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The 10 Most Recent Dispatches
- The Bat Segundo Show: Agnieszka Holland
- The Bat Segundo Show: Stephen Fry
- The Bat Segundo Show: Deborah Scroggins
- Komen for the Cowards: Betraying Breast Cancer
- The Bat Segundo Show: Susan Cain
- Forgotten Writers: Dorothy Uhnak
- Dwight Garner’s Revisionist Ignorance: Ayaan Hirsi Ali
- Forgotten Writers: The Novels of John P. Marquand
- The Situation in American Waffles
- The Bat Segundo Show: Elliot Perlman
Modern Library Reading Challenge
On January 10, 2011, Managing Editor Edward Champion pledged to read the top 100 fiction books from #100 to #1. Read about his progress as he makes his way through the Modern Library canon!
84. The Death of the Heart (January 6, 2012)
85. Lord Jim (November 30, 2011)
86. Ragtime (October 30, 2011)
Books To Jump Up and Down Over
The Call by Yannick Murphy: The always interesting author of Here They Come and Signed, Mata Hari returns with a novel that whips up a worldview from a rather quirky set of limitations: namely, the call logs that a veterinarian maintains as his son is unexpectedly put into a coma and an unforgiving economy denies him work. What emerges is a surprisingly optimistic, often funny, and very moving account on how one family uses acceptance and forgiveness as a way to atone for hard knocks. (Bat Segundo interview with Murphy)
Birds of Paradise by Diana Abu-Jaber: Forget Franzen and Eugenides. If you're looking for a social novel that counts, Diana Abu-Jaber is the author you're looking for. Building from the free-form exploration of consciousness and identity in Crescent and the gripping procedural structure of Origin, Abu-Jaber's latest novel is her finest, equally fluent with gutterpunk culture and smarmy real estate men. It has been suggested by The Washington Post's Ron Charles that you will likely gain some pounds while reading this novel. This is certainly true. Abu-Jaber's description of food is so precise that it often made me want to do more cooking. But I very much admired the way in which Abu-Jaber presents all her characters as unwitting victims of rough capitalism, which permits them some dignity even as they perform terrible acts.
The Last of the Live Nude Girls by Sheila McClear: This memoir isn't so much about the decline of the Times Square peepshow, as it is about one young woman's efforts to pull herself up by by her bootstraps when presented with few economic options. Filled with self-introspective candor and a quiet dignity, McClear's story is one that might befall any of us in these volatile times. While McClear does get back on her feet, her book leads one contemplating the terrible fates of other young women now moving to New York and falling into deadlier vocations. (Bat Segundo interview with McClear)
Pynchon, Thomas Archive
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Review: Taking Woodstock (2009)
Posted on August 25, 2009 | 2 CommentsThe realities were already fixed; the illness was understood to be terminal, and the energies of The Movement were long since dissipated by the rush to self-preservation. — Hunter S.... -
Pynchon and Protestantism
Posted on January 9, 2007 | No CommentsAmerican Prospect: “It’s easy to mistake Pynchon’s jittery, inventive monologues and his resentment of social order for the ramblings of a stoner hippie. But if Pynchon is a hippie he... -
“Against the Day” Roundtable, Part Four
Posted on January 5, 2007 | No Comments[NOTE: The discussion can also be followed at Metaxucafe. Previous installments: Part One (Max), Part Two (Carolyn) and Part Three (Megan).] The New Chums of Chance, aided by associative penchant... -
“Against the Day” Roundtable, Part Three
Posted on January 4, 2007 | 2 Comments[NOTE: The discussion can also be followed at Metaxucafe. Previous installments: Part One (Max) and Part Two (Carolyn).] The New Chums of Chance rose further into the sky, wondering if... -
“Against the Day” Roundtable, Part Two
Posted on January 3, 2007 | 8 Comments[VERY IMPORTANT NOTE: In case it wasn't clear, the Quite Balding Moderator wishes to note that this post came from the mordant wit of Carolyn Kellogg and not from his... -
“Against the Day” Roundtable, Part One
Posted on January 2, 2007 | 3 Comments[NOTE: The discussion can also be followed at Metaxucafe. Previous installments: Part Two (Carolyn) and Part Three (Megan).] It was with great fortitude and due diligence that the New Chums... -
Due to Recent Legal Threats, This Blog Will Now Be Known as “Blog Posts Showing What Happens on Each Synapse of Edward Champion’s Mind”
Posted on December 11, 2006 | No CommentsGeorgie Lewis of Tin House writes in with the following news: The highly anticipated publication of artist/provocateur Zak Smith’s visual homage to Thomas Pynchon’s seminal novel Gravity’s Rainbow took a... -
Against the Fray
Posted on December 5, 2006 | 5 CommentsThomas Pynchon may not have been susceptible to the Rake’s $49 check (and neither apparently is Dave Eggers), but the Ian McEwan flap has had Pynchon issuing a letter in... -
Add Another Chick Who Reads Pynchon to the List
Posted on November 21, 2006 | No CommentsLaura Miller weighs in. She doesn’t like it. -
More Takes on Pynchon
Posted on November 19, 2006 | 4 CommentsChristopher Sorrentino Ian Rankin (!) Carlin Romano Donna Liquori insists that girls don’t like Pynchon. (Huh? I’m sure that Pynchon tattoo-donning Carolyn would disagree.) Steven Moore Malcolm Jones on the... -
Jerome Weeks Embraces Blog Form More Adroitly Than Expected
Posted on November 15, 2006 | 1 CommentJerome Weeks complains about Pynchon and writes (even though he admits that he hasn’t read the entirety of Mason & Dixon), “His best work remains The Crying of Lot 49.... -
Pynchon Roundtable Forthcoming
Posted on November 1, 2006 | 1 CommentHear ye! Hear ye! Adept literary connoisseurs and other devoted followers of the Chums of Chance may wish to note that a roundtable, it being an interchangeable variable to be... -
Occupied
Posted on October 28, 2006 | 7 CommentsFirst page: epigraph from Thelonious Monk. Flip. Next page: Seal. Flip. Title page: One. The Light Over the Ranges. Flip. “Now single up all lines!” “Cheerly now…handsomely…very well! Prepare to... -
Pynchon Red Alert
Posted on October 23, 2006 | 4 CommentsI’ve been informed that Against the Day is now in transit from New York. Reading and reporting will begin IMMEDIATELY upon its arrival. [UPDATE: Mr. Orthofer has his copy and... -
New Thomas Pynchon a Terry Malloy?
Posted on October 12, 2006 | 4 CommentsAccording to Marianne Wiggins, one of the fiction judges for this year’s National Book Awards, “As for Pynchon, it was patently obvious it wasn’t a contender.’” -
Pynchon Galleys Personalized
Posted on October 5, 2006 | 2 CommentsJohn Freeman observes that the galleys of Thomas Pynchon’s Against the Day are now being circulated, with the recipient’s name on the galley. I just sent the following email to... -
Pynchon Date Moved Up
Posted on September 6, 2006 | No CommentsChris Sweet observes that Amazon has bumped Against the Day‘s release date up to November 21. -
The Prying Into Lot 49
Posted on August 16, 2006 | No CommentsRon Silliman has an excellent post up about the documentary Thomas Pynchon — A Journey Into the Mind of P. and auctorial anonymity. -
Imagine If All Those Energies Went to Deconstructing the Text Instead of Harassing the Poor Man
Posted on August 7, 2006 | No CommentsIf you think litbloggers have too much spare time, check out this obsessive video, whereby a bunch of Pynchon freaks dissect a shadowy two-second video image of Pynchon walking down... -
New Pynchon Novel Gets a Name
Posted on July 20, 2006 | No CommentsAssociated Press: The book is called Against the Day. Penguin publicist Tracy Locke has also confirmed that Pynchon wrote the blurb. -
Pynchon Description
Posted on July 17, 2006 | No CommentsFrom Pynchonoid (via the Rake), a description for Pynchon’s next novel from the main man himself: Spanning the period between the Chicago World’s Fair of 1893 and the years just... -
New Pynchon Book?
Posted on June 20, 2006 | 31 CommentsFrom Scott comes this rumor that Pynchon has a new book out in December from Viking, set in 1897 Chicago. There is nothing currently listed at the Amazon site, nor... -
Pynchon’s Niece is a Porn Director?
Posted on April 11, 2006 | 1 CommentYou learn something new every day. -
More Fun with Amazon
Posted on September 20, 2005 | No CommentsAmazon has recently instituted “text stats,” which measures a book by Fleish-Kincaid index (the higher you go, the more difficult it is to read), percentage of complex words and words... -
Quickies
Posted on January 26, 2004 | No CommentsPrimer: Winner of the Sundance Grand Jury Prize and the Alfred P. Sloan Prize. The film was made for $7,000, doesn’t appear to have a distribution deal yet, but somehow... -
Quickies
Posted on January 21, 2004 | 2 CommentsThanks to computers, professor Floyd Horowitz has uncovered 24 stories likely to have been authored by Henry James. Using common phrases, themes and pen names (the same methodology used to... -
The Reluctant Tries to Remain Impartial Too, But…
Posted on December 16, 2003 | No CommentsThe BBC has banned its journalists from writing newspaper and magazine columns pertaining to current affairs. The m.o.? “Impartiality.” The ban extends to both staff and freelancers. There is at...