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Pif Magazine
ISSN: 1094-2726
Published by:
Pif, LLC
PMB 248
4820 Yelm Hwy SE
Suite B
Lacey, WA 98503-4903
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| PAST ZINE REVIEWS | MORE ZINES |
afterDinner
Reviewed by Ingrid Woodrow
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Most people know what it's like to be totally engrossed in some task and to suddenly have the plug pulled: your computer crashes or there's a power failure right in the middle of your favorite TV show. I had a similar experience while reading afterDinner (www.afterdinner.com), an elegant site specializing in "personal narratives" or "poetic journalism" of no more than 1200 words. But more about that later. According to the editor, Alexis Massie, this literary genre is distinct in that it requires the blending of fact and fiction, "the transplantation of real events into a literary setting." The resulting work should ideally feature character development, conflict and resolution yet still have a "documentary" feel to it. |
afterDinner |
When I first discovered this 'zine last year, I felt as though I'd dug up a buried treasure. afterDinner is a striking example of minimalist design combined with quality content - I was particularly taken with the color scheme: old-fashioned pea-green with black Bernhard Modern font on white. It seemed a perfect example of the editor's comment that poetic journalism itself must balance "clarity with omission," ideally with something "haunting in the background, unspoken."
The work in Issue 16 did not disappoint. The featured authors, George Johnson, Michael Zacks, Roberta Puma and Tony Steidler-Dennison all succeed admirably in creating "literary versions" of themselves. Johnson, in "There's Nothing to See," tells of his friend Max who "has cats but doesn't understand them. Sometimes when we stop at his apartment I ask him why they lick each other or look at the ceiling when there's nothing to see...Max says, Privacy. Even cats need their secrets."
Michael Zacks' "Coffee Mug" details his presence during one of those rare "moments that decide our fate," of which the only reminder he now has is a Denny's coffee mug which, he suspects, may one day hold his ashes "as testament to a life whose soundtrack would not so much be accompanied by an orchestra as...a kazoo." The ellipses in the previous quotation are where I deleted a grammatical error in the original text. There are a few of these, along with three typos that I could detect (including one in the editorial). I thought I could find it in my heart to forgive these, given the overall quality of this unique site, and was all set to peruse the "Other Issues" when... nothing. A dead link. Just like that. I should have realized - fifteen other issues of this quality was too good to be true. And that's all there is to afterDinner - the tantalizing prospect of more. I expected to leave with a full stomach, but all it did was whet my appetite. A disappointment indeed.
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Ingrid Woodrow is a writer based in Brisbane, Australia. Her first novel, Goddess and the Galaxy Boy, will be published in early 2001. She is completing a PhD in Creative Writing at the University of Queensland and working on a new novel.She is also the founding editor of the online writing journal Mangrove, which is listed as a "Site of National Significance" in the National Library of Australia's PANDORA archive.
Further information and samples of her work can be obtained by visiting www.uq.edu.au/~eniwoodr