Quiet weekend filled with reading and analysis. The DiLeo anthology "On Anthologies" arrived in Friday's mail and has provided some very engaging reading on the economics and pedagogy of anthologies. I read thru a few of the essays in the collection and than turned to two other books - Leslie Marmo Silko's "Storyteller" and Norma Elia Cantu's "Canicula". The two books are similar in that the both bring together archival photographs with narrative texts, but Silko's "Storyteller" is far superior in its writing and range and scope of interests. Silko includes both photographs of relatives and images of the landscape, the Laguna Pueblo, devoid of the human element, and at no point do the photographs feel like a device for the author's larger project. The images are printed and presented in a variety of ways from full page bleed to sharing the page with text. Some images feel cropped. This contrasts with the selection of photos in Cantu's "fictionalized memoir" which has a feeling of the family photo album/scrapbook (the least interesting of which appear to be modern day yearbook and school dance photos). Cantu treats the photographs as objects which inspire the speaker's memories and meditations on the past, and frequent reference is made to the images, all of which include people. The speaker of Cantu's tales, are a young narrator speaking from the perspective of the girl in the photographs reflecting on a host of cousins, aunts, uncles, etc. which in time grows difficult to sustain. In Silko's book, the author tells the stories not only of the Marmon family clan, but also delves into the myth and legend of the Laguna people - in this way, the stories in this collection provide a wider angle into the exploration of memory and myth and the cultural experiences of the narrator of this book. And of course, the formal elements of "Storyteller" are far more interesting - ranging from prose to songs to poems sprawling across the page, vs. the strict narrative prose of "Canicula" which translates roughly as "dog days of summer". Silko annotates the photographs at the end of the book, whereas Cantu chooses to leave these poems in the realm of memento mori - playing again with the line between truth and fiction. Which do I prefer? "Storyteller" triumphs hands down.