- Jeff VanderMeer and M. John Harrison: how can you go wrong with that conversation?
- I couldn’t make the Lethem-PKD event, I’m afraid, but Matt Cheney has a lengthy report. The included novels in the second PKD LOA edition will be Martian Time-Slip, Dr. Bloodmoney, Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said, A Scanner Darkly and Now Wait for Last Year.
- I have not watched Smallville in two years (this was a sad addiction and nobody in particular can be blamed for this, except perhaps an old roommate), but if this is the kind of nonsense they’re now putting out, I think I may have chosen correctly.
- Things ain’t exactly cozy at the Poetry Society of America.
- A new “unheard” series of interviews with Graham Greene have been released.
- For a writer, the importance of cafes can never be underestimated.
- Exhibit #562 in the Case Against Franzen Being Any Fun. (Come to think of it, Franzen’s starting to look like a beardless Tanenhaus these days.)
- Carlin Romano on Exit Ghost.
- The Westchester Library didn’t think twice about nailing Elizabeth Schaper with a 50-cent fine. Schaper had gone to the library to return a book that her mother had checked out. But since Schaper’s mother had died the week before, Schaper’s mother wasn’t exactly in the position to return the book on time. To the martinet man behind the desk, this was simply no excuse. He insisted on the two quarters. The library, spineless to the core, has not issued any public comment or public apology.
- The AP is cutting its book review package.
- Want your kids to read? Start them early. (I learned, no joke, to read when I was two. So perhaps there is some truth in this.)
- Scorsese is making a film about George Harrison.
Author / Edward Champion
Over the Hump
Okay, after considerable coffee, a crazed ten-hour reading session, and several additional hours of research for one of two crazy deadlines, I’ve managed to grab four hours of sleep. And I’m now over the hump. Bear with me while I recalibrate to human time in the next day or so. If my emails have been terse or hallucinogenic of late, you now have your reason why.
Well, It Certainly Cuts Down on Travel Expenses to Venice & Rome
The Map of Humanity. (via MeFi)
Wouldn’t She Have Learned About Joints in the Joint?
I don’t know what’s funnier: the mad genius who teamed up Amy Sedaris with Martha Stewart in the kitchen or the fact that Stewart doesn’t know what bongwater is. (via Quiddity)
Roundup
- The sleeping schedule has gone to hell. So here goes.
- Scott McLemee and Peniel E. Joseph discussed Harold Cruse’s The Crisis of the Negro Intellectual, which in turn spawned a debate here. Jump in if you feel obliged. (via A Different Stripe)
- Liv Ullmann is taking a leading role for the first time in 38 years.
- So if you’re a newspaper and you’re contemplating this whole “How do I make money in the digital age?” question, a new consortium with Yahoo might yield surprising results — assuming that the good folks at Editor & Publisher aren’t drinking the Kool-Aid here. A Deutsche Bank analyst suggests that this deal could generate positive revenue for newspapers. If this is true, are newspapers dead? Or are the times (and, of course, the format) a-changing?
- When I’m not so busy, remind me to dredge up some experiential data sometime to support the fact that Garth Hallberg is not a nice man and has been known to chow down on leftover human kidneys from time to time.
- Joe Sacco on journalism. (via FLOG)
- To the four people who sent me the article, hoping that I’d get riled up: Nope, ain’t going to link to it. Bigger fish to fry.
- Richard Russo’s reading recommendations create films!
- Audible has launched its first crime serial. The series, entitled The Purloined Podcast, involves the murder of a Web 2.0 company executive by an angry listener who gets a bill for audio files he expected to download for free.
- I haven’t yet seen Ken Burns’s The War, in part because I was extremely bothered by the jingoistic tone of this alleged “regular folks” narrative. It turns out academics had issues with the film too about the inclusive nature of Burns’s story.
- Heaven forfend! Books are too depressing. Middle-school reading lists need to have happier books. Because 14-year-olds simply can’t handle verisimilitude. According to Mary Collins, who is actually an assistant professor of creative writing, Shirley Jackson was “lazy” for writing “The Lottery.” Never mind that this short story is a pitch-perfect example of the use of irony in fiction. Never mind that if you keep pushing the standards about what is offensive further, that it’s a zero sum game. (via The Valve, which has a more measured response to this nonsense than me)