#lit

BACKWORDS blog explores the intersection between presence and history. The blog is a platform that honors the moment of encounter that any one person experiences—with art, literature, music, performance, or place. Often, reflections fit multiple categories—the opposite of a news program or style blog, BACKWORDS is not preoccupied with immediacy. An event does not need to be current to be relevant, nor does a memory need to be close to its origins to hold its potency.

Featured Posts

2020 and The One Where We All Try to Stay Sane

Tunnel Vision: Preparing to Hike the Pacific Crest Trail

Giverny, This Way

Happy Holidays!

My First Foray Into The Wonderful Wallowas

Spice and Rain

Traveling with Less

Antibiotics and Balinese Dance, A Winning Combination

Let's Confuse Each Other In German: How I Turned 30 in Paris

The Art of Not Finishing A Book

Recently while catching up with an old friend in Seattle, we found ourselves wandering and gabbing inside the Elliot Bay Bookstore, a lovely independent bookstore on Capitol Hill that reminded me of Powell’s in Portland – yet with a much lovelier cafe and more peaceful environment. It was my first time in the store, and my friend, Ethan, told me that the “staff picks” section is always superb. After seeing many intriguing suggestions for future reads, I found myself, and our

Two Poems, One Song

In high school, I was not college-bound. I did not know what I wanted to do with my life, I did not see how I could even afford to go to college, and I was damn tired of academics. But somehow I ended up in advanced placement literature my senior year. It was there that I encountered two life-altering poems. I wish that I could say that this class woke up my academic ambitions and opened a limitless literary world to me, but it didn’t. In spite of her wit and caring, Mrs. Huk

Wakefield & Wordstock

Meeting your idols, your favorites, your cherished few, can be a mistake. Or everything you could have hoped for. Fantasy and reality play a sharp contrast here, and what you daydreamed versus what you get may sour or sweeten your feelings toward anyone you adore. A favorite song suddenly hits the wrong note, a treasured line from a poem or novel reads flat and remains on the page, when this meeting goes wrong. Or maybe their words or art matter more to you with a person firm

A Nation of the Heart: One Mormon Missionary's Experience with Queer Lit

In 2001, the British publishing house, Scribner, debuted an ambitious tome of a novel, near 600 pages, that would be considered beside Joyce and Wilde, Forster; and (of course, given that the novel draws its title from the form of At Swim, Two Birds) Brian O’Nolan, writing under the pseudonym, Flann O’Brien. It’s won awards and spawned both a long-running dance production as well as a stage play. The man who wrote it, Jamie O’Neill, worked as a hospital porter in London durin

Glitter and Gasoline in the Blood

Mindy Nettifee is a poet and a powerhouse of eloquence. Bust Magazine refers to her poetry as “the linguistic orgasm we've all been waiting for," and her bio reads like the poet equivalent of a rock star: She has performed and taught in over 500 hundred of venues, colleges and universities across America and Europe, competed in five National Poetry Slams, opened for indie rock act the Cold War Kids, headlined national poetry tours The Last Nerve, The Whirlwind Company and The

The New Thief of Always: Endless Scrolling, Wasted Time, and Hyperactive Boredom Through the Lens of

“However this miraculous place worked, it seemed real enough. The sun was hot, the soda was cold, the sky was blue, the grass was green. What more did he need to know?” – Clive Barker, The Thief of Always Like many of my fellow Millennials, I have a bit of an internet problem. I run two Tumblr blogs already, curlyhairedguys—what?—and a space dedicated to my photography business, each with modest followings in the thousands. I have a Facebook account, four emails addresses, a

Always, The Hours

"Dearest, I feel certain I am going mad again. I feel we can’t go through another of those terrible times. And I shan’t recover this time. I begin to hear voices, and I can’t concentrate. So I am doing what seems the best thing to do. You have given me the greatest possible happiness. You have been in every way all that anyone could be. I don’t think two people could have been happier till this terrible disease came. I can’t fight any longer. I know that I am spoiling your

Dinaw Mengestu's, The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears

It’s been a long time since I’ve walked into a bookstore and picked up a book simply because of the gorgeousness of its title, but The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears was such a title. Several years ago, at the Sunriver Books & Music store in Sunriver, OR, I was drawn to the levity associated with the idea of “Heaven,” and the burdening verb of “bear.” My curiosity was piqued by the ambiguity of the “beautiful things,” because beauty is so subjective it becomes as ambiguou

The Horror & Sublime

When my friend Hana Layson, new to the education department at the Portland Art Museum, invited me to participate in a 3-week program she was facilitating linking Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness to the video installation The Enclave by provocateur Richard Mosse I: Hadn’t seen the exhibit (but wanted to) Had read Conrad in college – and found the text a bit predictable Was aware of the famous Chinua Achebe argument that Conrad is thoroughly racist for depicting Africa (and C

Our Poison Horse

Derrick Brown’s latest book of poetry, Our Poison Horse, will not disappoint long-time readers and newcomers alike. If you haven’t heard of Derrick Brown, you may recognize his small press Write Bloody Publishing. He has published rock-star-esque spoken word poets such as Portland’s bright Mindy Nettifee, Seattle’s eloquent Elaina Ellis, the ever-touring likes of Buddy Wakefield or Andrea Gibson, and the profound Anis Mojgani. You can search the full list of authors on Write

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