Email Author Alexis Soloski

2007 Stories by Alexis Soloski

• French Tickler

  published September 25, 2007

  In a scene early in The Misanthrope, Paris's chief wits gather around a table to sip, nibble, and gossip. Their favorite topic: maligning... More >>

• Sherlock Holmes (The Early Years)

  published September 25, 2007

  A Study in Scarlet reveals that Sherlock Holmes first introduced himself to Dr. Watson with the cry, "I've found it! I've found it!" Holmes... More >>

• The Mail Gaze

  published September 18, 2007

  Onstage, the writer and drag artist Taylor Mac has appeared as a sea creature, a forest sprite, an American flag, a comic book, bubble wrap, and... More >>

• Out on a Limb?

  published September 11, 2007

  Corey Dargel's Removable Parts: A Series of Love Songs About Voluntary Amputation begins on a uniquely distressing note. The bald-headed,... More >>

• Brazil Nuts

  published September 11, 2007

  Nelson Rodrigues's characters do not end well—strangled, shot, burned to death. Hanging is the most common denouement. Even when a man does... More >>

• Water Works

  published September 4, 2007

  From Hart Crane and Walt Whitman to Frederico García Lorca and Nikki Giovanni, countless poets have distilled the clatter and clamor of New... More >>

• Avant-Garde, PA

  published September 4, 2007

  In his autobiography, Benjamin Franklin, Philadelphia's favorite son, lists the 13 virtues that will lead to "moral perfection"—moderation,... More >>

• A Power Play

  published August 28, 2007

  Hillary Clinton is a lesbian. Hillary Clinton doesn't bake cookies. Hillary Clinton took her husband's name only when it proved politically... More >>

• The Day After

  published August 28, 2007

  In a police lockup one day after the 9/11 attacks, a Muslim man in a Starbucks outfit faces toward Mecca and begins murmuring "Allahu akbar." A... More >>

• Dig the New Breed

  published August 28, 2007

  Prologue Lights rise on... More >>

• Oil and Blood

  published August 21, 2007

  On an overcrowded Nigerian bus, a priest lowers his head in prayer: "In Jesus name we pray di bus makes it safely to Harcourt main town. In... More >>

• The Voice Squad

  published August 14, 2007

  Don't call Wesley Stace a dummy. Under the pseudonym John Wesley Harding, he's recorded over a dozen tuneful and literate rock albums. And under... More >>

• Fringe Cringe

  published August 14, 2007

  Oh!" said a young woman seated behind me. "This is actually cool." We were attending an evening performance of Orientarhythm, one of... More >>

• Unpromised Lands

  published August 7, 2007

  In March 2003, President Bush stood in the White House Rose Garden and announced his plan to end the violence in the Middle East. "We have reached... More >>

• Welcome to the Fringe! Now Where the Hell Is It?

  published July 31, 2007

  These days, a skyscraper towers over Ludlow Street, a Whole Foods gleams on the corner of Bowery, a Starbucks dispenses lattes on Delancey. But... More >>

• The Ice Crean Man

  published July 24, 2007

  Antarctic lore has it that in 1913, explorer Ernest Shackleton placed a newspaper ad reading: "Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages,... More >>

• Home-Brood Drama

  published July 24, 2007

  Every month, magazines tout new ways to look and feel younger. If a return to youth is indeed desired, the theater offers a remedy far more... More >>

• The Dead Zone

  published July 17, 2007

  A professor of stage design, seated in the seventh row of Symphony Space, inspected the living-room set arrayed before him and quipped that if any... More >>

• Court Jesting

  published July 17, 2007

  The People vs. Mona gives new meaning to the term "show trial." This new musical, by the husband-and-wife team of Jim Wann and Patricia... More >>

• Absinthe Makes the Heart Grow Fonder

  published July 10, 2007

  In Edgar Degas's 1876 painting The Absinthe Drinker, now hanging in Paris's Musée d'Orsay, a woman sits before a glass of jade... More >>

• Mute Witness

  published July 3, 2007

  Does a war end with a cease-fire, the signing of a treaty, the withdrawal of troops? Or does it continue on, unresolved and unassuaged, in the... More >>

• The Smokey Past

  published July 3, 2007

  In 2001, the last survivor of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, Rose Freedman, passed away, at the remarkable age of 107. On the afternoon of... More >>

• Boom Town

  published July 3, 2007

  Irene, newly arrived in the Coney Island of the early 22nd century, solicits advice about adjusting to the big city, or at least its outskirts.... More >>

• Flood Wedding

  published June 26, 2007

  Perhaps director Michael Greif has an affection for mosquitoes. Or maybe he longs to have his attractive cast participate in a "wet muslin"... More >>

• Meat and My Gal

  published June 19, 2007

  Director Lear deBessonet is not a public company, but if she were, her shares would doubtless rise on the strength of her current... More >>