Katherine Bernard and Henry Review

Still from Katherine Bernard's "Thirsty," via The WILD

Recently, I was reading The WILD magazine (a fashion/arts publication I really enjoy). I especially like their art section. A week or so ago, they'd posted a short video by writer Katherine Bernard, and a Q & A with her.

The video is called "Thirsty," and it portrays a conversation between two women while they are both shopping online for clothes. It's not a narrative at all--rather, it deconstructs the absurd language of clothing and branding. For example..."Look at the broken-boyfriend, in the soft Hickman wash," one of them says to the other, while a movie still of a beaten-up Leonardo DiCaprio flashes across the screen. "I actually like the destroyed boyfriend..." the other replies. HA. "Boyfriend" branding is a huge pet peeve of mine...why must a jacket belong to a man before it can belong to a woman? What is the appeal of borrowing/not owning a garment?

Please watch the video (just scroll down the page a little, and you'll see it). It's just a few minutes long, and completely hilarious and clever. The short Q & A is great, too.

After watching THAT video, I was pulled into the rabbit hole after Katherine Bernard, the director. She runs Henry Review, which is a video reading series. I absolutely LOVE this idea!!

The short videos feature authors reading work into the camera (mostly work that they have written, but a few of them read work by someone else). There are also some short interviews up on the site.

The idea of an all-online reading series is pretty exciting to me...it unites a few of my interests. The only thing I wish about the Henry site is that its videos were embeddable. I'd love to include them here, but they are only available on the site itself. I can understand why they'd made that decision (they need exclusive content for their site), but I always think that the more sharable things are, the more they will grow. I wonder if they'd ever make a few of the videos embeddable...that would work nicely, I think (like when print journals feature a few of their pieces online, and the rest are only available if you purchase the issue).

I noticed plenty of fiction readings on the site, which is nice...varying levels of comfort from the readers (which makes sense, of course, and I actually like). A standout for me was this video of poet Lizzy Straus reading her piece, "Signs You Are Really a Mermaid" (the image below is a still from that video). But I'd definitely recommend exploring all the videos and seeing what strikes your fancy (Kathleen Hanna reads on there, and Sigrid Nunez). Also....they are open for submissions! (I just may have to submit something, and hope some of you do, too).

Lizzy Strauss's reading on Henry Review