A VERY OLD TITLE
The Sudden View
"Oaxaca is the home of
the tarantula and the widow-spider,
the rivers are full of crocodiles,
and the woods of pumas and tapirs,
and there is an earthquake every spring."

Great Reviews of the Past
Wall-to-Wall America
"This created no little hub-bub
and certainly brought up the question ---
still much in the air with the NEA ---
as to whether the federal government ought to be
sponsoring what some saw as paintings
that were just a bit too viewer-friendly."

BRIEF REVIEWS
Koula
Sahib

LETTERS
Paul Bowles
The Good Cripple
Edward Muybridge & O. J. Simpson

MORE LETTERS
Saramago's The Double
The Hong Kong Blues
Another Threat to Sue RALPH

EVEN MORE LETTERS
Cho-Cho Pleas
Jack Stangle
Washington Gone Crazy

ARTICLE
Revolution in the Fourth Grade
"I think it was in the 4th grade
that my career as an activist began.
There was a burning issue involving hall-passes
in my elementary school,
something to do with permission
to leave the class,
or go to the bathroom,
or something of the sort."

Great Articles from the Past
Paul McCarthy
"Disney has something to do with the future.
It's a virtual space, not unlike the Acropolis.
The Disney characters, the environment,
the aesthetic are so refined,
the relationships so perfect.
It's the invention of a world."

READINGS
Three by Sybille Bedford
Mexican Donkeys
"Where else in the world
could one acquire two such
enchanting, delicately made,
silk-muzzled creatures for that sum?
In later life they tend to become
sullen and coarse-grained,
with me they would spend
years of ease."

Patzcuaro, Mexico
"The worse the postal service,
the better the climate, wine and food.
Without such compensations,
Patzcuaro beats any telegraph office between
the Bosphorus and the Mexique Bay."

Mexican Bandits
"'It is their hour,'
said one of the passengers.
'Why doesn't anyone do something about them?'
'Gentlemen: they are armed.
Armed with firearms.'
'They do not take much,'
said another passenger.
'What is all this?' said E."

POETRY
Johann Sebastian Bach & Bees
"If Bach had been a beekeeper
he would have heard
all those notes
suspended above one another
in the air of his ear
as the differentiated swarm returning
to the exact hive."

Sunday Afternoon on a Highway in New Jersey
"'It's really sad
when you can't get laid
and you're a girl,'
I said to my friends
on the way to the abortion clinic.
They didn't hear me though,
because they were vogueing
in the backseat."

Toilet
"A tunnel finds us looking out the window
into one another's eyes. She leaves her seat,
but I know that she likes me
because the light saying 'TOILET'
has come on..."

THE OFFICIAL RALPH
Paradox-of-the-Month

GENERAL INDEX
A complete list of all books reviewed in RALPH,
arranged by title, including author, subject, and publisher,
plus a listing of all readings, articles and poems
that have appeared since 1994.

A PITHY SAMPLE
of our most notorious reviews
as collected in the hard-copy
"FOLIO"

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