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April 28, 2021
Henry Hoke's Playlist for His Novel "The Groundhog Forever"
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Roxane Gay, and many others.
Henry Hoke's The Groundhog Forever is an inventive and propulsive novel of art and friendship.
Kimberly King Parsons wrote of the book:
"In playful, exhilarating prose, Hoke pushes sentential limits, wryly examining the way art marks the world (and the many ways in which it fails to do so.)"
In his words, here is Henry Hoke's Book Notes music playlist for his novel The Groundhog Forever:
The Groundhog Forever shadows Thing 1 and Thing 2, queer film students in post-9/11 Manhattan, as they get stuck living the same day over and over together: the day they meet Bill Murray at a screening of Groundhog Day. Music is a major part of their vicious sequel. These songs were important to me while I was living the novel, or when I was writing the novel, and they’re also important to my main characters, whether they know it or not. I’ve paired each track with a passage from the book that harmonizes.
“Where or When” by Peggy Lee
She put the computer to sleep and sat back in her chair, glancing at Thing 2 through tired eyelids. She felt lulled away from any discontent by the certainty that there was a lot more future still to come.
Thing 1 drifted off, dreaming for the last time that tomorrow would be another day.
“Going Places (Zemix Version)” by Kid Creole and The Coconuts
In their minds Manhattan Island and the apocalypse were the same thing. The Things were constantly beginning again while the city was constantly ending. The birds that flocked through canyons flanking the park could care less.
When the city turns on its dwellers it doesn’t do so lightly.
“The Carpet Crawlers” by Genesis
Thing 1 and Thing 2 were probably best friends. They both wanted to make movies and were both in school for that. They became probably best friends fast, when they spent a long bad day together during the first week of freshman classes. When young people spend a long bad day together as strangers, they bond. That long bad day had happened roughly two-and-a-half years of Tuesdays before this Tuesday, which was Groundhog Day Day.
“The Truth” by Handsome Boy Modeling School featuring Róisín Murphy and J-Live
Thing 1 turned her head and oh yes, there he was, in a chair by the shadowed door. Bill, aglow in the flickering light of his own image. A shining star from their youth who was now a saint. The Divine Bill. He looked different from the coiffed early nineties brunette man in the groundhog movie. He now had short gray hair and a scraggle of beard. He was glorious.
The Things watched Bill. The Things ceased blinking. Bill watched himself die over and over and over.
“This Whole World” by The Beach Boys
Anna left the room and walked to a window at the north end of the hall, watched the Empire State Building and swore to herself that she wasn’t retreating. She’d stay in this city until the bitter end, no matter how bad the air quality got, or how much oversaturated blood they donated, or how many blocks the National Guard shut down, no matter how many American flags sprung up like blood weeds, and no matter how many people looked side-eyed at her skin color. Anna’s resolve to stay would be cement against every gross askance.
“Unravel” by Björk
“I sat where you’re sitting and listened to our favorite song over and over until the day ended,” she continued. “I wrote some poems, but they weren’t for you, they were for the Wednesday people.”
“Okay,” he said.
“I write for the future.”
“Church on White” by Stephen Malkmus
By most accounts it was an unremarkable morning for the city. A taxi passenger swung their door open without looking and a cyclist crashed through the glass of the window and lay screaming on the shatter of the street. But that happened in SoHo, where Thing 1 and Thing 2 weren’t.
“But Not For Me” by Ella Fitzgerald
At some point on Wednesday April 28th, everyone who didn’t die in the night woke up. Everyone woke up but the two Things. Thing 1 and Thing 2 weren’t there on Wednesday to wake up. They had been students as recently as Tuesday, in attendance at the big purple university in Manhattan. But on Wednesday they were nowhere to be found.
Tuesday was their last day.
“Black & Gold” by Sam Sparro
Thing 2 followed suit, and then he turned and went further. This was a moment on another Tuesday, the Devil was a myth, and he kissed Shotgun’s lips. He had to. Shotgun was the love of his life, or at least the love of his today, the today that had become his life.
“Us Ones In Between” by Sunset Rubdown
“These kids walking around like they’re invincible, when they’re not. And we are, and we don’t walk around like ... that.”
“Yeah, but they’re feeling invincible because they’re sure tomorrow’s going to come. And we know it won’t.”
Thing 1 and Thing 2 tried to breathe deeply, surrounded by Wednesday people. Wednesday people with the void coming at them like a slow-moving cloud.
“Shine Blockas” by Big Boi featuring Gucci Mane
If Thing 2 was going to tell anyone about Groundhog Day Day, about all the endlessness, it was May. He unfolded his stuckness, and May listened. And May believed.
“That’s a tough one,” she said when he was done telling. “Your favorite album of all time probably hasn’t even come out yet.”
“Another Day” by Galaxie 500
The sun hit them both from behind. They looked at the street and finally realized what they had missed in all previous repetitions, what had been absent the entire time. When the sun hit them, they no longer cast shadows.
Henry Hoke wrote THE GROUNDHOG FOREVER (WTAW Press, 2021), The Book of Endless Sleepovers and the story collection GENEVIEVES (Sublito Press, 2017), which won the Subito Press book prize. His work appears in The Offing, Electric Literature, Hobart, Carve and the Catapult anthology Tiny Crimes. He co-created and directs Enter>text: a living literary journal. Sticker, a memoir, is forthcoming from Bloomsbury's Object Lessons. Born to Alabamians, Henry grew up in Virginia and earned his BFA from New York University. He holds an MFA from California Institute of the Arts, where he taught creative writing from 2014-2019. He has curated events at the &Now Festival, Machine Project, the Neutra VDL House and the Poetic Research Bureau. His play At Sundown premiered at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and his short film Taking Shape screened on HBO. He teaches Scriptwriting at the UVA Young Writers Workshop.
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