Cool-looking authors No. 15

James Franco, author of the short story collection "Palo Alto"
(Photo by Inez van Lamsweerde, for VMan)

A question (partial) from the article "Why Critics Praise Bad Poetry"

Why would anyone
want to jump through
rhetorical hoops
to read a poem?

— Adam Plunkett (Bookforum.com, Sept. 15, 2011)

Look

Tengo's father turned
in his direction.
His expressionless eyes
made Tengo think
of two empty swallow's
nests hanging
from the eaves.

— Haruki Murakami
(translated by Jay Rubin, New Yorker fiction, 9-5-2011)

Cool-looking authors No. 14

Justin Torres, author of "We the Animals"
(Photo by Gregory Crowley)

Cool-looking authors No. 13

Ernest Hemingway, author of -- OK, please tell me I don't have to list what he wrote, since you know who the iconic American author is. And, yes, in addition to his famous novels and short stories, he also wrote poetry.

(Photo by Yousuf Karsh; iconic photo taken in 1957)

Cool-looking authors No. 12

Bret Easton Ellis, author of "Less Than Zero," "American Psycho" and "Imperial Bedrooms"
(Photo by Jeff Burton)

Cool-looking authors No. 11

L. Lamar Wilson, poet featured in "The 100 Best African-American Poems" and a good all-around person.
(Photo by Rachel Eliza Griffiths)

Miracles

But
miracles
have losers
as well
as winners.

— Albert E. Cowdrey, "The Bogle"
(short story, Fantasy and Science Fiction magazine, Jan/Feb 2011)

Cool-looking authors No. 10

Arthur Rimbaud (French poet, stopped writing around age of 21; died at age 37 in 1891)
(Photo by Etienne Carjat)

Reading

The voices in the books
were like the voices of the dead.
I did not hear them.

— Sherwood Anderson, "The Other Woman"