Thursday, August 28, 2008

Future Nights


Joyce Carol Oates has put out her last book, Wild Nights!: Stories About the Last Days of Poe, Dickinson, Twain, James, and Hemingway. I guess she wish she were Dickinson, inasmuch her impersonation in the picture above. One of the short stories is "EDickinsonRepliLuxe," a tale of a suburban couple that purchases a Dickinson android. Maybe this incursion into sci-fi has as precedent the collection of ten stories by Lovecraft compiled by her. The title of the new book refers to the following inspired Dickinson's verses:

Wild Nights – Wild Nights!
Were I with thee
Wild Nights should be
Our luxury!

Futile – the winds –
To a heart in port –
Done with the compass –
Done with the chart!

Rowing in Eden –
Ah, the sea!
Might I moor – Tonight –
In thee!