Dostoevsky for Beginners?

Fast realizing that blogging every day for a month is not all it's cracked up to be. Unwilling to admit defeat, but not feeling very inspired tonight.

Oh! I know! A number of factors have converged to convince me that I should read some Dostoevsky:

• reading David Foster Wallace's pro-Dostoevsky essay in Consider the Lobster, last week
  
• seeing Tiny Kushner last night, which includes a scene where Laura Bush reads her favorite novel, The Brothers Karamazov, to the dead children of Iraq
• the hype for From the House of the Dead at the Metropolitan Opera, based on one of Dostoevsky's lesser-known novels
• a promise I once made to a young man that I would read The Brothers Karamazov if he read Atonement. I doubt that this man kept up his end of the bargain, and indeed, he broke some promises about things that are far more important than Ian McEwan novels--so I shouldn't feel like I owe him anything, but nonetheless, I still feel guilty that I haven't read Dostoevsky.
  

So now I have a question for any Dostoevsky fans who read this blog: where should I begin? Karamazov? Crime and Punishment? Something else? (I wish Wallace had addressed this in his essay.) What novel will best give me the quintessential Dostoevsky flavor and make me fall in love with his work? Please don't hesitate to offer your suggestions.

SNL or Humana Festival?

Questions of categorization in the arts are notoriously tricky to answer. Where is the dividing line between a novel and a novella, between personal expression and self-indulgence, between comedy and farce?

Or, the question that prompts me to write this blog post: What is the difference between a short-and-funny one-act play and a comedy sketch?

You might say that comedy sketches tend to be more topical and up-to-the-minute--but while many sketches make fun of current celebrities or politicians, comedy troupes also perform material that makes fun of broader quirks of human nature or society. And yes, any one-act play that is longer than 10 minutes and/or features subtle characterizations is unlikely to merit the question "Is this sketch comedy instead?" But I've seen some pretty wacky one-acts in my time. What makes David Ives' hilarious "Words, Words, Words" (a conversation between three monkeys placed in front of typewriters to see if they will type the complete works of Shakespeare) a one-act play and not a comedy sketch?

Is it like what Sondheim says about Sweeney Todd: "If you perform it in an opera house, then it's an opera"? In other words, could the exact same script be considered both a comedy sketch and a one-act play, if in the first case it is performed by a sketch comedy troupe and in the second case by a cast of Equity actors? Is the author's intent the only thing that dictates whether it is "theater" or "sketch comedy"? (If so, damn, that makes me feel powerful!)

I'm asking this because on Friday I got an idea for a new one-act play, and I don't get those very often. But it quickly occurred to me that the subject of this hypothetical play is rather topical, and the conceit of it is extremely silly, and I probably wouldn't be able to sustain it for longer than 10 minutes. So, what's the difference between that and a comedy sketch? I think of myself as a playwright and would like to write a good one-act; it would take some mental adjustment to think of myself as a sketch-writer and I don't want to get led too far down that path.

I still think it would be a good idea for me to write this play, don't get me wrong, since it will surely teach me something about my craft. I just wish I knew what it is that I'll be writing!

No business (cards) like show business (cards)

Question for y'all, especially if you move in theatrical circles: Do playwrights have business cards? By which I mean, is it accepted practice to spend a bit of one's own money printing up cards that say "Playwright," and then to give them out to other theater professionals that one encounters? Or is this just weird/pretentious?

I ask this because I went to see The Arabian Nights at Berkeley Rep on Tuesday, and as I BART-ed back to the city, I found myself seated across from one of the performers, Alana Arenas. I congratulated her (it was an awesome production...longer post to come later) and we chatted for a bit. She was very sweet, and when I shyly told her that I am a playwright, she asked me my name and said she'd look out for my work.

At that moment, I wished that I could've handed her a business card that included my name, the title "Playwright," this blog address, etc. (Especially because my surname is very uncommon and hard to remember.) But do playwrights ever do this? What's the etiquette?