivera is an award-winning author of children’s books, including the young adult novel Never Look Back (Bloomsbury). Her work has appeared in The Washington Post, The New York Times, and Elle. A Bronx, New York native, she now lives in Los Angeles. Lilliam’s latest book, WE LIGHT UP THE SKY, came out on October 26 to critical acclaim. Mark Haber’s collection of stories, Deathbed Conversions, was translated into Spanish in a bilingual edition as Melville’s Beard by Editorial Argonáutica. His debut novel, Reinhardt’s Garden (Coffee House Press), was longlisted for the PEN/Hemingway Award. His second novel, Saint Sebastian’s Abyss, will also be published by Coffee House Press in May 2022. He is the operations manager and a bookseller at Brazos Bookstore in Houston, Texas. In this wide ranging conversation, I talked to Lilliam and Mark about how they create characters, horror and genre fiction, literary influences, sacrifices to Slender Man, and, of course, books.

A conversation with two incredible poets: Diane Mehta and Jordan Smith, whose poems were published in "Air/Light" Issue 3.

A discussion of the life and career of poet Marvin Bell with Christopher Merril and David St. John.

An interview with National Book Award-nominated poet Victoria Chang.

As the first installment of the Air/Light Podcast, we’re thrilled to present a conversation between choreographer Andre Tyson and Douglas Kearney about their performance, Code~dIsSoNaNcE~REVERIE. The conversation was hosted by Air/Light editor David L. Ulin. It was recorded on October 20, 2020.

If literature is an ecosystem, then bookstores are its foundation. They’re where literature intersects with community. They introduce people to new and idiosyncratic books while hosting events to support authors. Through it all, they serve as neighborhood community centers for readers and book lovers. But the pandemic has been hard on independent bookstores. Many have had to make direct appeals to their customers through GoFundMe and other crowdsourced campaigns. Local bookstores are facing what Dorany Pineda of the Los Angeles Times calls an “existential crossroads.” Losing our independent bookstores would be a truly devastating blow to the literary community and would only entrench the dominance of Amazon. A world without brick-and-mortar indie bookstores is not a world we want to live in. So Air/Light wants to help in our own small way. In a series of podcasts, we talk with the owners and workers at independent bookstores around Los Angeles to explore how they’re moving forward during COVID, what they’re looking forward to, what people are buying and reading, and more. Through this series we explore the art of bookselling. It’s also our hope that after you listen to these interviews, you’ll go online or in person—masked up and socially distant, of course—and support your local indie bookstore. In the first episode, Air/Light’s Katarina Dames speaks with Josh Spencer, owner and operator of The Last Bookstore in Downtown Los Angeles. Listen to the interview and then go do some holiday shopping…locally and independently!

Since it opened in 1996, Skylight Books has become a fixture in the Los Feliz and a center of the neighborhood’s literary community by hosting readings, book clubs, and launch parties. In the second installment of our “Art of Bookselling” podcast series, Air/Light‘s Claire Robertson talks to Mary Williams, the general manager of Skylight. Mary tells us about her favorite book of the year, comfort book buying in the run-up to the first lockdown, and how their customers are helping support the store throughout the pandemic. And remember: after you’ve listened, visit Skylight (or your own local bookshop) in person or online and buy a book or two. If you missed it, be sure to check out the first episode in the “Art of Bookselling” featuring Josh Spencer of Los Angeles’ The Last Bookstore.