FIFTEEN HITS
Each month,
our server tells us
which of our reviews,
readings, poems and articles
are getting the most hits
from our readers.
Here are the most
recent stars.

NEW TITLES
A People's History of Poverty in America
"Among 'advanced' nations,
the United States is first
in general poverty,
childhood poverty,
elderly poverty,
CEO pay,
health-care costs,
income inequality
and incarceration."

Soon the Rest Will Fall
"The heat in
the street
was nauseating.
The pavement burned
like a match head.
Slatts was dizzy and
ready to puke,
which was how
he liked things."

Hijos del Pueblo
"All women in Spain
were to live in one type
of enclosure or another:
the parental home,
marriage, convent,
house of correction, or
house of prostitution."

Revolution in Mind
"Freud dreamed he was
in a strange place with
a sign that read:
You are requested to
close the eyes.
It was a dream that
got him to start
working on dreams."

As a Friend
"If you ever want
to have a baby,
please don't read
Chapter One The Baby.
If you want to be a surveyor,
stay away from Chapter Two.
If you ever think of
ratting on your friends' loves,
read page 65."

The Last Prince of the Mexican Empire
"'There sits the emperor
on his cactus throne,' says
General Françoise-Achile Bazaine.
'For the glory of France
soldiers have been shot,
stabbed, burned alive and
castrated, disemboweled.'"

Oedipus Rex
"So be sweet and kind to mother
Now and then have a chat
Buy her candy or some flowers, or a brand new hat
But maybe you had better let it go at that
Or you may find yourself with a quite complex complex, and
You may end up like Oedipus...
I'd rather marry a duck-billed platypus
Than end up like old Oedipus Rex."

Great Reviews of the Past
Lizards: A Natural History
"Truman Capote wrote that
lizards were very fond
of Mozart sonatas:
The chameleons accumulated,
a dozen,
a dozen more,
most of them green.
They skittered
across the terrace and
scampered into the salon,
a sensitive, absorbed
audience for the music."

LETTERS
The Canterbury Tales
The Parson's Tale

MORE LETTERS
World Made by Hand
Howard Kunstler

EVEN MORE LETTERS
The Kinsey Report
The Tao Te Ching

YET EVEN MORE LETTERS
Cryptic Letters of the Month
Letters of Love
Artists from Krakow

ARTICLES
Mating for Death
"For in salmon,
and eels, and
many such creatures,
it is all too clear
that reproduction is
the last act of life,
and that the preparation to
reproduce is simultaneously
the preparation to die."

READINGS
The Empress of Mexico and the Pope
"She kisses his slipper.
'Permit me to sleep at your feet.'
'No, no --- '
'Give me a bedroom then!'
Never has a woman,
not even a nun,
slept beneath the roof
of the Vatican. 'Impossible!'
'Then I shall sleep in the corridor!'"

Slavery and the Welfare State
"Slavery, its successors
(sharecropping, tenancy, convict labor),
and the prison have been
as important throughout
American history in the lives
of (poor) African Americans
as have, say, Social Security,
homeless shelters, or Medicaid."

POETRY
The Lady Missionary
"I shall arrive in Africa
in gauze cloth
and smelling of honey.
I shall have sightings
of large hills and a far star
which I shall name.
I shall come and go as a man
and bag a tiger
on a mid-week afternoon."

Great Poems from the Past
Tradition
"My mother says
women were made to bleed
and the whole thing
takes twenty minutes.
She says afterwards
they'll wrap me up like a butterfly
for forty nights
and I'll drink only camel's milk."

THE OFFICIAL RALPH
Paradox-of-the-Month

GENERAL INDEX
All the back-issues of RALPH,
including titles of books under review,
along with author, subject, and publisher,
plus links to readings, articles, and poems
that have appeared on-line
since 1994.

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

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