The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2018 Read online

  Contents

  * * *

  Title Page

  Contents

  Copyright

  Editors’ Note

  Introduction

  QUIM MONZÓ: Divine Providence

  QIU MIAOJIN: An Excerpt From Notes of a Crocodile

  CATHERINE POND: This Rain

  ALEX TIZON: My Family’s Slave

  CARMEN MARIA MACHADO: Eight Bites

  JESSE BALL AND BRIAN EVENSON: The Deaths of Henry King

  SEO-YOUNG CHU: A Refuge for Jae-In Doe: Fugues in the Key of English Major

  STACEY TRAN: In Conversation with Vi Khi Nao

  DIEGO ENRIQUE OSORNO: Come and Eat the World’s Largest Shrimp Cocktail in Mexico’s Massacre Capital

  DAVID WALLACE-WELLS: The Uninhabitable Earth

  ROXANE GAY: An Excerpt from Hunger

  FRANK B. WILDERSON III: An Excerpt from Blacks and the Master/Slave Relation

  ANDREW LELAND, CHRIS WARE, DANIEL CLOWES, AND ANDERS NILSEN: A Tribute to Alvin Buenaventura

  CHRIS (SIMPSONS ARTIST): Six Selected Comics

  KARA WALKER: Artist’s Statement

  TONGO EISEN-MARTIN: Wave at the People Walking Upside Down

  GUNNHILD ØYEHAUG: Meanwhile, on Another Planet

  DAVID LEAVITT: The David Party

  KATHERINE AUGUSTA MAYFIELD: The Reenactors

  BEN PASSMORE: Your Black Friend

  KATHY FISH: Collective Nouns for Humans in the Wild

  KRISTEN ROUPENIAN: Cat Person

  ANNIE BAKER: An Excerpt from The Antipodes

  LUCY HUBER: A Fair Accusation of Sexual Harassment or a Witch Hunt?

  BENJAMIN SCHAEFER: Lizard-Baby

  LÁSZLÓ KRASZNAHORKAI: Chasing Waterfalls

  LAURA FRANCIS AND ALEXANDER MASTERS: Love, Death & Trousers: Eight Found Stories

  HANIF ABDURRAQIB: On Future and Working Through what Hurts

  SOUVANKHAM THAMMAVONGSA: The Universe Would be so Cruel

  SAMANTHA HUNT: A Love Story

  Contributors’ Notes

  The Best American Nonrequired Reading Committee

  Notable Nonrequired Reading of 2017

  About 826 National

  About ScholarMatch

  Read More from the Best American Series

  About the Editor

  Connect with HMH

  Copyright © 2018 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company

  Introduction copyright © 2018 by Sheila Heti

  Editors’ Note copyright © 2018 by Clara Sankey

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  The Best American Series® is a registered trademark of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. The Best American Nonrequired Reading™ is a trademark of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

  No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system without the prior written permission of the copyright owner unless such copying is expressly permitted by federal copyright law. With the exception of nonprofit transcription in Braille, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt is not authorized to grant permission for further uses of copyrighted selections reprinted in this book without the permission of their owners. Permission must be obtained from the individual copyright owners as identified herein. Address requests for permission to make copies of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt material to [email protected] or to Permissions, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company, 3 Park Avenue, 19th Floor, New York, New York 10016.

  hmhco.com

  ISSN: 1539-316X (print) ISSN: 2573-3923 (e-book)

  ISBN: 978-1-328-46581-8 (print) ISBN: 978-1-328-46713-3 (e-book)

  Cover illustration and design © Tommi Parrish

  Heti photograph © Steph Martyniuk

  v2.1018

  “On Future and Working Through What Hurts” by Hanif Abdurraqib. First published in They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us by Two Dollar Radio. Copyright © 2017 by Hanif Abdurraqib. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  From The Antipodes by Annie Baker. First published by Samuel French, Inc. Copyright © 2017 by Annie Baker. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “The Deaths of Henry King: Selected Demises” by Jesse Ball and Brian Evenson. Art by Lilli Carré. First published in McSweeney’s. Copyright © 2017 by Jesse Ball and Brian Evenson. Reprinted by permission of the authors.

  “Six Selected Comics” by Chris. First published by @chrissimpsonsartist on Instagram. Copyright © 2017 by Chris. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “A Refuge for Jae-in Doe: Fugues in the Key of English Major” by Seo-Young Chu. First published in Entropy. Copyright © 2017 by Seo-Young Chu. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “Wave at the People Walking Upside Down” by Tongo Eisen-Martin. First published by Open Space, collected in Heaven Is All Goodbyes. Copyright © 2017 by Tongo Eisen-Martin. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “Collective Nouns for Humans in the Wild” by Kathy Fish. First published in Jellyfish Review. Copyright © 2017 by Kathy Fish. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “Love, Death & Trousers” by Laura Francis and Alexander Masters. First published in the Paris Review. Copyright © 2017 by Laura Francis and Alexander Masters. Reprinted by permission of the authors.

  Selection excerpted from Hunger by Roxane Gay. First published by HarperCollins. Copyright © 2017 by Roxane Gay. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “A Fair Accusation of Sexual Harassment or a Witch Hunt?” by Lucy Huber. First published in McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. Copyright © 2017 by Lucy Huber. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “A Love Story” from The Dark Dark by Samantha Hunt. Copyright © 2017 by Samantha Hunt. Reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Originally published in the May 22, 2017, issue of The New Yorker.

  “Chasing Waterfalls” by Laszlo Krasznahorkai, translated by John Batki. Published in English by Harper’s Magazine. From the story “Nine Dragon Crossing,” included in The World Goes On. Copyright © 2013 by Laszlo Krasznahorkai. Translation copyright © 2017 by John Batki. Reprinted by permission of New Directions Publishing Corp.

  “The David Party” by David Leavitt. First published by Washington Square Review, Fall 2017. Copyright © 2017 by David Leavitt. Reprinted by permission of the Wylie Agency, LLC.

  “A Tribute to Alvin Buenaventura” by Andrew Leland, Daniel Clowes, Chris Ware, and Anders Nilsen. First published by the Believer. Copyright © 2017 by Andrew Leland, Daniel Clowes, Chris Ware, and Anders Nilsen. Reprinted by permission of the authors.

  “Eight Bites” by Carmen Maria Machado from Her Body and Other Parties. First published by Gulf Coast. Copyright © 2017 by Carmen Maria Machado. Reprinted by permission of Graywolf Press, www.graywolfpress.org.

  “The Reenactors” by Katherine Augusta Mayfield. First published by Columbia University School of the Arts Thesis Anthology. Copyright © 2017 by Katherine Augusta Mayfield. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  From Notes of a Crocodile by Qiu Miaojin. Published in English by The New York Review of Books. Copyright © 1994 by Qiu Miaojin. Translation copyright © 2017 by Bonnie Huie. All rights reserved.

  “Divine Providence” by Quim Monzo, translated by Peter Bush. Published in English by A Public Space.”La divina providencia” taken from El perque de tot plegat © 1993, 1999 by Joaquim Monzo, © 1993, 1999 by Quaderns Crema, S.A. (Acantilado), Barcelona, Spain. Translation © 2017 by Peter Bush. Reprinted by permission of Quaderns Crema, S.A.

  “Come and Eat the World’s Largest Shrimp Cocktail in Mexico’s M
assacre Capital” by Diego Enrique Osorno. First published by Freeman’s. Copyright © 2017 by Diego Enrique Osorno. Translation copyright © 2017 by Christina MacSweeney. Reprinted by permission of the Wylie Agency, LLC.

  “Meanwhile, on Another Planet” from Knots by Gunnhild Øyehaug, translated by Kari Dickson. Translation copyright © 2017 by Kari Dickson. Reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

  “Your Black Friend” by Ben Passmore. First published by Silver Sprocket. Copyright © 2017 by Ben Passmore. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “This Rain” by Catherine Pond. First published by Sixth Finch. Copyright © 2017 by Sixth Finch. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “Cat Person” from You Know You Want This by Kristen Roupenian. Copyright © 2019 by Kristen Roupenian. Reprinted with the permission of Scout Press, an imprint of Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.

  “Lizard-Baby” by Benjamin Schaefer. First published by Guernica. Copyright © 2017 by Benjamin Schaefer. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “The Universe Would Be So Cruel” by Souvankham Thammavongsa. First published by NOON. Copyright © 2017 by NOON. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “My Family’s Slave” by Alex Tizon. Copyright © 2017 The Atlantic Media Co., as first published in the Atlantic. All rights reserved. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

  “Stacey Tran in Conversation with Vi Khi Nao” by Stacey Tran and Vi Khi Nao. First published by Cosmonauts Avenue. Copyright © 2017 by Stacey Tran and Vi Khi Nao. Reprinted by permission of the authors.

  “Artist’s Statement” by Kara Walker. First published by sikkemajenkinsco.com. Copyright © 2017 Kara Walker. Reprinted by permission of the author.

  “The Uninhabitable Earth” by David Wallace-Wells. First published by New York Magazine. Copyright © 2017 New York Media LLC. Reprinted by permission.

  “An Excerpt from Blacks and the Master/Slave” by Frank B. Wilderson III and C.

  S. Soong. First published by the syndicated radio program Against the Grain, which originates out of KPFA-FM in Berkeley, California. Republished in 2017 by Racked & Dispatched. Copyright © 2015 by Frank B. Wilderson III and C. S. Soong. Reprinted by permission of the authors.

  Editors’ Note

  IN ONE OF MY FIRST EMAIL EXCHANGES with this year’s guest editor, Canadian author Sheila Heti, I asked her what she hoped we might achieve for this collection: “I think we want to pry literature from the cracks; to see it where we didn’t see it before and look where other people aren’t looking.” This sentiment became the guiding principle of our collection. Featuring writing published in the U.S. in 2017, this year’s anthology not only presents new work from little known authors—both national and international—it also exhumes lost and translated voices from the past, highlighting the longevity of words across generations and geographical borders. As always, it is idiosyncratic and contains eclectic writing of all genres, offering a view of the world through the prism of a group of fifteen Bay Area high school students, who make up BANR’s editorial committee.

  The members of this committee are smart, they are savvy, and they know what they like to read. As the new managing editor, I worked with our intern Laura to ensure that everyone was comfortable and reading conditions optimal during our weekly meetings. I needn’t have worried as each one proved immensely fruitful, with conversations often taking unexpected twists and turns. Rarely did the committee like something unanimously. Instead, each piece was fiercely defended, hotly contested, and passionately debated. Ultimately the votes were cast—and as the year progressed, the “yesses,” “nos,” and “maybes” piled up.

  Many of the stories in the anthology feel strange and otherworldly, offering glimpses into other realities that reveal unexpected things about our own lives. Sheila’s own writing style and unique perspective ensured that whatever we read was fresh, exciting, and completely new. Her influence empowered the students to bring in unusual pieces they’d discovered in the far corners of the Internet to share with the group. Sheila never underestimated the students’ ability to read unconventional and demanding writing; they always rose to meet the challenge, highlighting everything that 2018 has taught us about high schoolers: they are even smarter and more powerful than we have been giving them credit for.

  For every piece included in this collection, there were three that didn’t make the cut. These have been included in the Notable Reading section on pages 288–290. Lola still thinks about Willis Plummer’s poem “10,000 Year Clock’ every day, while Max fell head over heels in love with “A House Meal,” and Sidney reckons that Leslie Jamison’s piece on Second Life in The Atlantic is something they’ll never forget. We hope your BANR adventure continues beyond this book.

  Our committee would like to say a few final words to you, dear reader: Coco wants you to know that as strange as this collection is, no one was on drugs when we put it together. Xuan is super excited for you to dive right in, and Huckleberry says that if you don’t like one piece, move on and just keep reading! Charley suggests you keep an open mind, while Zoe recommends bringing tissues. Emilia’s advice is a little more prescriptive: take it slow, she says, read a maximum of two pieces per day, otherwise you won’t be able to appreciate them. After you read, she continues, pause and let the words sink in. Max concludes that we may have a strange collection, but reading always, always has a direct impact and positive outcomes. I can’t think of a better way to send you onto Sheila’s wonderful introduction. Thank you for reading!

  —CLARA SANKEY and the BANR Committee

  June 2018

  Introduction

  “Something that’s really big for me is: does it represent the year 2017? But I think I’m looking for a piece that is both timely and will withstand the test of time—that in twenty years, is still going to be relevant to whoever is reading it.” —Emilia

  I DIDN’T KNOW WHAT I WAS GETTING INTO when I agreed to guest edit this anthology. It was all very confusing and yet presented as very straightforward—this is typical McSweeney’s, who no longer run the project, but began it, and it still bears its stamp—you are sort of expected to understand and are given very little direction, then you realize by the end that there was no direction, you were supposed to make it up on your own.

  Perhaps some of the fifteen students knew this already—the ones who had been on The Best American Nonrequired Reading committee before. There was a chaotic sense of direction from the beginning, and that an anthology was made, and that it’s as good as I think it is, perhaps has something to do with what happens when the task is no less pure than “let’s get together and read and talk about what we’re reading and somehow that will turn into an anthology.”

  I only met with the BANR committee twice, when they flew me out to San Francisco from Toronto. The first time, in November, I entered from Valencia Street into the McSweeney’s offices (crammed with books and journals and computers and people) and went into the low-ceilinged basement where a long table was piled with granola bars and chips and candy and photocopied sheets. The students welcomed me warmly, casually. They had been meeting every Monday night from 6 to 8 p.m., starting in September, and would meet until the end of May. Clara Sankey, the managing editor, led the sessions, with the assistance of this year’s intern, Laura Van Slyke.

  The evenings proceeded like this: For the first hour, the committee read silently, sitting around the long table. After the reading was done, one person began the discussion by giving a summary of the piece, then gave their opinion. Then another person gave their opinion, then another person did the same. Sometimes all of them did. Discussion ping-ponged back and forth. Sometimes a piece would be discussed for a half hour or more. Then there was a vote to determine whether the piece should be included: yes, no, or maybe. Then on to the next piece.

  As evidenced in the notes Laura took during each session, there wasn’t an atmosphere of tidy agreement:

  HUCKLEBERRY: I love this so much—it’s
like a rollercoaster (“Everything is a rollercoaster, haha,” interjects Max). It’s very fast and you can’t immediately understand what’s around you, but you’re enjoying it. And it builds to a very satisfying ending about death that I’ve never read before!

  MADI: It’s a very BANR read. You get lost in him! His flow is intriguing.

  EMILIA: I couldn’t read this. It felt like drowning. As soon as I got air, I didn’t want to go back under the water.

  I came into this process with a fair amount of skepticism about the value of anthologies: Who would rather read an anthology than a book that is one thing, with one tone, and point of view? Aren’t magazines the place for a collection of things by different authors, rather than a book? But now I can see that this anthology is something different—not just because of the quality of the material (many anthologies are quality) but because of the process it represents.

  Most concisely, as Annette put it when I returned to interview the students in the spring, “For me, the point of BANR has always been much more about what happens in this room than what we do with the book outside of the room. I’ll see it in a bookstore sometimes, and be like Hey! And that’s fun. But for me, it’s like a breath out when I come to BANR. It’s one of the safest spaces in my life. I don’t have to bring my reservations into this space; I don’t have to put a caveat on everything. I can just be okay with listening to everybody, because I know that everyone here respects everyone else.” I think everyone felt this grateful—especially in a year so dominated by fears about how polarized America had become. Here at least was one environment where disagreement could be had; where people changed their minds.

  Emma understands this anthology as being in conversation with social media: “I feel like one of the problems with how people read nowadays is they get a lot of their reading through social media and through friends. It turns into these feedback loops, and it’s this preaching to the choir. BANR is a nice process, because I didn’t get these readings from my friends. A lot of it is just random stuff from a random anthology that we have downstairs.” If BANR interrupts their loops, maybe it will interrupt yours.