new faces:
meeting the new kids
fall, 2006


miho nonaka


Miho Nonaka is a bilingual writer born and raised in Tokyo. Her first book of Japanese poems, Garasu no tsuki, was a finalist for Japan's national poetry prize. Her poems and nonfiction in English have appeared or are forthcoming in Tin House, Quarterly West, Crab Orchard Review, Prairie Schooner, Iowa Review, and Contemporary Voices from the Eastern World: An Anthology of Poems (W.W. Norton & Co.), among others. —dmm

1) If you were not an English professor, what would you be doing? (Fantasy professions allowed.)

A pastry chef, or a lighthouse keeper.

2) If you won the lottery (let’s say the pot is a whopping six million) would you still teach?

Probably.

3) What was your worst subject in college?

Chemistry, not the theory part, but the lab work. I used to get results that were impossible all the time.

4) What’s your favorite punctuation mark?

Definitely ellipsis.

5) What do you like the most so far about Eastern and/or Charleston or Matoon?

Having coffee dates at Jackson Avenue.


6) What radio station, CD, or tape (or 8 track) is currently playing in your car?

Unfortunately, it’s broken.

7) What is your favorite book/novel?

The Street of Crocodiles and Sanatorium Under the Sign of the Hourglass by Bruno Schultz.

8) What’s your favorite holiday?

Thanksgiving.

9) What is the worst present you have ever received?

Fried ants.

10) What was your worst job ever?

Working in the office in Tokyo, where people teased me mercilessly for not being conversant with a subtle variety of honorifics.

  


letitia moffitt

Letitia Lehua Moffitt was born and raised in Hawaii. Her stories have been published in Black Warrior Review, Aux Arc Review, Jabberwock Review, Fairfield Review, The MacGuffin, SNReview and Yawp; she has also published poetry in Dos Passos Review and literary criticism in Critique. She received a BA in English from UC Berkeley, an MA in English and Creative Writing from San Francisco State University, and a PhD in English and Creative Writing from Binghamton University. She also worked for several years as a research editor for various Wall Street investment banks and survived to tell the tale. Her areas of academic interest include multicultural literature, women writers, contemporary American fiction, and narrative theory. Her non-academic interests include cooking, hiking, and traveling, as well as art and music. —dmm

1) If you were not an English professor, what would you be doing? (Fantasy professions allowed.)

I’d be a chef or a jazz pianist, or I’d write English murder mystery novels. Given that I can’t afford chef’s school, I haven’t tickled the ivories in 15 years, and I’m not English, it’s a good thing I like being a professor.

2) If you won the lottery (let’s say the pot is a whopping six million) would you still teach?

Sure. I’d teach cooking, jazz piano, and the art of writing an English murder mystery. I’d be so rich, folks would have to humor me or I’d cancel my endowment.

3) What was your worst subject in college?

It used to be my best subject, believe it or not: Math. I loved Calculus in high school, so much so that during my sophomore year in college, full of hubris, I took an engineering-level Math class. On the first exam, I think I got a Z-. They had to invent a whole new alphabet for my test scores, but somehow I passed. Then I declared English and never, ever looked back. Now I proudly proclaim the lifelong-English-major’s mantra: “I can’t even balance my checkbook!”

4) What’s your favorite punctuation mark?

The semicolon. It is mysterious; it is misunderstood; it looks like the bastard child of a comma and a colon. I love that it scares people a little; it’s the badboy punctuation mark that rides a Harley but really, deep down, is charmingly sweet and simple.

5) What do you like the most so far about Eastern and/or Charleston or Matoon?

I really love that soybean field outside my window. It’s turning all yellowy-gold right now. Oh, yeah, the people are great and all, but that soy, I tell you—just magical.

6) What radio station, CD, or tape (or 8 track) is currently playing in your car?

Radio station: I’m not sure; probably the “all-static, all the time” station. CD: Usually either Latin jazz (some of it more in the “fusion” category—ever heard Latin rhythms with bagpipes?) or contemporary Hawaiian music (one recent fave is Keali’i Reichel’s chant CD, and if you associate Hawaiian music with Elvis or Don Ho, you should hear this—it’s serious and stately, none of that “kamana wana lei u now” nonsense).

7) What is your favorite book/novel?

No matter what I say, I’ll wish I’d said something else—or several something elses. I guess I’ll wimp out and go with James Joyce’s Ulysses (that’s my answer for now, anyway). Yes, it’s a trite choice, the literary equivalent of “Citizen Kane” as favorite film, but the Nausicaa and Penelope chapters get me every time.

8) What’s your favorite holiday?

A tie between Cinco de Mayo and Bastille Day, in part because each has a somewhat misguided historical basis, as all good holidays should, and in part because both lend themselves to fabulous thematic dinner parties.

9) What is the worst present you have ever received?

I was always a runty child; year after year, adults would beam at me, “Oh, you’re SUCH a big girl now!!” because that’s what people say to little girls to boost their self-esteem, or something. Anyway, one year for a birthday that numbered well into the teens, I received a complete set of little-girl’s underwear—panties, slip and camisole, all frilly and pink with big red strawberries all over them, as though looking like a child means displaying poor sartorial taste. The gift came from an aunt who thought the rules of aging didn’t apply to me and each year bought gifts geared for an ever-younger niece. Everyone squealed, “OOOH how CUUUTE!” I guess I didn’t die of embarrassment, since I’m still here, but I came awfully close when someone suggested I try them on right away.

10) What was your worst job ever?

The rumors are true: I worked on Wall Street. I’m not proud. And I didn’t exactly have a swank corner office; the day I started as a research editor in a global investment bank, my boss led me past the posh domains of the high muckety-mucks, past all that and back into what used to be a storage room. I was to share this room with six other editors. This was the first sign of many that led me to the astonishing realization that Wall Street doesn’t value good writing—seems it’s a drag to have to revise your treatise for world domination because the modifiers got misplaced. Now you know why I walked away from a six-figure income. Say, when exactly do we get paid again?

   

marjorie worthington



Marjorie Worthington received her Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Dartmouth College, her Master of Arts in English from the University of Missouri, and her Ph.D. from Indiana University with concentrations in Twentieth-Century
American Literature, Narrative Theory and Women's and Gender Studies. The focus of her research is on contemporary fiction, particularly experimental and metafiction.—dmm

 

1) If you were not an English professor, what would you be doing? (Fantasy professions allowed.)

Radio talk show host.

2) If you won the lottery (let’s say the pot is a whopping six million) would you still teach?

My father has assured me that he is going to win the Powerball someday and when he does, he is going to give me a chunk of that change.  So, I often ponder what my career future should be when that happens (next year, probably).  I realized that if I didn’t have to work, I’d spend my time reading, writing, and talking about reading and writing.  That’s pretty much what I do here!  So, when that lottery ship comes in, I’ll probably stick around.  Maybe I’ll carpet my office, though.

3) What was your worst subject in college?

Economics.  I finally realized that I did better if I just wrote the opposite of what I thought the answer was.  Of course, who needs Economics when you have Powerball?

4) What’s your favorite punctuation mark?

I love the semi-colon; it lets you be long-winded without making a run-on; it allows me to write the way I talk; it can be overused, though.

5) What do you like the most so far about Eastern and/or Charleston or Mattoon?

I like a lot of things, but the first thing that comes to mind is the square.  I love the square!  I particularly like the murals all over the buildings.  They have so much character and they really show how much pride the town takes in itself.

6) What radio station, CD, or tape (or 8 track) is currently playing in your car?

“Free to Be You and Me,” the big 70s children’s album.  I loved it as a kid and am trying to get my daughter to like it.  For some reason, she cries whenever it’s on.  Is it wrong to keep playing it anyway?  Were the 70’s that bad? 

7) What is your favorite book/novel?

Tom Robbins’ Skinny Legs and All.  Wonderfully goofy yet oddly profound.  Like a smart DaVinci Code, with a can of beans as a protagonist.

 8) What’s your favorite holiday?

Christmas.  I love it so much that I never get tired of the music or decorations.  I am always happy to see them, no matter how early they lug them out.  Oh, and the food, of course.  Mmmm. Fudge.

9) What is the worst present you have ever received?

I once got a set of little tea dishes with mice on them.  It was a mouse wedding, so one dish had the mouse bridal shower, the other had the mice getting married.  I didn’t get the mouse bachelor party plate, but I would have loved to see that one.  I was thirty years old at the time, so I wasn’t really into mouse tea, but I’m saving it for my daughter who is two and already loves a good fake tea party. 

10) What was your worst job ever?

In grad school I temped at a factory.  Half of my job was working in the office, so I had to wear nice-ish clothes.  The other half involved doing inventory in the warehouse, climbing on dusty boxes and palettes in the stifling heat.  I ruined more stockings that summer…