Housedeer issue number 6 Mumtaz Manji tells the story of her remarkable life, beginning in Tanzania, where she was born in 1944. She lived in Kenya, Belgian Congo and Uganda, before being one of the many people expelled by Idi Amin in 1972 and finding herself a refugee with three small children and what she … Read more
Housedeer issue number 5, published in late 2015, features the legendary downtown performer Agosto Machado. It is full of vivid recollections of New York in a certain golden period, populated by all the characters of the day. Agosto is a living treasure. The deer image for this issue is a detail from a painting by … Read more
There is nothing I love more than a good interview with someone truly interesting, whether it’s reading one or conducting it myself. The first issue of Housedeer is devoted to the childhood of Liza Stelle, daughter of Eddie Condon, made through stories told by her sister, Maggie. Berenice Abbott’s famous image on the cover (used … Read more
I was the editor of GOODIE MAGAZINE for the decade in which it existed. Ira Cohen, pictured here, was its first subject. I did the interview with him over the telephone. Ira loved the telephone. Have a look at the Goodie list and send me an email if you’d like to order back issues. Goodie’s … Read more
This issue of Goodie is different from the rest, in that it is not simply one interview with one person, although I did interview the very sweet owner of the bookshop where I found the collection of books once owned by Dr. Culp. Even in 2000, secondhand bookshops were disappearing fast. In a way, Dr. … Read more
That’s Debbie’s car going by downstairs, the picture snapped from my window on 7th Avenue. Debbie needs no introduction, but we didn’t talk about Blondie at all for her Goodie. We talked a lot about childhood and the way New York used to be, and her issue is also about Jackie 60, the legendary nightspot created by Chi Chi Valenti and … Read more
Marty Matz was an enormously likable guy, big and bewhiskered, a lover of animals and opiates, a great poet and a wonderful storyteller. Like most good artists he never had any dough to speak of by the end of his life, but if his stories and his poems were worth their weight in gold, he’d … Read more
I met Penny for the first time in 1988, the night my friend Liza Stelle took me to St. Mark’s Church to see her perform along with the great Margo Howard-Howard, who Liza knew well. I loved what they did together, with Penny impersonating Margo while Margo impersonated someone else, and after that night I … Read more
Back in 1989, when I worked at the Three Lives and Company bookshop on West 10th Street, I made friends with a boy who would come in a couple of times a week and buy several books and then stand and talk about all kinds of things. This was Billy Neil, who came from Hawaii … Read more
Gregory Corso needs no introduction, but what is special about this issue is the interview with his daughter, Sheri. We met her and were able to do the Goodie interview thanks to the great Roger Richards (himself a subject of Goodie) who along with his wife Irvyne, looked after Gregory for the last dozen years … Read more
I first met Yana Chupenko in the early 1990s when I was introduced to her by our mutual friend Carla Olla, who was in a band called PMS (Pre Metal Syndrome) with Yana at the time. Like everyone, I think, I loved Yana right away. She’s one of the most magnificent creatures I’ve ever encountered; beautiful, smart, talented … Read more
Al Carlin, may he rest in peace, was the father of my friend Marilou, who I met in 1988. While visiting her family on Long Island one day, I was struck by Al’s charm and his storytelling. When Goodie came into existence a decade or so later, his stories still rang in my head. So we went back out … Read more
I can’t think of anyone who dressed up the streets of New York better than Baby Dee did once upon a time, as she rolled through the neighborhoods on her harpcycle playing her accordion. My Dear Readers letter from her Goodie: “We were thinking, ‘Gee, what shall we send out for Christmas?’ It has to be something delightful … Read more
This one is special to me, because Seaweed was my dad. He taught me to love books. He had a hard time in life, and some of that is in the Goodie, but he also had a miraculous innocence about him that made everything possible. If you don’t have any money but would like Seaweed’s … Read more
I met Cathy Clarke in 1993 in the hospital room of a friend who had broken her back, and almost immediately Clarkie, as lots of people called her, became one of my favorite people. She still is, although it has been a long time since I’ve seen her. She always had the most wonderful stories to tell–and … Read more
I first met Captain Bob in 2001, after the terrible day of September 11th. He ran a little bar on a barge which sat on the river surrounded by old boats. I had seen him often there, but I hadn’t spoken to him. On September 11th I went over to sit on the lightship Frying … Read more
As with quite a few of my Dear Readers letters for Goodie I said ‘we’ in this rather than ‘I’, although it was in fact I who bought the signed copy of Women, by Charles Bukowski, from Roger in 1991 or 1992. I still remember standing in the entry to my building, where I still live, … Read more
I met Kasoundra through Liza Stelle, who spoke about Kasoundra over the years, usually laughing, but it was not until Liza was sick that I really got to know this great lady. Kasoundra was one of very few people that Liza would allow in to visit while she was dying. From my Dear Readers letter for Kasoundra’s … Read more
Neke Carson became (in)famous for his painted portrait of Andy, which he made holding the brush in his behind. But there’s much more to Neke than his reputation as the Rectal Realist, a distinction memorialized in the movie Nine and a Half Weeks. (He had a cameo appearance in the movie and the ‘Rectal Realist’ … Read more