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SEPTEMBER 2015
"ZAC'S CONTROL PANEL"
AVAILABLE SEPTEMBER 10th, 2015
"Zac's Control Panel" is a collection of famed experimental author Dennis Cooper's short, transmutational works employing and 'misplacing' animated gifs. As in his highly acclaimed and popular novel "Zac's Haunted House", Cooper uses the gif as a language-like material to reposition, in the case of these new works, forms considered literary (the short story, flash fiction, the poem) and nondenominational (the documentary, the reenactment) into complex, poetic, claptrap visual literary mediums.
"Zac's Control Panel" will be available from Kiddiepunk as a free download or to view online from September 10th, 2015.
More info here: www.kiddiepunk.com
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JANUARY 2015
"ZAC'S HAUNTED HOUSE (A NOVEL)"
AVAILABLE NOW
Dennis Cooper’s tenth novel bears all of the earmarks of his legendary and controversial work — intricate formal and stylistic play, disturbing content, an exploration of the borderline between fantasy and reality, concern for the emotions and dilemmas of youth, etc. — but it is both something unique in his body of writing and possibly something of a world’s first in the novel genre itself.
Instead of gathering materials from language, sentences, and the developmental character and narrative possibilities allowed and restricted by written fiction, Cooper has turned his characteristic inventiveness on the animated gif, employing gifs’ tightly wound, looping visual possibilities, nervous rhythms, tiny storylines, and their status as dismembered, twitching eye candy to compose a short novel of unexpected complexity, strangeness, poetry, and comedy.
"Zac’s Haunted House" is as fun and eerie to explore as its namesake attraction, and, the more closely one searches and decodes its carefully detailed sequences and construction, a deep and fraught fiction puzzle.
Available as a free download or to view online: www.kiddiepunk.com/zacshauntedhouse
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MAY 2014
"GONE: SCRAPBOOK '80 - '82"
LIMITED EDITION BOOK OUT THIS MONTH
From Infinity Land Press:
Put together in secrecy during late 1980 until early 1982 GONE is a tour de force into Dennis Cooper’s most private obsessions and forbidden fantasies. We’ve never seen him exposed like this before, without leaning on (or hiding behind) his remarkable craft. Cooper mingles picture- and text collages, prose and poetry with news reports and pornography. The tabloid killings of William Bonin, Dean Corll and John Wayne Gacy – the victims catalogued repeatedly like Warholian icons – bleeds into late 70s/early 80s teen stars and anonymous, forgotten porn actors in a crude, yet rigorously composed collage of Sadeian proportions. This is the template of the inner drives that later would spawn the masterpiece “The George Miles Cycle”.
Softbound, 196 pages, Limited edition of 100 copies
Available for pre-orders from 27th April, shipping from 27th May 2014
More info / buy here
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AUGUST 2013
THE WEAKLINGS (XL) OUT IN NOVEMBER
From Sententia Books:
The Weaklings (XL) is Dennis Cooper’s first full-length collection of poetry in almost two decades. Although best known nowadays as the author of nine celebrated and controversial novels, including the five novel sequence The George Miles Cycle (1998-2000), The Sluts (2004), and, most recently, The Marbled Swarm (2011), Cooper came to prominence as a poet in the early 1980s. His first collection, Idols (1979), is considered a classic of gay literature, and his second, Tenderness of the Wolves (1981), was nominated for The Los Angeles Times Book Prize. His most recent collection was The Dream Police: Selected Poems 1969-1993 (1994). Cooper’s poems have been widely anthologized, including in Post-Modern American Poetry: A Norton Anthology, and were featured in the PBS series The United States of Poetry. The Weaklings (XL), which expands upon a limited edition 2008 book of the same name, gathers the best of Cooper’s poetry from the last 19 years.
More Info here
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MARCH 2012
KUNSTVEREIN AMSTERDAM PRESENTS CLOSER: THE DENNIS COOPER PAPERS (MARCH 23 - JUNE 23, 2012)
In continuation of Kunstverein’s survey-as-shop series, Closer – The Dennis Cooper Papers profiles the influential literary figure of Dennis Cooper, acknowledging his important impact across literature, poetry, performance and visual art.
The exhibition hinges on the George Miles Cycle (1989 – 2000), a series of interconnected novels that include graphic scenes of violence and desire, of pedophilia, mutilation and necrophilia. The complex structure of the cycle could be seen as literary sculpture; one that is layered and constructed out of geometrical forms.
In the collaboration with the Fales Library & Special Collections of New York University, Kunstverein presents the archive of the George Miles Cycle, comprised of manuscripts, journals, posters, correspondence, scrapbooks and videocassettes. In addition, works by Vincent Fecteau and Falke Pisano are shown alongside the archive material. Artist Trisha Donnelly has been commissioned to produce new work based on the five novels.
More Info here
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FEBRUARY 2012
'TEENAGE HALLUCINATION' AT CENTRE POMPIDOU, PARIS
DC and his frequent theater collaborator Gisele Vienne will co-curate a section of the annual Un Nouveau Festival at the Centre Pompidou in Paris entitled TEENAGE HALLUCINATION. Running from February 22 to March 12, TEENAGE HALLUCINATION will include art exhibitions, films, lectures, live performances, concerts, an installation of the visual components of Cooper/Vienne's works to date, and performances of their theater pieces Last Spring, a Prequel (2011), Jerk (2008), and Cooper/Cochrane/Houston-Jones' Them.
More Info here
'LAST SPRING, A PREQUEL' AT WHITNEY BIENNIAL
Gisele Vienne and DC's most recent collaboration, "Last Spring, A Prequel" has been selected as part of the 2012 Whitney Biennial.
"Dark fantasies and primordial urges lurking beneath the surface of day-to-day life are the subject matter of this installation, in which an animatronic teenage boy engages in an unsettling dialogue about evil and the nature of reality with himself via a hand puppet. The project was conceived and created by Gisèle Vienne, much of whose work explores the edges of normative human behavior, often utilizing puppets and human-size dolls. It is her latest collaboration with Dennis Cooper, whose poetry, experimental novels, and short stories have powerfully mined this territory for more than thirty years, inspiring a generation of envelope-pushing artists. The haunted house–like setting of this surreal scene is enhanced by the original music of Peter Rehberg and Stephen O’Malley, both of whom have collaborated with Vienne before. For these artists, working with transgressive material is not solely meant to create shock effects; on the contrary, there is a moral dimension. As Vienne has said, “We need to face horrible things, it’s healthier.” LAST SPRING: A Prequel is, as the title suggests, the prequel to a larger theatrical project, itself designed as a labyrinthine hotel (rendered in the wall drawings on view in the galleries), featuring a series of grotesque horrors and a teenage boy trying, and failing, to escape his own mind."
More Info here
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NOVEMBER 2011
'THE MARBLED SWARM' OUT NOW!
DC's long-awaited new novel 'The Marbled Swarm' is out now!
From the Harper Perennial website:
'The Marbled Swarm' is Dennis Cooper's most haunting work to date. In secret passageways, hidden rooms, and the troubled mind of our narrator, a mystery perpetually takes shape - and the most compelling clue to its final nature is 'the marbled swarm' itself, a complex amalgam of language passed down from father to son.
Cooper ensnares the reader in a world of appearances, where the trappings of high art, old money, and haute cuisine obscure an unspeakable system of coercion and surrender. And as the narrator stalks an elusive truth, traveling from the French countryside to Paris and back again, the reader will be seduced by a voice only Dennis Cooper could create.
Click here to buy 'The Marbled Swarm' from Amazon
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SEPTEMBER 2011
'FRENCH HOLE' OUT NOW!
DC has teamed up with Kiddiepunk Press to release 'French Hole, Being Fifteen Outtakes from The Marbled Swarm'. This limited edition chapbook is either a precursor, sideshow, offshoot, series of secrets, fractured sequel, or a bunch of polished discards from Dennis Cooper's imminent and long-awaited novel 'The Marbled Swarm'.
'French Hole' comes in two forms:
- Standard Limited Edition of 50 copies
- Deluxe Limited Edition of 20 signed and numbered copies that also comes with a bonus 20-page book "An Attempt at Shattering Pierre Clementi as a Child" by artist Michael Salerno
Click here for more info
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JUNE 2011
'HORROR HOSPITAL UNPLUGGED' REISSUE OUT NOW!
Dennis Cooper's long out of print collaboration with artist Keith Mayerson (first published in 1996) has just been re-released by Harper Perennial.
From the Harper Perennial website:
“Stunning. . . . Youthful angst is rarely portrayed as this terrifying.” — Library Journal
Dennis Cooper and Keith Mayerson’s boundary-breaking graphic novel Horror Hospital Unplugged is back in a long-awaited reissue. Crystallizing a primal period of creative experimentation for both Cooper, whose Frisk -era storytelling is at its finest, and Mayerson, whose gritty, unadorned visual style would later explode into color, Horror Hospital Unplugged is a vital piece of underground comics craft. The moody, kaleidoscopic, and sexually charged story of would-be rock star Trevor Machine, and his flirtations with love, fame, homosexual identity, and the disaffection of youth, is a provocative immersion in world of ambition, confusion, and debauchery—and an crucial glimpse at the early creative achievement of two cult icons.
Buy the book from Amazon
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'JERK / THROUGH THEIR TEARS' BOOK+CD
Text by Dennis Cooper. Illustrations by Gisele Vienne. Music by Peter Rehberg.
Jerk is a collaborative artist's book and audio recording by director Gisele Vienne, author Dennis Cooper, musician Peter Rehberg and performer Jonathan Capdevielle, which translates a previous collaborative theater work into a violent multimedia disquisition on puppetry, serial killing and homoeroticism. The play and book are based on the Texan serial killer Dean Corll.
Buy the book from Amazon
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NEW LHOTB RELEASES
Two new titles from DC's 'Little House on the Bowery' imprint have recently been released: Matthew Stokoe's Cows and Lonely Christopher's The Mechanics of Homosexual Intercourse.
More info on the Akashic Books website.
JUNE 2010
'SMOTHERED IN HUGS' OUT NOW!
DC's new book 'Smothered in Hugs: Essays, Interviews, Feedback, and Obituaries' (Harper Perennial) has just been released.
"Selected from the range of Cooper's essays and reportage in Artforum, Bookforum, Detour, Interview, LA Weekly, Spin, and the Village Voice, among other publications, 'Smothered in Hugs' presents the best nonfiction of one of America's greatest writers. Cooper has written on grave social issues, producing touchstone pieces for a generation of readers. His obituaries for Kurt Cobain, River Phoenix, and William S. Burroughs offer portraits that are both crystallizing and appropriately indefinite. His reckonings of contemporary writers are astute and unsparing. And, of course, he serves as witness to the work and play of an illustrious roster of cultural personalities—and does so with an acuity and fairness missing from most pop culture criticism."
Buy the book from Amazon
More info on the Harper Collins website
JAN 2010
NEW LHOTB RELEASES
The two newest additions to DC's 'Little House on the Bowery' series for Akashic Books are both out now. Firstly, Derek McCormack's new novel (and his second release for LHOTB) The Show That Smells and secondly, released this month, Mark Gluth's novella The Late Work of Margaret Kroftis.
More info on the Akashic Books website.
MAY 2009
'UGLY MAN' - OUT NOW!
Dennis Cooper's new book of short stories, Ugly Man (Harper Perennial), is out now!
You can buy the book from Amazon or from all good bookstores.
DENNIS COOPER'S 'UGLY MAN' BOOK TOUR DATES - NYC, LA, PARIS:
May 27: New York City, Bryant Park Summer Reading Series, 12:30 pm, Dennis Cooper in conversation with Tony O'Neill
May 27: New York City, The Boiler Room, 86 E. 4th Street, 6 pm, Launch party for 'Ugly Man'
May 28: New York City, CLAGS/CUNY, Lambda Literary Awards, 7 pm, Dennis Cooper, award presenter
May 29: New York City, BEA, Booth 30, 3 pm, Dennis Cooper signs 'Ugly Man'
June 1: Los Angeles, Skylight Books, 7:30 pm, Reading & signing
June 2: Los Angeles, Book Soup, 7 pm, Reading & signing
June 6: Paris, Couvent des les Recollets, Festival Paris en toutes lettres, 6 pm, Reading & onstage interview
June 8: Paris, Shakespeare & Co., Reading & signing (in English)
About 'Ugly Man' - From Publishers Weekly:
The cult novelist's collection of short stories plumbs veins of dark humor amid the sex and gore his fans have come to expect. The contents range from short shorts—a rumination on The Fifteen Worst Russian Gay Porn Web Sites and an abortive episode entitled One Night in 1979 I Did Too Much Coke and Couldn't Sleep and Had What I Thought Was a Million-Dollar Idea to Write the Definitive Tell-all Book About Glam Rock Based on My Own Personal Experience but This Is as Far as I Got—to longer pieces in which sadistic male characters explore their preoccupations with the murder, mutilation and rape of nihilistic teenaged boys. Stories of the latter group often feature text pared down to dialogue alone or resembling scripts complete with stage directions. The lighter fare, such as it is, provides much needed comic relief, as in the case of The Anal-Retentive Line Editor, which proceeds through interstitial edits upon a series of drafts of a piece of gay erotica, forming a running conversation and problematic seduction between author and editor. This is classic Cooper: explicit, unconventional and, to the uninitiated, alarming.
FEBRUARY 2009
'UGLY MAN' - AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER
Dennis Cooper's new book of short stories, 'Ugly Man' will be released by Harper Perennial on May 26 and is available for pre-order now from the Harper Collins website or from Amazon.
From the Harper Perennial website:
"The most dangerous writer in America" (according to The Village Voice) is back with the funniest book he's ever written: Ugly Man.
Internationally acclaimed writer Dennis Cooper—winner of France's Prix Sade—continues to study the dark material he's always explored but does so now—in stories—with a sense of awareness and a satirical touch that exploits and winks at his mastery of this world. In Ugly Man, as he has done for decades, Cooper lays bare the compulsions and troubling emptiness of the human soul in taut, gleaming prose.
SEPTEMBER 2008
DC/CD
Two new DC-related CDs are being released in the next month:
:: Peter Rehberg's 'Work for GV 2004-2008' (Editions Mego, October '08) collects scores for DC and Gisele Vienne's theater works 'I Apologize', 'Un Belle Enfant Blonde' and 'Jerk', and features texts and spoken performances by DC. Comes in a deluxe package designed by Stephen O'Malley.
:: 'Ugly Man' (Dot Dot Dot Music, September '08) by Safe with Dennis Cooper is available as a limited edition of 200 copies. Features artwork by Alex Rose.
UPCOMING DATES
For DC's theatrical collaborations with Gisele Vienne
:: September 12, 14: Bochum, Germany, Fidena Festival, Jerk
:: September 24, 25: Lausanne, France, L'Arsenic, I Apologize
:: September 27, 28: Geneva, ADC, Kindertotenlieder
:: September 29, 30: Geneva, L'Usine, Jerk
:: October 3, 4: Toulouse, France, Festival le Printemps, Jerk
:: October 6: Zagreb, Croatia, Festival Queer Zagreb, Jerk
:: October 8, 9: Paris, Fondation Cartier, Jerk
:: October 10, 11: Marseille, Festival Actoral, Jerk
:: October 13, 14: Budapest, Hungary, Budapest Autumn Festival, Jerk
:: October 16, 17, 18: Graz, Austria, Steirischer herbst, Jerk
:: October 20, 21, 22, 23: Lorient, France, CDDB, Jerk
:: November 5, 6, 7, 8, 9: Seattle, On the Boards, Jerk
:: November 21: Rouen, France, Festival Autome in Normandie, Kindertotenlieder
:: December 3, 4: Amsterdam, Holland, Frascati, Jerk
:: January 20, 21, 2009: Le Parvis Scene Nationale Tarbes Pyrenees, Jerk
:: April 7, 8, 9, 10, 14 & 15, 2009: Paris, Theater de la Bastille, Jerk
:: May 2009: Murcia, Spain, Centro Parraga (dates & times tba), Jerk (in Spanish)
:: May 22, 23, 2009: Hamburg, Germany, Kampnagel, Kindertotenlieder
:: June 2009: Murcia, Spain, Centro Parraga (dates & times tba), Kindertotenlieder
:: June 3, 4, 2009: Scene national de Foix, Jerk
:: June 2009: Gijon, Spain, Laboral Escena - Ciudad de la Cultura (dates & times tba), Jerk (in Spanish)
JULY 2008
'DENNIS COOPER: WRITING AT THE EDGE' OUT NOW
'Dennis Cooper: Writing At The Edge', a new critical study of DC's work, edited by Paul Hegarty and Danny Kennedy has just been published by Sussex Academic Press.
- More information here
- Buy the book here
MARCH 2008
DC SIGNS WITH HARPER PERENNIAL
It has just been announced that Dennis Cooper has signed a three-book contract with publisher Harper Perennial (an imprint of HarperCollins), which will publish a book of short stories (the much-aniticipated 'Ugly Man'), an essay collection and a forthcoming new novel. Read an article about the signing here.
JANUARY 2008 (UPDATED)
'THE WEAKLINGS' NOW AVAILABLE FOR PRE-ORDER
Dennis Cooper's long-awaited, new book of poems, entitled 'The Weaklings' is now available for pre-order from Fanzine Press. This deluxe version of 'The Weaklings' (DC's first book of poetry since 1995's 'The Dream Police') comes in a hardbound edition with illustrations by Jarrod Anderson and is limited to only 300 copies... in other words, get in quick or you will miss out!
DC WINS 2007 PRIX SADE FOR 'THE SLUTS'
DC’s book The Sluts (French title: Salopes) has just won the prestigious 2007 Prix Sade, a French literary prize for writers who are "going beyond all forms of censure and who [defy] the moral or political order against all forms of intellectual terrorism."
A short video of the event has been posted on YouTube, which you can view here.
VICE MAGAZINE INTERVIEW
DC is interviewed by Steve Lafreniere in the current issue of Vice Magazine, where he talks about Little Caesar and his blog.
Check it out here.
MAY 2007
SITE UPDATE
Welcome to the all-new www.denniscooper.net. Have a good look around as most pages have been expanded and updated. Also added is a page on DC's recent theatrical collaborations with Gisele Vienne that have been taking Europe by storm.
THE NOVEMBER 2006 NEWS
DENNIS COOPER'S BLOG HACKED:
MESSAGE FROM DC:
'On last Friday afternoon Paris time my blog was hacked. People trying to access the blog are currently being hijacked to a sex/spyware site. I don't know how serious the damage is because my account at blogger doesn't seem to exist at the moment. As of this writing, blogger.com has not responded to my requests for a diagnosis and report. I'm hoping against hope that the blog is intact and I'll be able to continue as soon as possible. Chances are that the blog has been destroyed. As soon as I know what the situation is, my blog will return. I don't know whether it will be located at the old address or at a new one, or whether it will have its history or not. Until this is sorted out, one of my blog's community has set up a temporary meeting place at the address below. I'll be posting updates and news there. As I stupidly never backed up my blog, this situation is potentially devastating to me, but I will continue as best I can. Thanks for your patience and support.'
http://dcblogsters.blogspot.com/
-- Dennis Cooper
UPDATE: NOVEMBER 22nd:
DC'S BLOG HAS STARTED OVER AT A NEW ADDRESS:
http://denniscooper-theweaklings.blogspot.com/
THE MARCH 2006 NEWS
ENTER AT YOUR OWN RISK: THE DANGEROUS ART OF DENNIS COOPER:
Leora Lev's groundbreaking book 'Enter at Your Own Risk: The Dangerous Art of Dennis Cooper' (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. April '06) is now available for pre-order here. This first ever collection of critical writings on DC's work includes contributions from major contemporary literary theorists, fiction writers, artists, and filmmakers. The volume is illustrated with photographs and art, including a number of color images. Some of the contents include:
A previously unpublished essay on 'Frisk' by William Burroughs ****
Pulitzer Prize winning novelist Michael Cunningham on 'Try' ****
Dodie Bellamy ('The Letters of Mina Harker') on 'Period' and DC's early work. **** A long interview with film director John Waters about DC's work. **** Novelist Matthew Stadler on 'My Loose Thread' **** New Narrative writer Kevin Killian on 'Guide to Trust,' the traveling museum show of artworks inspired by DC's novel 'Guide' **** An interview with DC by novelist Robert Gluck **** Essays on the novels in DC's 'George Miles Cycle' by respected critics Elizabeth Young, James Anneseley, and Earl Jackson Jr. **** Critic Brandon Stosuy and filmmaker Lawrence Brose on adapting Cooper's work for film **** Editor/critic Marvin Taylor on 'Closer' **** Leora Lev on 'The Sluts' **** and much more
'Enter at Your Own Risk' will have its official launch at the big academic conference and multi-media presentation on DC's work to be held at the Granary Theatre in Cork, Ireland on April 8th. For more information on the conference, use the above link.
AMAZING NEW GOD JR. SITE:
DC's Italian publisher has put together an amazing and wild new website for God Jr. complete with flash graphics, lots of links and even a trailer for the novel! Check it out here. It will blow your mind!
THE JANUARY 2006 NEWS
DENNIS CD/BOOK: The long-awaited limited-edition CD/Book set 'Dennis' has just been released and is available to buy from here.
'DENNIS' is a collaborative, limited-edition, Story-Booklet & CD. Each booklet and CD is packaged in a hand-numbered, beautifully designed 'Arigato Pak', with red letterpress and black offset printing.
Dennis Cooper's original short story The Ash Gray Proclamation (titled after the Robert Pollard song of the same name) was passed around to a variety of bands and musicians - those Cooper loved or those that were already fans of his work. Four years in the making, 'DENNIS' showcases fourteen songs by musicians who have been inspired by the author and, in many instances, directly influenced by the accompanying story.
OTHER NEWS
'GOD JR.' IS BORN: Well, in the United States at least. The flood of reviews has begun, and if you're curious to read what the pundits have been saying, here's a select checklist of some publications and websites we know about that have expressed their early opinions. For up-to-the-minute reviews and articles, do the requisite google search.
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WORLDWIDE DC RELEASE DATES: Here's an updated list of newly released or forthcoming DC books around the world. For exact dates, publishers, and more info, check your local listings.
Italy: God Jr. (November '05)
France: The Sluts (February '06), God Jr. (fall, '06)
Denmark: My Loose Thread (early '06)
Spain: Guide (early '06), My Loose Thread (late '06)
Sweden: Frisk (early '06)
Portugal: The Sluts (fall, '06)
China: Closer (summer, '06)
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THE SLUTS NOW AVAILABLE IN PAPERBACK: Dennis Cooper's wildest book, 'The Sluts' is now available in paperback, published by Carroll & Graf. You can pick up a copy from Amazon here.
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