Month / January 2004

by DrMabuse

Entertainment, Not Literature

Two Blowhards has a very interesting post up about the differences between book people and movie people. The book world’s inability to appreciate or understand the craftsmanship of writing a popular novel is what continues to keep John P. Marquand’s name (for one) from being celebrated as a great writer. As I’ve said more than once, Marquand, winner of the Pulitzer in 1937, is , for the most part, out-of-print today. His books, which offered a grand mix of satire and entertainment, were extremely popular during his time and still hold up well today in their careful observations of middle-class life.

But because Marquand could not find universal acceptance among critics who were quick to condemn him because he was a solid storyteller, because he dared to put his name on the popular Mr. Moto books rather than hide behind a Starkian non de plume, if you find his paperbacks at all, you’ll find them housed within trashy covers that make Marquand come off as a sensationalist (“One woman’s climb to the top!”), which undervalue his abilities as a stylist or a satirist. Or you’ll find the covers for the later books, which desperately try to plug Marquand as the greatest American novelist since Sinclair Lewis. And who wants to fall prey to that kind of marketing? For later generations who know nothing of Marquand, this paperback cover Lamarckism has pretty much killed Marquand’s shot at surviving the fray or being remembered. It was only the Pulitzer and the resultant curiosity about The Late George Apley‘s narrative structure that drew me to the book and allowed me to discover him. Otherwise, I might never have heard of the guy. And yet how often are we attracted to a ribald movie poster or a DVD cover that isn’t too far removed from Harlequin romances?

How many of us are willing to enjoy a well-made monster movie like The Thing from Another World or even a not-so-well-made monster movie like The Blob? We have no problem intellectualizing Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines or even the three Matrices, which are, let’s face it, enjoyable crap. But confess that you like even a handful of Stephen Kings (full confession: I like King) or that you liked Elmore Leonard’s novels more than Salman Rushdie’s post-Satanic Verses work to a roomful of literary snobs and you’ll either be led to the door or dismissed as a hopeless case. John Updike declared Tom Wolfe’s A Man in Full as “entertainment, not literature.” But as far as I’m concerned, A Man in Full or Bonfire of the Vanities are gripping reads laced with honed prose and careful observations. I would kill to have had the skills to write either of these. But I have known intelligent people to put these labels aside and enjoy half-baked crap like Zoolander or the last two Austin Powers movies.

Where Howard Hawks can be extolled beyond measure as a consummate artist of grand entertainment, years after Rio Bravo was panned on its release, by the same measure, Marquand still falls by the wayside in the book world. While the auteur theory can be applied across the board to an artist like Stanley Kubrick and an entertainment-oriented director like Michael Curtiz, in the medium guided more explicitly by “one voice,” the auteur is doomed upon even a casual embrace of the page-turner.

by DrMabuse

AudBlog #1 — The Slings and Arrows of Outrageous Bagels

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[1/24/06 UPDATE: As insinuated in the comments, during an earlier incarnation of this site (Dr. Mabuse’s House of Fun) that you will likely never see, I had a program entitled “Babblings of an Insomniac,” which I suppose was a podcast years before podcasts were podcasts, that involved getting together with a friend and talking about whatever we felt like it. I had coined the term “aug,” hoping for some Peter Merholz-style propagation. But it never caught on. Should some Brobdingnagian entity grant me limitless spare time, I may post my audio development over the past seven years in full.]

by DrMabuse

The Reader’s Last Sigh

The Associated Press reports that Rushdie’s new novel will “have a lot more India in it” than Midnight’s Children. That’s great. But it still doesn’t change the fact that Rushdie hasn’t written a single compelling novel since Haroun and the Sea of Stories.

Who says they aren’t crazy about libraries in the sticks? In Modesto, 100 volunteers are trying to maintain a small sales tax to ensure that their libraries stay open.

Geologists are trying to stop a creationist book from being sold at the Grand Canyon. The book, Grand Canyon: A Different View, suggests that the Canyon came into being not by the erosion of the Colorado River over millions of years, but because of a wager between Jesus and Peter. Peter lost the bet. And instead of turning water into wine, as Peter hoped, Jesus created the Grand Canyon. But not without starting a few side projects like lime jello and double-entry bookkeeping.

And Pete Rose has the best marketing gimmick around: “Read my book before judging me.”

[1/24/06 UPDATE: As of November 2004, the controversy died down. I am not in a position to confirm this, although I will try and make a phone call to determine what the National Park Service’s position is, but it appears that Tom Vail’s apocryphal book is still being sold at the Grand Canyon store. Of course, all this came well before any of the Intelligent Design bullshit. But the decidedly unscientific Tom Vail has remained quite smug about his victory.]

by DrMabuse

A New Kind of Pragmatism

The New Yorker on Howard Dean: “Last summer, Joe Trippi told U.S. News & World Report that he had given Dean a curious piece of advice: ‘I tell him the only way he can win is to believe in his heart he cannot win. We?ve got to act like we have nothing to lose.’ That, as they say, was then. When I asked Dean, in mid-October, whether he still subscribed to the Trippi wisdom, he replied, ‘In part. I think the problem with the Democratic Party in general is that they?ve been so afraid to lose they?re willing to say whatever it takes it to win. And once you?re willing to say whatever it takes to win, you lose?because the American people are much smarter than folks in Washington think they are. Do I still believe it? I think you have to be ready to move forward and not just try to hold on to what you?ve got. I truly believe that if you?re not moving forward you?re moving backwards in life. There?s no such thing as neutral.'”

by DrMabuse

The Kookysolo Manifesto

Sasha Cagen’s book, Quirkyalone: A Manifesto for Uncompromising Romantics, is now ranked 436 at Amazon. But I must take umbrage with Ms. Cagen’s success. I fear that Ms. Cagen has plagiarized me. Back in April 1997, I wrote a piece for Motherfuckin’ Angry Motherfucker, a zine assembled by a staff of one at Kinko’s with a modest circulation of 42. I’ve contacted my attorney about this and he’s informed me that a little bit of public exposure may help my case. I’ve also obtained permission from the editors of Motherfuckin’ Angry Motherfucker to reprint my piece, “The Kookysolo Manifesto,” in full on this website. There are, of course, certain similarities between the two catchphrases “quirkyalone” and “kookysolo.” However, I wish to assure my readers that this was simply an essay whipped up in the course of a drunken evening. If I had known that “kookysolo” had appeal, I would have cashed in the same way that Ms. Cagen has. Of course, there are also subtle differences between our respective philosophies. But I leave the readers to judge the results (and Ms. Cagen’s possible theft) for themselves.

People Like Us: The Kookysolos
by Edward Champion

I am, perhaps, what you may call a man who masturbates frequently. Relationships are like nectar from the gods. They happen, but perhaps only once in a blue moon. For years, I’ve wondered if I should check into a clinic or get a liposuction. But, of course, that would be a betrayal. Why would I desire to be one of those ironies that grace the magazine covers? The Meg Ryan type cast in repeated roles that involve a concept as believable as a government that never lies: the absolutely gorgeous young woman who can’t seem to find Mr. Right or so much as a date with a fine young stallion.

The morning after New Year’s Eve (another hangover in bed alone, another year minus a good afterglow) I was standing in the San Francisco air when I realized that I needed one of two things: a good lay or a cup of coffee. I settled for the coffee, since getting the good lay involved an endeavor more intricate and demanding than getting a Ph.D. At least if I wanted something immediate. I drank three double lattes, just to be sure that I was awake, and began rambling incohrently to the guy behind the counter, who was also suffering from a hangover. “I’ve got it!” I exclaimed. “Kookysolo.” Needless to say, I was 86ed from the cafe. My picture hangs on the wall.

But I knew that I had something with this kookysolo thing. It was clear to me that not only was this a term that could stick with the socially inert, but that it could be used as an excuse for those people who are afraid to introduce themselves or to give their fellow humans the benefit of the doubt. Gravitating towards the kookysolo label would allow people a justification for their own self-pity, those people who watch Love Connection or Blind Date in the dark.

We are the puzzle pieces who never actually throw themselves into the box. We inhabit singledom as our natural capitulating state. In a world where most people have no problem living up to John Donne’s idea that no man is an island, we are, by force of our convictions, our abrasive personalities, and our failure to remember first names, hopelessly antisocial.

Yet make no mistake: We are no less concerned with making an effort to ask someone out on a date, whether we be male or female. We do not have the courage to voice our interests in someone. Secretly, we are romantics, but romantics who are terrified of putting ourselves out there or giving a stranger a chance. We want a miracle. We want someone to somehow perceive our terrifying inability to interact and do the work for us. And in this quest, which is no different from plopping onto the couch with the remote control rather than getting out into the world, we are our own worst enemies.

For the kookysolo, the world is a terrifying place of axe-murderers and rapists behind every corner. We cannot conceive of the possibility of failure and when it does happen, as it does all too frequently, we remain convinced that the world is out to get us. Thus, we go home and watch television and drown ourselves in a bottle of wine rather than pick ourselves up and accept that, yes, one day, a nifty soulmate will be there, so long as we keep plugging away. We kookysolos have become so hopelessly placated by our 57 channels of cable and the number of beverages in a convenience store that we’re surprised that the same principles cannot be applied to relationships.

By the same token, being alone is understood as a way to reinforce these terrible impulses, to be considerably more hindered by our fears. Our weekends are full of intricate rituals. Lots of potato chips and television and vodka. Even if we do find the fortitude to go on a date, we’re terrified by the prospect of wrapping our arms around our date just to see how it feels. Because we go into the thing assuming the worst.

And so, a community of kookysolos is essential.

Since people like us eventually hit a point where we’re willing to throw in the towel, it becomes essential to get together with other kookysolos and have pity parties. Support groups are just the tip of the iceberg. We need manifestos. We need self-help books that are modeled exclusively on half-baked theories rather than science. We are a demographic that will always buy these books. Because, dammit, it’s something we can reach for in the hermetically sealed comfort of our own home. It’s something that confirms what’s destructive to us.

But if this is what it means to live, then you can count me out. Because probably the worst thing that can happen is when one kookysolo hooks up with another kookysolo, and the two of them kvetch endlessly about their own fears and limitations. Bonding based on crippling negativity is a recipe for chaos. If the relationship survives, it will be quilted in emotionally clingy fabric, which is healthy for neither party. But chances are more likely that it will end badly, and it will further terrify both kookysolos into avoiding relationships.

The earth will quake if anyone, en masse, actually believes that being kookysolo is a good idea.

by DrMabuse

Quick Quickies

Since it is book-related, Paul O’Neill fesses up that the Iraq plan was in place well before 9/11. The first major blow from an insider.

Updike’s first short story: “The moment his car touched the boulevard heading home, Ace flicked on the radio.”

Anybody have any clues on the Key West Literary Seminar fracas? Moorish Girl (and all of us) wants to know.

Six Bay Area ladies talk mystery writing.

A big Blair-like blowup at USA Today. Jack Kelley has resigned.

The Times gives a lot of space to the image.

And an engineer attempts to deconstruct postmodern literary criticism.

by DrMabuse

A Special Column by Laura Miller

[EDITOR’S NOTE: Miguel Cohen is unwell this week. He reports that he Super-Sized his McDonalds meal by mistake. He believes he’s suffering from mad cow disease. I asked Miguel what increasing the size of his fries and drink had to do with beef. He replied, “You just don’t know, man.” While the doctors investigate Miguel’s condition, Laura Miller has agreed to fill Miguel’s shoes with a special exclusive.]

Columnist’s block, like a bad heroin habit, is a subject of lackluster interest to those who are capable of filing a column that actually includes a few nifty ideas and a great annoyance to me personally. It differs somewhat from writer’s block in that the columnist is faced with the prospect of sounding important, because the columnist must keep her job, even when she really doesn’t know the audience she’s writing for. “To hell with filing the article,” once said Jayson Blair to a friend, “let’s go get sushi and not pay. I’ll make the shit up as it comes along.” Well, we all know what happened to him. At least the writer has talent, whereas the lofty book columnist is often a windbag who cannot grasp so much as a whit of the typical book enthusiast’s mind. The columnist does not understand that most people do not give a damn when she writes in a smug, highfalutin tone and that, if they do, they’re generally reading the New York Times Book Review with their pants draped around their ankles while on the john and have every intention of using the back page as a clever substitute for something I cannot mention in a family newspaper. Either that or they’re a unique form of starfucker, pining for a Salon gig, or they’re wise enough to keep their trap shut. If you complain of not being able to write a column, you might be openly mocked in the book community (though never to the columnist’s face) or even satirized on a blog.

Marilyn T. Chambers, star of Behind the Green Door, wouldn’t dare to write a book column unless she had some inkling of what she was talking about. Nevertheless, you can see how important I sound because I referenced a figure whom you may or may not have heard of. The brilliance of including Chambers in this paragraph is that I can spell out her credentials (i.e., Chambers starred in a piece of smut called Behind the Green Door, in case you didn’t catch that fact the first time) and somehow get through Chip McGrath’s filter. Chambers is intrigued by the neurological dimensions of faking orgasms in general, not because she has endured columnist’s block (although, if she were a columnist, we might say that she has) but because she has gone through episodes of something not dissimilar: she sings for her supper. We might call this avocational condition “whoring.”

Just how much whoring is too much remains a tricky question. Mata Hari, who was a sharp cookie who liked to dance, and who found herself gyrating obsessively (giving the columnist redundant clauses with which to increase word count), explains, “The dance is a poem of which every movement is a word.” Scientists studying the effects of logorrhea, which is what might happen if you were to apply a certain rectal condition to words (i.e., this column), tested for it by asking columnists for columns describing their state of health. Most responded with columns that were too long: the shortest at around 6,000 words. Some scientists resigned from the project immediately. A few collapsed, reporting that they could not read a newspaper column for several years, after being exposed to such limitless verbosity. The handful of scientists left standing asked, “What the hell does any of this have to do with Mata Hari and dancing?” In fact, an early draft of this column was so bad that the folks at the copy desk pined for another David Brooks column. If you’re a prolific popular columnist (or you think you are) like me, you can delude yourself into thinking that you’re better than those groundlings making wisecracks, or those people who have a sense of humor that you lack. Writing a worthless column is an art, albeit a low one, beyond reproach, that comes out painfully. You may not realize this, but my life is in shambles. Of course, if I admitted anything human like that, then perhaps the perceptions would shift. If I suggested in any real way that I was passionate about books, then you might love me the same way you love Michiko. But allow me this small metaphor, for I am not inured to rejection notices the way that most of you may be. I have not written a novel and I don’t have Michiko’s Pulitzer, but I am a columnist. And I have an airtight gig. I want to keep my job. You like me, right?

A little snark or playful banter is easy to mistake for something serious. I’m not quite sure where I was going with the Mata Hari reference. And I don’t know what I was thinking when I mentioned Marilyn Chambers. But perhaps I can offer a scientific hypothesis that will get us back to the main.

In 2003, many of the book blogs, reading the New York Times Book Review because they liked books and they liked Chip, noticed from time to time that one columnist was full of shit. In other words, too much of a grand gig (i.e., writing for the New York Times), as well as too little (i.e., anything written for Salon), can trigger columnist’s block, and this explains why “the bigger the lack of passion, the bigger the block.” Lewis H. Lapham writes the same damn column every Harper’s, but at least he is a harmless enough crank. Lapham may be one-note. He may have a testosterone that doesn’t quit, but he has a passion and a sense of humor. So it was something of a shock to see him writing about George Plimpton this month. Apparently, someone at Harper’s finally got around to telling him that his blustery assaults on Bush were maiming small children in Ecuador.

A friend of mine (yes, I have friends) once invented a “cure” for this condition: to counteract a series of humorless columns, create something more humorless. Think up a bland, banal subject — something like columnist’s block or covering a book that you’re inclined to hate from the first page — and expend 1,000 words on it. In your mind invest it with such life-defining importance that your entire journalistic career hinges upon this one central silly thing. You must take a topic that no reasonable person would waste a paragraph on and approach it as if it were some truly important ideal, something as important as the Federalist Papers, something as pivotal to this planet as carbon.

Blocked or not, columnists have been disappointingly unimaginative in their responses to columnist’s block. One exception is the tiny literary genre of book columns on the back page of the New York Times Book Review. No, not those cutesy cartoons. Hint hint. I know of only one worthwhile columnist who I can read even when I know she is suffering from columnist’s block. In fact, you may not know this, but I have assembled a small chapbook which features this columnist’s ouevre. It reflects, I believe, the highest pinnacle of columnist’s block. Such useless credos as “you have to live” before you write are pure poppycock, because any real columnist knows that she can bluff her way through anything. Particularly when the columnist has failed to live and cannot crack so much as a smile. Whatever tortures the reader must bear, that makes it art in my book.

by DrMabuse

Gene Wolfe, Fantasy Maestro

Ultan’s Library: A journal for the study of Gene Wolfe.

James B. Jordan interview: “I used to belong to a chain letter that included Gardner Dozois, Jack Dann, Chelsea Quinn Yarborough, Mike Bishop. And we would write long newsletters about our doings and then put them in a packet and they would be sent around. This was before they had computer bulletin boards and all that sort of stuff. And I could almost invariably identify the writer from the first paragraph or two. The writer was only overtly identified with the signature, because it was done in letter form. But the styles of the people who were writing were sufficiently different that I could very easily pick out most of them without difficulty. And I am a good imitator. I could write imitation Shakespeare that you would think was probably legitimate Shakespeare because there is a lot of Shakespeare for me to look at. I have sort of knack for doing that sort of thing.”

Excerpt from Knight, Wolfe’s new book (part of the Wizard Knight series).

“Under Hill” — short story

“Castaway” — short story

“Copperhead” — short story

Wolfe on Lord of the Rings: “Philology led [Tolkien] to the study of the largely illiterate societies of Northern Europe between the fall of Rome and the beginning of the true Middle Ages (roughly AD 400 to 1000). There he found a quality — let us call it Folk Law — that has almost disappeared from his world and ours.”

The influence of Borges on Wolfe’s work.

by DrMabuse

The Cincinnati Enquirer is a Purveyor of Filth

Cincinnati Enquirer: “And for those outraged that the low-rated Doonesbury survived while Boondocks didn’t, we made the decision to drop Boondocks because we did not want to keep publishing a comic that we regularly needed to censor. During the past year, Boondocks was substituted a number of times because it was deemed inappropriate for a family newspaper. And not just this family newspaper. Editors across the country were making the same decisions.”

Well, you have to give the Enquirer credit for a creative excuse. Some folks have caled Boondocks unpatriotic or racist. But this is the first time I’ve heard of it being “inappropriate for a family newspaper.”

But is the Enquirer really a family newspaper?

August 5, 2001: This expose trying to demystify the N-word, mentioning “nigger” ten times and “nigga” ten times.

Peggy O’Farrell, April 9, 2003: “Dr. Safwat Zaki, a urologist with UC Physicians at University Pointe, says products purported to enlarge the penis don’t work. Some surgical options are available: Pumps can be implanted into the penis, and fat can be injected to increase its girth. But the injections don’t last, and the implants carry the risk of infection and scarring.” The Enquirer informing its readers on how to increase penis size? Indecent!

Margaret A. McGurk, Boogie Nights review: “Mr. Anderson handles the porn-making scenes with restraint; by focusing on the onlookers rather than the actors, he achieves an almost romantic mood. A few other sex scenes are hard to watch, particularly one that ends with a savage beating. Yes, there is some nudity, including a brief, display of Eddie’s claim to fame.” Reporting sex scenes! What is this? Adult Movie Guide? Indecent!

Jane Prednergast, March 25, 2000: “The Fort Thomas suspect used a condom, leaving detectives without semen to identify in the first home-invasion rape Fort Thomas has seen in years. That’s one aspect of the case that makes it different from the serial rapes being studied by investigators in Mason, Mont gomery and Colerain Township.” You don’t talk about semen or condoms in a family newspaper. Indecent!

Mike Boyer, September 29, 2002: “Pedro’s is planning a semen collection facility serving the entire Midwest on its farm, with Wisconsin-based Genex Cooperative Inc.” Indecent!

Tom Loftus, November 8, 2003: “Seelye said his jail’s procedure is to search new inmates ‘down to their undergarments’ in most cases. A thorough strip search was not done in Hawks’ case because such searches are done only when there is some suspicion that an inmate is bringing contraband into the jail, he said.” Groping inmates! Beyond indecent!

The Starr Report on the Enquirer servers: Colorful langauge all over the place.

Indecent, I say! Why stop with Boondocks? Why not shitcan all the writers?

(via Old Hag)

by DrMabuse

Back from My Hiatus

Liz Spiers has excerpts from the new Peter Biskind book, Down and Dirty Pictures. From what I can tell, Ben Affleck tried to give Harvey Weinstein a fruit basket, with unfortunate results (“Apples! That’s bad taste. Do you know who I am? I don’t eat fucking apples. Who is this guy? I’m going to go outside and kick your fucking ass. You take your apple bitch home and fuckin’ kill him.”). (via Greencine Daily)

Dave Pelzer is now trying out the “regular guy” angle. But how regular can a guy be when he’s made as much money as Pelzer has? Pelzer’s quoted, “Everybody thinks, ‘Oooo, Dave Pelzer. Oooo, Dave Pelzer.’ That’s why I just say, ‘Just shut up and sit down.’ I’m just a regular guy trying to keep my family together. I’m just the village idiot that wrote a book.” Five now, actually, with the just-releaed Privilege of Youth. If Pelzer’s such a regular guy, if he truly is a self-proclaimed village idiot, then why do people keep buying his books? And why does he keep landing those lucrative lecturing gigs? Hey, Dave, I’ve got your “regular guy” right here. It’s called unshaven, unpublished dude, maybe collecting unemployment, having a Top Ramen fiesta.

Speaking of regular guys, the Globe has an obituary up for Samuel Albert. Albert was an insurance executive who worked long hours and raised five kids, squeezing in a poem when he could find the time.

Need an angle to pitch your project? Try the grey market. The Financial Times writes, “Eighty per cent of the country’s wealth is controlled by the over-50s but 95 per cent of adspend targets people under-50; 86 per cent of over-50s say they don’t relate to most current advertising yet, for example, 66 per cent of new cars are bought by people over-45. The over-50s in employment outspend their under-50 counterparts by 20 per cent. And over the next 20 years the over-50s market in the UK will grow by 30 per cent, while the under-50s market will shrink by 5 per cent.”

The possibilities here are limitless. We’re talking a Steely Dan reunion, a fiction market saturated by endless Anne Tyler-like variations on suburban white males descending into mid-life crisis action when their $200 fillet mignon arrives slightly undercooked, and more sex and nudity involving older people (Diane Keaton’s flash was just the tip of the iceberg). So go at it, brave new marketers! You’ve spent a small lifetime getting hep to the demands of a coddled generation just out of high school. But do you have what it takes to get acquainted with the likes of “Rikki Don’t Lose That Number?”

The funny thing is that thirty years from now, people will be demanding a reunion of OutKast.

by DrMabuse

Hiatus

I regret to inform my loyal readers that I will be taking a blogging hiatus that will last approximately twelve hours or so. Perhaps less. The reasons are unimportant. But after talking with my therapist about it, we’ve concluded that blogging has stressed me out. I need to get out in the world for a little bit and find myself. Of course, while this kind of thing is something that the average person would take days, weeks, or sometimes months to get through, I’m happy to tell you that I’m a pretty decisive guy. Twelve hours of contemplation. Twelve hours of reading that Po Bronson book, Get Off Your Ass and Do Something With Your Life. And then I’ll be happy to emerge from my private jetliner and kneel down before the lord like Eldridge Cleaver.

Apologies in advance for any inconveniences this may cause.

by DrMabuse

Seven Books in Tibet?

The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger: Optioned by Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston for New Line.

The Curious Incident of the Dog in Night-Time by Mark Haddon: Optioned by Brad Pitt.

Dreamland by Kevin Baker: Optioned by Brad Pitt.

Mark L. Smith script: “Brad Pitt is reading one of his scripts.”

And there’s probably more. The moral of the story: If your book rides the careful crest between literary and pop, Brad Pitt will option it.

by DrMabuse

I Love You Too, Irvine (Sort Of)

To his supreme credit, Alexander McCall Smith claims that his remarks about Irvine Welsh have been “misinterpreted.” Welsh’s status has been downgraded to “a partially indecent hooligan whom I’ll never buy a drink for.”

A new Michigan law requires publications that depict “explicit content” to be covered up. Booksellers and reading groups are furious. And they’ve filed a lawsuit. In the meantime, they may want to consider covering up Ann Coulter’s books. Pretty explicit stuff, given that she’s advocated blowing up the New York Times building, as well as suggesting, “We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity.” (via Sarah)

Catherine Kennan has a very juicy piece on highbrow personals. It doesn’t get any closer to understanding the phenomenon (who can?), but it does feature a very amusing exchange between Kennan and one of the guys behind a personal ad. And it’s impossible to resist this ad: “Find the 10th coefficient in the expansion of the binomial (1+x) to the 20th power. Then love me some more. Mathematical Ms, Cambridge.” (via Chica)

The latest culprit behind declining book sales? USA Today suggests it’s the DVD.

Sarah Waters has turned down a Who’s Who entry because she’s not sure how relevant the directory is to today’s world.

Columbia Journalism Review has a piece on former New Republic editor Gregg Easterbrook. It’s another guy fired because of blog story, but the cause here is far more nefarious (and strangely immediate).

And more on Norr from the Daily Planet. Efforts to track down settlement terms are nice from an outside source, but there are few conditional questions revealed.

by DrMabuse

Bonfires of the Vanities

Demonstrating to the world that nihilism begins in India, a mob has destroyed 30,000 ancient manuscripts because Oxford University Press spilled the beans about a Hindu king’s parents. Strangely, a similar book in the United States, Bill O’Reilly’s Who’s Lapping Up for You Now?: My Early Days as a Salamander, has not spawned any mobs or burnings. But there have been a few interview walkouts. (via Bookslut)

Martha Freeman’s The Trouble with Babies is a children’s book with a brief passage referencing two gay fathers. Predictably, the yokels are now damning it, citing the book’s “homosexual agenda.” The book’s been removed from library shelves and sales have dropped off because of this misperception. And the proposed Queer Eye for the Straight Dad spinoff series has been cancelled.

by DrMabuse

Hey, Chip, You Rock My World!

Well, since folks are either making confessionals or unabashedly whoring, I’m more than happy to join the collective hue and cry. In fact, Chip, send me a book and I’ll wash your windows in a garter strap! Not a pretty sight, I know. But if that fails to quell the current cries of sexism, then I’ll legally change my name to “Pia Zadora.”

[1/23/06 UPDATE: Two years and countless criticisms of Sam Tanenhaus later, I haven’t been called by the NYTBR. Not so much as a thank you note for the brownies I sent Sam Tanenhaus. My pitches to my own hometown newspaper have fallen on deaf ears. (Never mind that they have taken out-of-town litbloggers for their pages.) The newspapers don’t want me, either because I come across as too volatile or I simply can’t write. As a man who has been on staff for a magazine, I’d like to think it’s the former. I don’t mean for this update to sound as if I’m throwing a pity party or to imply that I’m bitter or anything. I still plan to go on writing, even if it means most of my words being deposited here. But this is a telltale warning to all you whipper-snappers out there. The fresher, the more distinct and the more original you are, the less likely the mainstream media will want you. At least that seems to be my experience.]

by DrMabuse

Well, Since It Seems So Important.

They gathered on the shifting sands, away from the bright lights and the big stars. Kith and kin caught on the question of kaput, the winds cutting across their chiseled jaws, freezing limber pecs and refrigerating halter tops housing surgical implants. It was an ineluctable assault on the California senses. Fifty degrees was just too damn cold. They were concerned. Perplexed. Unable to offer answers. Ensnared by the greatest enigma to face humanity since Poe whipped up his “Gold Bug” code or those planes disappeared in the Bermuda Triangle. But who really cared about these trivialities? There were more pressing concerns than the mysteries and achivements of the human race.

Their friend was behaving strangely.

No longer the virginal vixen they had worshipped. No longer the adorable fuck-me starlet coveted by Bob Dole. No longer the gal who might have slept with Justin Timberlake. Or not. But possibly a John Wayne Gacy in the making. A troubled soul.

Their friend had been spotted slamming shots. More than a few times. Oh, she was of drinking age. Of that, there could be no doubt. But because she was accustomed to staggering demands, because she was rich beyond the dreams of that amateurish carapace she had thrown off long ago when she crossed those Ts on a contract signed in blood, her employees were afraid to tell her that she had a sizable problem. But was it the steady lucrative paychecks or genuine commiseration? Was their friend naive enough to believe that she could buy the sympathies of an entourage or was it a classic case of amoritizing pathos to ensure popularity? Had she been told that all along?

Whatever the case, they kept the hard line. No problems. Nothing to report. Shot while trying to escape. But then their friend had been whisked out of the Palm Casino, vaguely cognizant, succored by white man’s burden. But, no, their friend had not imbibed beyond the pale.

Thoreau would have marveled over this denial of excess. If anything, the deceitful impressions slung by well-paid publicists would have sent him into a sudden apoplexy. Their friend could no longer be characterized as modest, as virtuous, as inherently good. Now she was a victim of her own restless problems. Of course, unlike most of the public, there was an image to perpetuate and a deep-seeded unhappiness to conceal. And if she had behaved like that without the platinum records, the limos and the Braques on the wall she never looked at, she would have been 86ed from any self-respecting dive, declared a high maintenance case among an inconsequential neighborhood, possibly left alone to inflict herself with a harder narcotic she couldn’t afford. A daily habit in the hundreds.

So when their friend sauntered down a Vegas “30 Minutes or Less” nave with all the sanctity of a microwaved Swanson TV dinner, tying the knot with a childhood friend, acknowledging the true ceremonial import with a garter over blue jeans, and when their friend cancelled the deal 55 hours later, it reflected something else that the newspapers hadn’t considered. She could marry on a whim and then throw it away. She could drink to excess and emerge with a momentarily crippling hangover. She could do almost anything and then forget it ever happened. Except one thing. A pivotal facet not long ago.

A recording contract. A Faustian deal she had to fulfill. The only commitment she had. Don’t point to the men who had perfected the art of harvesting profit over litigious decades. The star, as always, was the culpable one. Even a star young, dumb, and full of come who didn’t know any better.

And they concluded that if their friend fell asunder, or was trampled by her own coping mechanisms (harmful behavior which they encouraged), there would be another friend to grope and laud, to salivate for a time until this friend too became forgotten or the paychecks dried up. Fame was an airtight science, a neverending cycle. And the public would never stop making rash conclusions based on the few things they could espy through the tiny observational sliver.

[1/23/06 UPDATE: The original link above does not look, but it linked to a frivolous FOX News article with the headline, “Loved Ones Worry About Britney.” The article is no longer available. It is as if FOX News’s coveted resources were devoted to other things in January 2004.]

by DrMabuse

Shorties

And the Whitbread goes to Mark Haddon’s The Very, Very Curious Incident of the Dog Who Was Let Out by the Baja Men in the Morning, Afternoon and Night Shortly After He Was Fed His Meal, which I’ve been meaning to read. Except I can never remember the exact title.

David Mamet is insane.

I didn’t realize the Alexander McCall Smith/Irvine Welsh thing had legs, but even in Scotland, they need their “bag of bones”/”entertainment not literature” Vidal/Mailer in-fights.

Andy Hamilton won’t write for BBC1. Hamilton claims that Auntie Beeb has pressured a writer to remove lesbian characters from a script to “incorporate the conservative tastes of focus groups.”

Modern Humorist: “Where are all the R’s? Is it a typographical error? Does the writer simply not like R’s? Or are there mysterious deeds at play, and are the R’s somewhow involved?”

Birnbaum talks with Jonathan Lethem. Birnbaum even gets Lethem to fess that Laura Miller is “making a contribution to literary journalism.” Birnbaum also shoots the goofy gale with Neal Pollack. Among the revelations: “[Eggers] said he didn’t want me along because my stuff was much more confrontational and in your face and aggressive and loud and profane. He wanted to take McSweeney’s in a more respectable direction. And then one day I woke up and my link was off the site. And I wasn’t a McSweeney’s guy anymore. Overnight. My main conduit for communicating over the Internet had been removed, so I had to start my own site.”

And The Chronicle has apparently reached a settlement with Henry Norr.

[1/23/06 UPDATE: It is quite likely that the Henry Norr story will be slipped under the rug. But I think it stands as a remarkable testament as to how a journalist’s outside activities are controlled to a great extent by his employer. As the newspapers continue to cut the coverage and eventually begin to drop, I am wondering if they’ll become even more controlling. Henry Norr, happily, is still writing — largely for online outlets. He can be found contributing reports for Macintouch and is still actively filing no-bullshit Macworld reports from the front lines.]

by DrMabuse

Public Transmogrification

I’m not much of a public transportation critic, but I’d say that this morning’s bus ride was unsatisfactory. It had nothing to do with the 350 pound woman who sat next to me, shoving her backpack into the veneer-like threshold between us, permitting me a space buffer of approximately 1.2 millimeters (less than a trusty bullet caliber) and the compression of my body into the area of (roughly) a burlap rucksack designed for someone of Twiggy’s physique. It had nothing to do with the extenuating circumstances of this. Because I was actually able to open my book and read, even if it involved an acute open book aperture angling approximately 27 degrees, with educated guesses on how sentences ended on the left page and began on the right page. (“It was a dark ______________. ____________ better things were afoot when the gentle ________________.”)

It had nothing to do with the bus arriving late, or the extremely crowded confines within, or the body odor and the vociferous cell phone conversations carried out over such substantial topics as Paris Hilton’s new TV show, of which I haven’t a damn scrap of knowledge about. It had nothing to do with what the MUNI ridership comes to collectively expect under these circumstances. I’m convinced that people have only the sweetest intentions at heart when they deliberately collide into your back and seethe, “Get out of my way, motherfucker.” And you respond with something along the lines of “Blessed are the peacemakers” or “Have it your way, my dear Boswell.” Of this, I remain irrevocably convinced.

No, the problem had much to do with the wavering velocity of the vehicle, the origin of which could be traced to a very militant driver who seemed to confuse a trundle up Market Street with the First Battle of Ypres. “Enter through the front,” she barked at some hapless passenger trying to garner pivotal square footage through the back door. I could only imagine what this driver would do with a Glock gun in her hand. The volatility was manifest in the bus’s motion. The bus alternately moved at a snail’s pace or hit the ground running with a sharp slam on the gas, followed by a sudden brake, buffeting people forward from time to time. I’m not sure if the physical results of this eccentric two-step can be adequately described outside of a dance floor, or if they have underlying value in an aerobic environment. But it did have a unifying effect on the passengers at large. We were united. United in contusions, united in bumping into the metallic seats in front of us, united in being terrified of the bus driver quite possibly working the thirteenth hour of her shift, though being paid a lot more than a lot of us.

Overall, I’d have to conclude that the bus ride was unsatisfactory.

by DrMabuse

Quick Quickies

Margaret Drabble on Bloomsbury (via ElegVar, a Unix-like acronym I couldn’t resist)

Journalista investigates the implications of Borders’ “category management” on graphic novels.

Unusual San Francisco Architecture and The Map Room (a blog abut maps) (both via Menlo)

Defective Yeti has a heck of a forward-thinking scheme for making money off conservatives.

Slate: Should students be allowed to hook up with professors? The great irony is that the article was written by Against Love author Laura Kipnis! (via Chica)

Jonathan Yardley takes on The Reivers (which is in my bookpile). (via Sarah)

by DrMabuse

Smile! You’re on Canted Camera!

The Harper’s Iraq lies piece with sources, efforts of which originated in this MeFi thread.

And fingerprinting and photographing foreign visitors is overkill. It’s bad enough that visitors are subjected to a silly little quiz (“Have you ever been a Communist?”) that, embarassingly, demonstrates how little this nation has evolved from its McCarthyist paranoia half a century ago, or that this is one of the few Western nations in which citizens and non-citizens are split up after a twelve-hour transatlantic flight, rather than conjoined in one queue (not always the case going the other way), with instructions articulated only in English. In fact, nothing of these questions, the fingerprints or the photographs is mentioned on the DHS page referencing procedure (again, only in English).

But I don’t see how photographs compared against databases will stop the true professionals, particularly when any real criminal can undergo plastic surgery, grow a beard, shave his eyebrows, or do any number of things to avoid being detected by a guy at customs who ain’t exactly the brightest bulb at the airport.

What’s interesting about the US VISIT program is that it’s actually been in the works since 2000, which suggests that this privacy-invasive program isn’t a direct countermeasure to Sept. 11. The Post article quotes spokesman Mike Milne as follows, “If we have your information in the system, it protects you as a passenger from someone being able to use your documentation.” Oh really? So say Joe Visitor comes into the nation, gets his picture taken by the DHS, and then gets his credit card stolen by some serious thief who uses the card (before Joe Visitor cancels it) to buy “questionable” goods like bullets or raw compnents with which to construct an explosive. Given what we’ve seen of the INS wilfully damning without burden of proof, and such sickening stories as the treatment of Maher Arer by U.S. authorities, can we really count on a non-ICC compliant government to stand by habeas corpus? (And here are a few more side issues: (1) How secure are the databases? (2) What other information is being compared against the photograph? (3) If accused of a charge, does the visitor have access to this data or would their right to fair trial be obviated by a military-style tribunal? (4) Given the current spending spree of the U.S. government — projected to hit a $500 billion deficit in five years — is there any possibility that the government will sell these databases off to a marketing organization to stave off insolvency?)

But the silliest thing about US VISIT is that anyone coming into the United States by land will not be photographed. Given how easy it is to book a flight to Canada, rent a car and head south, this suggests to me that the program is more of a show of force rather than a legitimate countermeasure.

And it’s sure to perform wonders for foreign relations. In response, Brazil has begun performing the same tactics on Americans. The U.S. Embassy had this to say in response: “While we acknowledge Brazil’s sovereign right to determine the requirements for entry into Brazil, we regret the way in which new procedures have suddenly been put in place that single out US citizens for exceptional treatment that has meant lengthy delays in processing, such as the case today with a more than nine hour delay for some US citizens arriving at Rio’s international airport.” But is the Embassy more concerned with the delays or the singling out of American passengers? If the latter, the irony is dripping wet.

[1/23/06 UPDATE: Two years later, security regulations are now accepted as easily as brushing one’s teeth twice a day. While I recognize this post as a particularly heavy-handed one, I am not sure what to make of my feelings now. I feel like an absolute hypocrite. For it seems impossible now to imagine a traveling existence in which one is not required to hand over one’s ID or to be subjected to rent-a-cops who have the false impression that they’re today’s answer to Dirty Harry. This is the kind of Orwellian show of force that angered me as a teenager. And I wonder just how much of a prisoner I am in my own country, and why I (and most Americans) have come to accept this, even when the reasons behind the War on Terror have been rendered bunk. I don’t really feel any more secure than I did before September 11, but I have come to accept this existence as part of the risk of everyday existence and don’t let it get in the way of anything I do, save of course the whole handing the ID over thing.]

by DrMabuse

Queen Anne, Ordinary Life and Assorted Schlepping

Lisa Allardice dares to ask a question that some people have answered, but have refrained from voicing, fearful of being labeled some rabble-rouser to be dealt a harsh blow, never again to be invited to those swank cocktail parties: Is Anne Tyler washed up? Since I value my respiratory tract (and I’ve been known to cave when wine and cheese are placed beneath my nose, but only in weak moments), I’ll only say that I’ve liked Tyler’s books in the past, but reading Ladder of Years on a whim was a very bad idea. I suspect my struggle had to do with what Tyler considered to be the ultimate revolutionary choice for a woman: running away from your husband. And this in 1996 with a rising divorce rate. I think we can all agree that this precludes Tyler from the “contemporary literature” canon.

Also in The Guardian is an amusing and forthright essay from Danny Leigh, first-time novelist of The Greatest Gift. Not only does Leigh try to wrestle with the conundrum of whether his protagonist mirrors his life, but he also confesses that, as a human being, he figures his life experience is pretty banal. But that apparently didn’t stop him from discovering things about himself that he could throw an imaginative spin on.

This article on fan fiction doesn’t nail down any conclusions, but does offer a not-bad overview of K/S and other exemplars of fan fervor. (via Graham)

Heru Ptah apparently made a killing selling his book on the subway. To the tune of $100,000 and an MTV Books deal with an advance in the mid-five figures.

Great headline with disappointing followthrough: Diet books with prose to savor? Fat chance. If only. And this fillip in the Philly. I dare a major newspaper to assess the poetic value of The Atkins Diet.

by DrMabuse

Memo to Writers: Please Stop Dying!

Writer Roy Clarke has been kicked out of Zambia. The cause? Calling President Levy Mwanawasa a “foolish elephant” and two ministers “baboons.” Apparently, Fleet Street tactics don’t get you far in Africa.

Philip Pullman’s trilogy is now a six-hour play. But its staging hasn’t been without controversy. A few febrile fans have planned to picket the theatres. But if playwright Nicholas Wright “includes the Tom Bombadil scene,” the production should be in the clear.

Pulitzer winner John Toland has died at 91. In addition to writing Hitler: A Bigass Biography to Demolish All Bigass Hitler Biographies, Toland won the 1971 Pulitzer for The Rising Sun, which covered the Japanese Empire during the same time period. A few other people who departed from this earth over the weekend: Barbara Jeffris and L.A. underworld novelist Douglas Anne Munson.

And David Kipen has a nice tribute to the recently late John Gregory Dunne.

I’ll try and scoop up more news later, but, as all of you nursing vacation hangovers should know by now, today involves something of a shift back into gangly routine. And it’s probably more abrasive than casually replacing your bar of soap with Brill-O-Pad. In the meantime, why not try some of the folks on the left, many of whom are returning back to their respective perches?

by DrMabuse

The Un-Ethicist #2

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What’s the real story, Lil Miss Anonymous? Do you want to play ball or don’t you? Life’s a bitch, ain’t it? One minute, you’re lying flat on your ass eating Cheetos and faxing resumes, not getting a single interview. The next minute, bang, a job lands in your lap with all the gainful ardor of a chihuahua with a bladder problem.

Your altruism is commendable, if more than a little suspect in a capitalist republic that favors a ruthless dog-eat-dog mentality — to give you a specific analogy, it’s a bit like lapdogs and chihuhuas taking bites out of each other beneath a sneezeguard at a Vegas buffet with a broad culinary swath. First off, did your friend know about this specific ad? The great thing about the help wanted section is how some of these painfully cheery recruiters try to disguise their ads by giving you a private fax number for a specific venue (though tracking the telephonic prefixes and the general language used can easily keep you ahead of the game), or don’t give you any information at all (“Apply: Position #342”), or offer you very strange instructions on how to apply (“Please arrive on Wednesday at 9:30 a.m. Prepare for further application procedures. Bring dungarees.”).

My brother Randy mentioned Samuel Beckett when answering this question, and I have to say that, despite his complacency and attempts to be down with the liberal arts crowd, he’s onto something. If you feel the need to throw in the towel (because your friend will find out), keep in mind that the employment world is so hopelessly Byzantine that with any “Luke, I am your father” revelation to your friend, there’s probably a million variables you can fall back on.

After working for a radio show with a well-known host, I wrote an essay about it, without naming the host or show, although anybody who’d heard the show could have identified both. I did not vilify the host but characterized him with amused detachment. When I mentioned the essay to a friend who works for an organization associated with a show, he implied, without reading it, that publishing it would be wrong. Would it? A.B.S., NEW YORK.

When William Goldman wrote about his experiences (Adventures in the Screen Trade), he had no problem dishing the dirt. He characterized several stars and directors as utter buffoons — in a few cases, outright avaricious ones. You could make the case that Goldman was trying to sabotage his own career. He was, after all, around 51 when he wrote it. So a case could be made that the hostile chronicling arose from a mid-life crisis. But something very strange happened. The book became a bestseller and is often referenced in film classes. And Goldman still has a career, albeit writing crap like Dreamcatcher.

What do you really want to do, A.B.S.? That’s the real question here. Obviously, you have a hankering to publish this puppy (assuming it bears enough merit to be published). But why the hell are you writing to Randy? If you’re not prepared to make a hard decision between your job security and your desire to emulate Rex Reed, then I’d say that you need to put some more complications into your life. Publish it. Accept the consequences. Take a fucking risk for once, you chicken. The fact is, A.B.S., that you’re just too passive-minded for my time. So if you want me (or Randy) to make a decision for you, then I’d favor the harder choice. If only to get these silly journalistic urges out of your system and put a little hair on your chest.

Jesus, the radio business turns people into a bunch of wishy-washy bores, doesn’t it?

by DrMabuse

Disappearing Books & Some People Just Don’t Understand

In Singapore, Starbucks cafes have initiated a used-book program to get people reading. Read a book, drop it off at a Starbucks, and get $1 off a drink. Of course, there’s one chief problem with the plan beyond this failure to encourage people to read it. (Hypothetically, you can just move a book from the National Library to one of the 17 Starbucks outlets participating.) If the book is bad and likely to put you to sleep, shouldn’t the coffee discount apply before you read the book, rather than after?

At the Three Creeks Community Library, books on the occult are the most likely titles to be stolen. More so than tomes on test preparation or sex. I leave the conspiracy theorists to figure out if the occult books are hexed or not.

Publishers looking for a quick way to pulp their overstock may wish to contact Ed Charon, who holds the Guinness world record for tearing phone books into shreds. Or not. Ed Charon, you see, was just unseated by a thirtysomething. This young upstart can tear 12 1,000-page phone books apart in 12 minutes. “There’s no age or race barriers,” Charon said. “Everybody enjoys this.”

A.S. Byatt writes on the enduring power of the fairy tale and concludes that its legacy can be found on the Web.

The Sunday New York Times reviews Wolves of the Calla and refers to Oy as “the talking dog-badger companion,” while also comparing a conversational exchange involving stew to Widow Douglas’s cooking in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Highbrow attempts to understand popular fiction don’t get any funnier than this. Or maybe they do. Also in the Times: Heinlein’s “first novel,” For Us, the Living is unearthed. No real conclusions about the quality. More of an undergraduate-style summary than anything else. But it does include the blurb-whoring revelation that “the belated publication of this early work is a major contribution to the history of the genre.” Thankfully, John Chute has also taken on the book. He notes that For Us, the Living “promulgates the kind of arguments about sex, religion, politics and economics that normally gain publication through fringe presses, not the trade publishers Heinlein submitted his manuscript to.”

The Green Man Review asks a few spec-fic names (including Charles de Lint, Gwyneth Jones and Ellen Kushner) to spill their favorite books.

And, just as Gene Wolfe’s new book, The Knight, has escaped the floodgates, the folks over at Infinity Plus have an interview up with the maestro.

by DrMabuse

By the Page

Crazed Hypothesis Which Involves Momentary Shift From Lit-Loving Guy Into Silly Marketing Type (With Extraordinary, Speculative Overtures) And Mischeviously Suggesting That William Goldman’s “Nobody Knows Anything” Maxim Applies to the Publishing World: If a 300-page novel is, by Page 165, something you’re trying to finish reading so you can move on to the next one, can you conclude it’s a good novel (if you admire it in spurts)? Conversely, if it’s something you can’t put down, does it follow that the book is a great one, whether pop or literary?

Is Page 165 is the make it or break it point? Sure, there’s the possibility that the story or prose will pick up in 5-10 pages. But if the reader or critic is not mind-staggeringly drunk over the book by now, then the writer can kiss her shot at being short-listed or getting a rave review goodbye, or face being a literary mid-lister. In which case you hustle the people behind the Today Book Club.

Is this how the publishing world works? Chaos theory?

Here’s where a bit of extremely specious speculation into American lit comes into play. If we examine the last five years of winners by page count, we find the following:

Pulitzer Fiction Winners

1999: The Hours by Michael Cunningham (230 pages)
2000: The Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri (198 pages)
2001: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon (656 pages)
2002: Empire Falls by Richard Russo (496 pages)
2003: Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides (544 pages)

Average: 424.8 pages
Next Awards Ceremony: May 2004

Of the Pulitzer winners, only The Interpreter of Maladies and The Hours are less than the around-500 page mark. And that’s only because The Interpreter of Maladies is a short story collection. My guess is that The Hours‘s uber-homage to Virginia Woolf led the page count factor to be dismissed. But the Pulitzers seem to favor sprawling epics, whether a Greek family coming to Detroit, two Jewish emigres making a killing in the comic book industry, or Russo’s wide blue-collar swath.

National Book Award Winners

1999: Waiting by Ha Jin (320 pages)
2000: In America by Susan Sontag (400 pages)
2001: The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen (592 pages)
2002: Three Junes by Julia Glass (368 pages)
2003: The Great Fire by Shirley Hazard (288 pages)

Average: 393.6 pages
Next Awards Ceremony: November 16, 2004

The National Book Award winners are more manageable reads, averaging out at the 350 page mark. But page count isn’t so much as a factor, as are consequences over time (World War II in The Great Fire, what happens to characters over a decade in The Three Junes, familial trappings in The Corrections).

The National Book Critics Circle Award

1998: The Love of a Good Woman by Alice Munro (352 pages)
1999: Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem (336 pages)
2000: Being Dead by Jim Crace (208 pages)
2001: Austerlitz by W.G. Sebald (304 pages)
2002: Atonement by Ian McEwan (368 pages)

Average: 313.6 pages
Next Awards Ceremony: March 4, 2004

The odd one out here is The Love of a Good Woman, which is a collection of short stories. (And I’m discounting short story collections because, by definition, they’re harder sells than novels.) But it would appear that the National Book Critics prefer breezy, puncutated books with a more quirky style. Ian McEwan has a reputation for whittling his prose down to the bone. Austerlitz is “short,” but the conversations embedded within the novel require work to pick out, being separated by commas. Being Dead is, of course, the ultimate perspective novel in that it follows the disintegration of two corpses. And Motherless Brooklyn has the Tourette’s syndrome hook.

SILLY CONCLUSIONS:

The shorter your book, the more likely you’re going to win the National Book Critics Circle Award. But only if the prose is perspective-oriented and “challenging” enough to impress the critics.

If your novel is a little longer and your book is more centered around time and location, then you stand a shot at the National Book Award.

And if you have a sweeping epic, then the Pulitzer’s your best bet.

This leads me to wonder whether some publishers are more inclined to typeset their books to pander deliberately for specific awards, with abstruse cover art to match, and whether some editors, sensing that a prospective title has some literary merit (i.e., award-winning potential), will press the writer to tailor their books within these guidelines. (“No. Make it a little longer. And can we go off to Bavaria for a few chapters?”)

Of course, all of this is just extremely idle speculation on a rainy day. And I haven’t even taken a look at the finalists, or accounted for timed release dates. But being ill-informed on multiple levels about this sort of thing, I’d be extremely curious to hear from someone inside the publishing industry just how “pre-packaged” a particular book is for these three major awards. It certainly works that way with movies, and, since the risks are just as great (on a smaller financial scale) in fiction, it would seem to me that at least something along these lines would be in place in New York.

Just about every trade paperback edition that comes out has some kind of “Short-Listed” or “Finalist” nod on it, if it can include it. (Even a later edition of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius had “Pulitzer Finalist” on it when it already had a built-in audience, which mystified me.) You’ll recall that Jonathan Franzen got his panties in a bunch over advertising the Oprah Book Club selection on the first hardcover edition.

So the questions are: Are we seeing a shift towards award-conscious releases (even in first editions)? (The more awards, the merrier.) And, if so, how embedded is this within current publishing house policy? And by what factual criteria do they base these ebullient cover-laden interjections?

by DrMabuse

Top Films of 2003

A best book list would be futile, for the same reasons that Jessa noted. By my estimate (and I started logging in April), I read roughly around 97 books in 2003. But many of these were attempts to catch up with books published last year, or getting up to speed with the literary canon, or playing the read-the-precursors game with current releases (such as Robert Caro’s LBJ biographies and the Dark Tower books). The book-to-film ratio (and the media consumption-to-life experience ratio) this year dramatically shifted. Nevertheless, there were notable lapses into film geekdom (such as the Castro’s Noir City series and the San Francisco Independent Film Festival) in which I threw in the towel with fellow cinephiles and went hog wild. While I averaged about 1-2 films a week, it’s quite conceivable that I saw fewer films this year than I’ve seen in the past seven years. Despite a conscious attempt to avoid the obvious cinematic bombs (Bad Boys 2 and The Cat in the Hat to name two that come to mind), 2003 was, nevertheless, a solid movie year for the indies and an abysmal year for the Hollywood films. Oddly enough, my favorite film of the year was, in fact, a Hollywood film.

Best Films of 2003:

1. Mystic River
2. Down With Love
3. Spider
4. Teknolust
5. Spellbound
6. Lucky
7. Bad Santa
8. The Magdalene Sisters
9. Intolerable Cruelty
10. The Barbarian Invasions

Honorable Mention: American Splendor, Capturing the Fleischmans, Thirteen, The Cooler, Alien: The Director’s Cut, A Mighty Wind, Dirty Pretty Things, Irreversible

Overrated: The Return of the King, Lost in Translation, Kill Bill Vol. 1, Cremaster 3

Guilty Pleasures: The Core, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Bubba Ho-Tep

Haven’t Seen Yet: The Fog of War, The Company, 21 Grams, In America, Cold Mountain, Girl with a Pearl Earring, Master and Commander, Looney Tunes: Back in Action, The Triplets of Bellville, Monster, Shattered Glass

Worst Films of the Year (or Why Did I Pay $10 For This?):

1. Love Actually
2. The Matrix: Reloaded
3. Scary Movie 3
4. The Recruit
5. Big Fish

by DrMabuse

Is There Life?

The Science article requires membership to some orgainzation that sounds too much like someone’s rear end, so all we have are generalities in other media outlets to go by. But it looks like the Australians have found a habitable region in the Milky Way where life is likely to exist. Charles Lineweaver notes that there are four components necessary for life: a star, elements to form a planet, evolutionary time, no chance that the star will fall prey to a supernova. But there are three additional facets Lineweaver fails to list: wars triggered by colossal misunderstandings, edible underwear and parking tickets.