Come hear us speak at Gelf Magazine’s Varsity Letters Series in Dumbo.  Details below. Going to be magic.

Jan Larsen Art (Official site,map)
63 Pearl St (between Water St. and Front St.)
Brooklyn, NY 11201
Next to the F train. Close to the A,C. Accessible by the 2,3.

Doors open at 7:00.
Event starts at 7:30.

We had the honor of appearing on NPR’s excellent Only A Game show.  Here’s the interview with the magical Bill Littlefield.  The show features unbelievable music and they found this Dolly Parton classic, Ping Pong to buffer our piece.  Here she duets with Kristofferson.  Magic. 

Henry Miller found a paddle fit his hand as sweetly as a pen.  He battled Anais Nin at Clichy, Lawrence Durrell in Corfu, and Man Ray in Hollywood.  ”I play a Zen-Lile game,” he once claimed, “No matter how glamorous an opponent may be, I never let him, or her, distract me.”

Magic slideshow and excerpt from our “If You Lived Here You’d Be Rallying By Now” chapter which makes a scientific case as to how Ping Pong built the great American Suburb.  

We were honored to be on the Brian Lehrer Show this morning.  He is quite a pongeur.  After our hit was over, he broke out his paddle and gave us a bruising and a beating.  Here is our interview.  Even Charlie Rangel’s breaking news could not deter us from talking Table Tennis. 

We are honored to be covered in New York Post’s Page Six this morning.  The World would be a better place if Ping Pong was on Page Six every morning.  

The excellent Billy Heller has hailed our mighty tome as one of the finest books that are “Required Reading.”  We are in lofty company listing just after Salman Rushdie’s Luka and the Fire of Life.   

The untold story of Ping Pong’s role in the rise of the cigarette.  Back in the 1950s, when the average American puffed on a staggering 2,558 ciggies a year, everyone was inhaling.  How did Big Tobacco lure the country into lightning up?  By co-opting the purity of the ping pong lifestyle and perverting it in the name of Marlboro Country.  Mary Reilly, US Champion casually puffs on a Camel and proclaims “Experience is the best teacher, in playing table tennis or choosing a cigarette.”  Glowing in their neckerchiefs, a doubles combo suck on a Pall Mall as their non-smoking opponents sweat and wheeze.  A Kool smoking couple suggest their favorite brand “smooths your throat” and “clears your mind of every thought of bosses and time clocks.” 

Dave Itzkoff wrote a magic piece on the Tournament of Champions. It is an honor to be mentioned in the same article as Howard Jacobson’s Mighty Walzer.  Best Ping Pong book ever.  

Update: We are also in our favorite Australian outlet, the Sydney Morning Herald and the most intelligent of English quality papers, The Independent.

Thanks to all who came out last night to cheer on a full throated field of pongeurs battle to the death to celebrate the launch of Everything You Know is Pong and raise money for 826 NYC.  It was a magic night and we were honored by the spirit of the competitors who dispatched each other with abandon.  All photos by Christopher Farber.