Roundup

Ah, the folly of youth! College journalist William Sindewald had the funny idea that attending a Chris Dodd rally would reveal a limitless avalanche of hot young women hanging onto the political blowhard’s every words. And why not? Chris Dodd even has a MySpace page! He’s gotta be hip! What Sindewald found instead was a boring speech and fewer girls there than a Rush concert. Here’s a hint to aspiring young lotharios on the political trail: The hippies were the ones who got laid during the 1960s, not the Leo Strauss acolytes. (via Feministe)
Is this NYT Health article a legitimate piece of a journalism or a movie tie-in?
Howard Junker reports that Alfred Kazin didn’t suffer fools gladly at Amherst. There’s much more about Kazin’s belligerence towards students in Richard Cook’s forthcoming biography.
Conversational storytelling for all to strive for: “[H]e can make opening a window seem like the most exciting and naughty thing that has ever happened.” This comes with the news that 47% of Americans have Googled themselves.
I’m saddened to report that I have no present need for an OhMiBod vibrator, however useful the device may be. If however, you need to rock out while you stretch out, SexyWhispers is giving them away if you tell them why. (via Smart Bitches)
Can you trust any statute over thirty? While we’re on the subject, that Sherman Antitrust Act is a doddering old bastard and, quite frankly, I’m amazed that he’s still alive, even if his existence involves mostly sucking down Jello while important companies are prevented from near total market monopolization. But don’t worry. With the current government, I’m sure they’ll euthanize Old Man Sherman quite soon!
Joshua Furst on Mailer: “He knew who he was and he neither allowed the threat of repercussions to silence him nor shirked them when they came. This, I believe, took courage. All of which is exactly why he was such an indispensable voice in American letters and the culture at large. If Mailer often willingly played the buffoon, he did so with the knowledge that this was a sure way for him to slip free of the tyranny of his own fame.”
Once again, Jonathan Franzen mangles an interesting argumentative position. (via Maud)
Is shit art? And, yes, this is a literal question. (via C-Monster)
Sam Sacks on Marilynne Robinson. (via Scott)
Longass Q&A with Andrew Wylie. (via Sarah)
A Bookninja interview with Tom McCarthy. And related Tintin vs. Remainder comparison. (former link via Conadlamo)
RIP Diane Middlebrook.
Heather Mills is too focused on “charity work” to write a sex book. Insert Benny Hill-like insinuation here.
Scott Timberg’s article on whether 2007 has been a bad book year has been widely linked and I may respond at length to Timberg’s claims in a future post.
This NYT article points to the decline in investigative reporting. I should note that several stories I pitched this year as investigative pieces ended up getting turned into op-ed pieces. And I know this has been the case with other journalists. (via OUP Blog)

Roundup

Laura Huxley has died.
Also, I missed this but Anthony Burgess’s widow died a few weeks ago.
Speaking of Burgess, it appears that some Northwestern artists are having a laugh concerning Warhol’s Vinyl.
Will Self makes a cameo appearance in today’s Los Angeles Times.
Who knew that Kubrick was once interested in adapting Foucault’s Pendulum?
Some recommended reading back to Dave Itzkoff: the collected works of John Clute, or, if that’s too dense, Science Fiction for Dummies.
If you are a writer, you do indeed need other creative outlets. (And if you are a writer, you should probably never write about just one subject.) (via Callie)
Yet another play-it-safe end-of-the-year books list.
Are city planners to blame for the decimation of urban architecture? (via Paul Collins)
Jonathan Rosenbaum on cinematic marketability and quality films denied release. (via James Tata)
Yuko Kondo has redesigned Pynchon’s covers. (via eNotes Book Blog)
Is Pullman unsubtle?
On racing pigeon clubs. (via Jenny D)

Roundup

Diana West’s The Death of the Grown-Up, has received a handful of notices: William Grimes mocked it and The New Criterion’s Stefan Beck was less dismissive, pointing to the Grimes Defense (”If an argument has been exaggerated a little bit for effect, we can throw it out—baby, bathwater, and even the soap scum of lingering doubt.”). Beck appears to be unaware that Grimes’s diluted form of reductio ad absurdum has existed long before Grimes. Indeed, it’s in use by many of today’s critics. And while many bemoan this rhetorical tactic, it is nevertheless a valid form of argumentative response. The problem with Grimes’s review in question isn’t his stance, but the flitting manner in which he declares West “Wrong. Totally wrong.” on the subject of Islam without citing specific textual examples. A good editor would have called Grimes on this and demanded that he strengthen his argument. Grimes really should have been permitted to write a 2,000 word essay instead of having his argumentative column inches diminished. Alas, the days where essays could be expanded to meet their argumentative requirements (as opposed to advertising demands) appear to be long over.
Heidi McDonald observes that a new Speed Racer comic is forthcoming.
Yes, I too am worried about David Schwimmer as feature film director, but with Simon Pegg and Dylan Moran on board, maybe — just maybe — there’s a chance.
Keir Graff has more astonishing numbers about book critics and ethics.
More demonstrative proof that Katie Couric has all the journalistic prowess of a Vegas cocktail waitress. The CJR’s Curtis Brainard, however, thinks that such a limp line of questioning is fair game.
Jonathan Lethem’s “The King of Sentences.”
This year’s Orange Broadband Prize celebrity dunce jude? Lily Allen. Presumably, Allen will call at least one of the Orange Prize finalists a “cunt” and find a way to blame her slur on Amy Winehouse.
Bloglines appears to be seriously messed up. I’ve noticed that many blogs have lost scores of subscribers overnight. Between this, the delayed text, and the recurrent appearances of the Bloglines Plumber, I think I’m switching over to Google Reader or something else.
Alas, I was too swamped in deadlines to offer a few thoughts for this, but January Magazine has released its holiday gift guide.
Is it possible that the grand horror film company Hammer is using MySpace to make a comeback? (They will be releasing Beyond the Rave, the first Hammer film in 30 years and Ingrid Pitt is in the cast.)
The Sharp Side on Malcolm Lowry. (via Mark Thwaite)
Wayne Koestenbaum on Elizabeth Hardwick.
Joseph Duemer investigates a mystery involving copyright and Bruce Springsteen’s image.
Normblog responds to Doris Lessing’s Nobel speech, pointing to five ways in which the Internet is beneficial to books. (via Maxine)
The 100 Great Christmas Bummers. (via Pages Turned)
Motoko Rich investigates how web work transforms into book sales. (Also related, albeit not particularly penetrating: the rise and fall of blogger book deals.)
Nicolas Cage and Alex Proyas are teaming up. I thoroughly loathed Proyas’s cinematic bastardization of I, Robot and have hoped since then that the guy who gave us the startling and underrated Dark City isn’t washed up.
It appears that the Cincinnati Post is dead in three weeks.
Harold Pinter’s papers are being preserved.
Also from the Guardian: DJ Taylor argues that authors have the right to say controversial things.

Roundup

Because of other deadlines and ancillary technological healing, I won’t be covering the New York Anime Festival today. But I will be there on Saturday and Sunday. In the meantime, Heidi McDonald has assembled a crazed journalistic army. So you can no doubt find coverage over at The Beat. Making sense of the daunting schedule does indeed require a strategy. So I have decided to simply throw myself on the floor with full gusto and see what happens. This always seems to be the best policy under such circumstances. Podcasts and reports are forthcoming.
It’s that time of the year again when Congress devotes its energies issuing ridiculously draconian Internet policies instead of showing a little backbone in relation to larger matters of war and corruption. CNETs Declan McCullagh reports on a bill known as the SAFE Act — not to be confused with the efforts a few years ago to curtail the PATRIOT Act — that seeks to punish anyone running a Wi-Fi network with a $300,000 fine if they do not report on someone downloading an “obscene” image. And The Nation’s Larisa Mann reports on a House Resolution that threatens to do away with a school’s federal funding in toto if the school allows even one illegally downloaded song. Democrats in large part supported both of these bills. In fact, for the first bill, the only two people who voted against it were Republicans — including Ron Paul. These two pieces of legislation suggest that the Democrats have special interests in mind more than the First Amendment. And if you want to do something about both of these bills, Public Knowledge has an action page for the school bill. Meanwhile, the SAFE Act has now been received by the Senate and is being referred to the Committee on the Judiciary. Contact the Senate Judiciary Committee and let them know that asking a wi-fi network operator to consistently be on the lookout for an image that is “obscene” or “lacks serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value” (the bill as passed by the House specifies U.S.C. Section 1466A as well as child pornography) places an undue hardship on coffee shop owners trying to attract customers and runs contrary to the First Amendment.
Three Percent lists the Best Translations of 2007.
On a related note, Scott observes that the book he voted for — Enrique Vila-Mata’s Montano’s Malady — didn’t make the longlist. I likewise think this is disheartening. And as NBCC Board Member, I hope to draw greater attention to translated titles. It’s bad enough that newspapers frequently ignore non-English titles for review, but the time has come to draw greater attention to the fact that not all books are written in English and that there are translators regularly doing hard and often thankless work, sometimes denied even a mention in book reviews! (For instance, in all the celebration of Roberto Bolaño’s The Savage Detectives, how many of you are aware that Natasha Wimmer translated the book? Wimmer’s name isn’t even on the cover. Thankfully, Scott interviewed Wimmer a few months ago.) For more insights into translation, see the Segundo interviews with translators Betsy Wing and Jordan Stump. And I hope to feature more translators in future Segundo shows.
Is Joshua Henkin a manly writer or not?
Why isn’t there more hypertext fiction? (via Maud)
Sign of the times? The Sacramento Bee has outsourced some of its advertising production work to India.
$3 million for Karl Rove’s memoirs? (via Quill and Quire)

Monday Afternoon Roundup

A brief goose-step from deadline dancing for some afternoon discoveries.
Due to considerable labor I needed to apply elsewhere, I had to bow out of the Litblog Co-Op. But I’m pleased to observe that they’re back in action this quarter, having selected Matthew Eck’s The Farther Shore as their Read This! pick.
Scott Esposito has unleashed a brand new issue of The Quarterly Conversation.
The magnificent Scarlett Thomas can be found at the Independent, chronicling how technology affects her writing. (via Bookslut)
Sarah examines mysteries outside of America and Britain.
Some great news for Vollmann fans. Vollmann and Madison Smartt Bell have both been awarded the Strauss Living Awards. They will both receive $50,000 a year over the next five years to devote themselves to writing. Hopefully, in Vollmann’s case, this will help him finish up the remaining three dreams left in his Seven Dreams cycle.

Roundup

It’s good to see Katie Haegele not only investigating how sites like LibraryThing have value in cataloging obscure printed zines, but discovering how academic librarians are using LT to keep track of small collections. I’ve been resistant to LT because of the 200 book cap. But perhaps someone might be interested in establishing a universal database tracking all known titles that have ever been put out. John Labovitz is certainly doing this for e-zines. But not every print zine went online. So why not the print catalog equivalent?
A single page of a love story written by Napoleon Bonaparte has been sold for $35,400. Assuming that there are about 400 words on this page, Napoleon now writes at a rate of $88.5/word. I suspect Ted Kennedy’s on the phone with his agent right now wondering why he couldn’t get a better word rate for his memoirs.
Why don’t the Brits love science fiction?
Now here’s a use of public tax money that I have no problem with. Apparently, US and Russian astronauts have had sex in space for, ahem, research purposes. “The issue of sex in space is a serious one,” says Pierre Kohler. I quite agree. Until some enterprising inventor figures out a way to control discharges in zero-G, only a creatively deranged mind would look upon the slapstick comedy possibilities. Why then do I have an idea for a movie called There’s Something About Density?
Someone recently suggested to me in a conversation that nobody cares about Guy de Maupassant anymore, but it appears, thankfully, that some people do indeed care.
It looks like Putin now wants to censor Russian culture. Didn’t he learn anything from glasnost? Should I have bothered to ask that last question?
Did editors corrupt Kerouac and Carver?
A slim but welcome profile on Donald E. Westlake. (via Booksurfer)
Pricing problems for newsprint production.
If Erin O’Brien is the Pynchon of hack feature writing, does anyone have a shot at being the Nabokov of hack feature writing?
The obligatory book tours are dead article. (via Book Glutton)

[UPDATE: Snopes says there were no sex experiments by NASA.]

Quick-Ass Roundup

A University of Alberta researcher has discovered that men are more likely to enjoy a story if they know it’s fictional, whereas women are more likely to enjoy a story if they know it’s based on the truth. (via The Valve)
Tao Lin on the levels of greatness a fiction writer can achieve in.
Dubious music criticism from NPR.
Some background on Mae West’s SEX.
George R.R. Martin interviewed.
OS: “I don’t want to get started on a rant over here, but why can’t male celebrities have the same freedom in describing their own same-sex dream romps?”
Latest Maslin pearl of wisdom: “‘Diamonds, Gold and War’ is the work of an author who knows African history intimately. If this ambitious volume seems to follow too closely on the heels of ‘The Fate of Africa’ (2005), Mr. Meredith can draw on decades’ worth of earlier research and experience to give it authority.” Given that Meredith has indeed spent decades of his life to studying African history, it would seem patently obvious that he “knows African history intimately.” And who gives a damn over how fast Meredeith is pumping out his books? How is that a crime? And does Maslin even understand that The Fate of Africa deals with a different time period than Diamonds, Gold and War?
Costs have risen big time in New York.
The Progressive interviews Jane Smiley.
Updike on Ha Jin.
No apologies necessary. Finish the book!
Support staff axed at the New York Times.
60% of America believes political coverage is politically biased. The other 40% have dates with Kool-Aid Man.
No Swedish jaunts for Lessing.

Roundup

Regrettably, my Hound has not yet come to life. Nor has my mouth become lathered with her sap. But I’m on deadline right now, with an avidity that could come only from the Evil One. So cut me some slack.
Awards season is far from over. Indeed, if a literary award did not exist, it would be necessary for Voltaire to create one. Never mind that he’s been dead for centuries. In any event, the NBCC blog has long, long, long lists for fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. These lists represent books that received multiple votes from NBCC members and finalists. The most anachronistic choice: Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace, which isn’t bad for a novel finished in 1869 that started off as a self-published title.
Speaking of “self-published” authors, Sarah uncovers a remarkably austere attitude taken up by Lee “Anything Self-Published Must Be Fanfic” Goldberg and the Mystery Writers of America concerning Edgar Award submissions. Charles Ardai, one of the parties restricted by these rules, has offered several thoughtful comments. Imagine Tolstoy rebuffed because of these rules. But, alas, the trains must run on time.
Motoko Rich reports that Senator Kennedy’s memoirs have been sold for $8 million to Twelve. Kennedy had hoped for $12 million. After all, $12MM at Twelve does have a golden circle quality about it. But an accountant used the wrong multiplier and, well, $8MM, it was. But Kennedy should be grateful that it wasn’t a mere $4MM.
Jeff VanderMeer talks with Steve Erickson.
The Los Angeles Times’s Geoff Boucher looks into the Marvel online archive and points out that “it’s hard to assume that particular reading position with a desktop computer, just like it’s hard to roll up a laptop computer and jam it in your back pocket when you ride your bike.” Maybe this might be a rare scenario in which the Kindle is helpful. Alas, the likelihood of Amazon nixing the DRM is as slim as John Bonham returning from the grave for a Led Zeppelin reunion.
CNET has an update on the Universal Digital Library. “You’re not going to find over 900,000 works in Chinese on Google,” says Michael Shamos, the UDL director of intellectual property. And he’s right. But you’re not going to find 900,000 works in Esperanto at the UDL either. So which online library should we be spilling our guts to a therapist over?
An early review of the next Benjamin Black novel with this interesting observation: “Banville’s novels under his own name have mainly taken the form of monologues or confessions by the grieving or the guilty; Black’s characters are blocked from confessing, and the tension it brings to the form is palpable.”
CAAF dredges up Henry James’s review of Louisa May Alcott’s first novel, Moods.
Just overheard at my neighborhood cafe: “Boy, it feels naked here without art! I’ll hang my clothes on the wall if you don’t put up new paintings. I don’t care how cold it is outside!”
Christ, True Grit was out of print? Thank goodness that’s been rectified. (via Maud)
In the UK, it appears that the BBC, ITV, and Channel 4 have banded together for a joint on-demand service. Like Persona Non Data, I likewise find this surprising and intriguing. How long before bloodshed is carried out?
Michael Ondaatje has received his fifth Governor General’s Award. The Canada Council for the Arts has responded by saying, “Okay, Mike, you’ve had your time. You’re the John Larroquette of the Canadian literary scene. If you think you’re getting a sixth award, then we’ll send Atwood down to kick your ass!”
The Post-Intelligencer talks with Judith Thurman.
This Recording recontextualizes American Psycho.
Dolly Parton and Amy Sedaris! Does it get any better? (via Quiddity)

Roundup

A side question for library geeks: When it comes to research, are you more of a SIBL or a Central BPL advocate? I have my own thoughts on the pros and cons of each library, and I do indeed like each one in different ways. (Sadly, SIBL has replaced Lexis with Factiva. But there are still some worthwhile resources here.) The one thing that has truly astonished me since moving to New York is the remarkable protectiveness that university libraries have towards their collections. You can’t even walk into these places and just look at — not borrow — the books. Back in San Francisco, I could walk right into the J. Paul Leonard library and park my buttocks at a LEXIS Academic Universe carrel. I could also talk my way into the libraries at Cal, since they weren’t that hard-core about checking ID — or, at least, not with me. Such is not the case here in New York, which seems to fear the vox populi getting their grubby little fingers on an obscure tome. And that’s just inside the library. (Is seeking knowledge considered a terrorist act?) I suppose I can understand this sentiment in relation to private university libraries. But this student ID policy is also enacted at the CUNY libraries. And given that public tax money helps to sustain these libraries, I find it immensely hypocritical for a public university library to deny resources to the public. Even crazier, there’s a racket called the Metropolitan New York Library Council, in which you have to belong to an organization just to get access to one specific book that isn’t available elsewhere, and that you have to request special permission only for these books. I don’t think this is what the people who built these libraries had in mind. On the private university library front, sure, you can become a Friend of the Bobst Library, but it will cost you a minimum of $175/year if you want to access the NYU library more than three times a year. (And if you want year-round Lexis access, the best deal I’ve uncovered is the Queens College library, where a $50 minimum donation will get you in and get you borrowing privileges.) It seems that New York is very much predicated on the idea that knowledge belongs only to those who can pay for it. But I find this to be a repellent and decidedly antidemocratic notion.
The identity of the man behind the New York Ghost was hardly that much of a secret, but it is good to see the Other Ed get some Gray Lady press.
Another year, another dispute over Gene Wolfe. While I can understand Waggish’s frustrations about the Book of the New Sun series, I side with Richard in this case. The books can be enjoyed even if you don’t figure out all of the puzzles and even if Wolfe ain’t exactly forthcoming about such details as Severian’s sister. Waggish appears to be upset because Wolfe’s plots aren’t spoon-fed to him, thus presenting the suggestion in Waggish’s mind that the half-revealed details don’t add up to something. Well, that is his judgment, not Wolfe’s. He seems upset that Wolfe would rather write novels playing by his own rules. Which is a bit like a snotty undergraduate complaining that Ulysses is just too damn hard and that therefore it is James Joyce who has failed. When, in fact, the answer involves rereading the book again and again. Or moving onto other books. Or trying again years later when one is (hopefully) a bit smarter.
National Geographic has recruited John Updike to write about dinosaurs. And I have to say that a very odd admixture.
Emily Colette Wilkinson offers this consideration of Jeffrey Steingarten, who is indeed an enjoyable food writer.
Scott Eric Kaufman nails what’s wrong with NYT blurbs. (via Tayari)
Darby Dixon examines writing crap, which I would agree boils down to getting to the end of what you’ve written and giving yourself permission to write crap, so that you can fix it in revision.
A bizarre David Mitchell interview. (via Conversational Reading)
The Dylan press angle in I’m Not There.
Indie presses in the Independent.

Roundup

If you’re anything like me, your dietary habits have gone straight to hell courtesy of Thursday’s gorging, and you’ve taken up casual fasting and desperate walks to restore your metabolism to more modest pre-Thanksgiving states of ingestion. Which isn’t to say that this regimen is entirely successful or that the wintry chill has made any sizable impact upon the tendency to hibernate. But it is, after all, the intentions that count, even when laziness threatens to lambada dance with your appetite, which remains mystified that you had not one, but two giant plates of dinner. Yes, Thanksgiving is indeed the American way. But fortunately, no loved ones were harmed or screamed at on this end.
Temporal proximities being what they are, this means, of course, that toothless book lists, devoid of tomes that take chances or that make hard dips into genre, are par for the course. No doubt this ledger will be measured against better books in the days to come. But I must wonder what What is the What, published in October 2006, is doing on a list ostensibly celebrating 2007’s hot titles. Could this be a delicate stratagem to woo Eggers once again to the Review’s page? A bargaining chip or a true sign that Tanenhaus is out of touch?
End of the year lists aren’t so superficial, are they? Mr. Mitchelmore lists a few reasons why he likes them.
This is why I slightly fear playing Guitar Hero 3. Bad enough that pounding power chords on an axe causes me to forget that I am not Yngwie. But when a trusty Stratocaster is replaced by fantastic plastic, there are considerably more ignoble maneuvers I will attempt in an effort to have fun.
If you thought David Hasselhoff’s days were numbered, it appears he might be on board the Knight Rider revival. Personally, I’m hoping that he shouts something along these lines for full effect. (via Smart Bitches)
I’m on the lookout for podcasts that don’t sound like FM radio (or people trying desperately to get on FM radio; thank you, Adam Curry, for spawning that plague upon this medium of possibilities), but that involve real people expressing their natural enthusiasm. Movies You Should See is a fun little podcast I’ve recently discovered. Not only does their dog bark in the background, but there is a good deal of arguments over the pedantic.
The beginnings of caffeine!
I sincerely hope that this isn’t the end of Grumpy Old Bookman.

Roundup

I’ve just returned from a research run. And there are more Kindle emails I have to sort through. But in the meantime, here’s a roundup.
Cam’s Commentary has initiated the first of a three-part blogging roundtable.
Dive to Mark observes some Bezos hypocrisy. (via Three Percent)
Henry Kisor observes some of the perils of being a midlister.
Josh Glenn on poem-based movies.
Maxine returns again to the Philly Inquirer.
Some people have interesting Wikipedia requests.
Chevy Chase is trying again for a comeback.

Another Roundup From the Past!

Why stop at one pre-rigged roundup? Here’s another one for Monday. I know what you’re thinking. Did he fire two posts or only three? Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement I kind of lost track myself. But being as this is WordPress 2.3, the most powerful web app in the world, and would blow a newspaper clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself a question. Do I feel lucky? Well, yes and no. In large part because I’m the punk and you’re not.
Except in this case, I’ve timed this second roundup to go up at sunrise in New York. Which makes you wonder when these roundups were written, or whether the first roundup is appreciably better than the second. One of many strange mysteries here at Reluctant.
Atwood revisits Brave New World (via Maud)
No, not the actress or the books editor. Is Elizabeth Taylor one of the most distinguished practitioners of the art of the short story from 1972? In other words, could this be a John P. Marquand figure that has been needlessly forgotten here?
“And always wet your hands before you handle a trout!”
Lindsey Gardner has been seeing her children’s books censored by publishers in some pretty odd ways. Sharp objects were removed in one book and another book banned youngsters from walking alone. If this keeps up, pretty soon any illustrated depiction of a human will be airbrushed out. Because really, you never know if their thoughts could be misinterpreted by a young reader! A little subconscious ambiguity here and a misperceived line there and eventually you’ll have yourself a corrupted young mind! Then again, to paraphrase Jack Burton, son of a bitch must pay!
From the lively link collector Michael Orthofer, who I presume isn’t prerigging his roundups, comes this profile of New York Review of Books curator Edwin Frank — another of the Literary Eds You Can Trust in New York. If Mr. Park is “The Other Ed,” then I suppose Mr. Frank will be referred to as either “The Third Ed” or “The Curating Ed” or possibly “The Win, Place or Show Ed.”
I’m with Gwenda on this. Why should fairy tales be confined to a specific century? Sounds to be like a temporal form of Jim Crow or apartheid, if you ask me.

Roundup

Well, hello there, readers! I’m posting this on Monday, except I’m not really writing this on Monday. I am actually cobbling a few things together on Sunday just to throw you off! You see, while I normally maintain the practice of posting things in real time, Monday is occupied. I’ll spare you the details, but it involves more marsupial-style assaults on the keyboard and all manner of crazed pedantic info. So I’m going to try this temporally displaced post in lieu of real-time content and see if there’s any controversy. It is, after all, somehow dishonest. And you’ll even be reading this when the sun’s up, when, in fact, it’s “currently” dark outside. All this is a way of demonstrating just how incorrigible litbloggers are.
Now what in the sam hill is going on here? It seems to involve haircuts, a trip to Jamaica, the recent acquisition of a digital camera, and the sticking out of tongues. I approve of at least two elements of this divine equation. Indeed, all this is a helpful reminder that I really need to get in more trouble. What I do know is that my current digital camera is on the fritz. So I can’t shock you with frightening photos of what I tend to look like after I’ve had a recent haircut (self-inflicted, I must confess; this is what happens when you bald). But I plan to frighten in other ways. And none of it involves Jonathan Franzen.
I haven’t yet confessed how vital the hero is to Brooklyn food culture. Let me assure you that it is vital, although this means nothing to you because you are reading this many hours from the composition of this post. Which is to say that, yes, you should be worried about temporal blogging experiments.
I regret to inform Ms. Klein (and Mr. Steinberg) that the shock is not wearing off. The problem is that “shock doctrine” is designed more as a buzz word rather than a bona-fide doctrine. I have no more use for buzz words than I do buzz cuts that do not come from my hand. It is just possible that Naomi Klein is a suitable barber, but I doubt it.
Pete Anderson is trying out Oxford American and blogging about it. We really need more of these magazine consumer reports. So I put forth the question to readers: what are your magazine subscriptions and are you really getting your money’s worth?
Chip McGrath is busy devoting at least two grafs to Martin’s appearance. I wonder sometimes if McGrath is wasting his times these days or if I’ve seriously overestimated him. This is a damn superficial interview. (And why the hell do you call this guy “Chip?” You may as well call him Sparky while you’re at it.)
Kurt Vonnegut is the most popular novelist of 2007 and Slaughterhouse-Five has sold 280,000 copies since 2006.
The Kansas City Star has named its top 100 books of the year. But since How Starbucks Saved My Life and the vastly overrated Amy Bloom novel Away is on it, well, you know what you’re in for.
I would like to tell you that a novel by an author is better than you might be thinking, but these opinions shall have to be restrained.
I also wish to confess of the noisy pipes here in Brooklyn. Good goddam, the sounds wake me up! How were such vociferous pipes constructed? Why weren’t they replaced? And why do we put up with this noise? Guess I’m now a New Yorker of sorts.
I have, incidentally, grown another beard. Rex Reed calls it “the best beard Ed Champion tried to grow since the last one.” Roger Ebert says, “Thousands of follicles come together and we are left wondering why.” Kenneth Turan writes, “Why does he grow these beards in the first place? It is this rhetorical question that best represents the Ed Champion problem in a nutshell.” Okay, the reviews are mixed. But, for now, I’m keeping it.

Roundup

I’ve learned from a few people that there are falsehoods now circulating about things that I purportedly did at the National Book Awards. Look, folks, if you think I did something, email me and I’ll be happy to clarify and tell you the truth. (For example, since I learned that Joan Didion did not want to be interviewed, I left her alone. And I was sure to ask everyone I taped if they had a few minutes before talking with them.) Frankly, I was too busy working my ass off to do much of anything else besides journalism.
Lee Goldberg observes that the AMPTP has been smearing the WGA with attack ads in newspapers, and notes WGA President Patric Verrone’s response.
There’s a new Bookforum up, with lots of good stuff, including John Banville on the pulp age, pointing out that the worlds portrayed in The Big Book of Pulps — alas, its hefty thud has not yet landed in my mailbox — “where men were men and women loved them for it, where crooks were crooks and easily identified by the scars on their faces and the gats in their mitts, where policemen were dull but honest and never used four-letter words, where a good man was feared by the lawless and respected by the law-abiding.”
I realize that I’m slacking on the podcasts, but there’s work to be done and deadlines to meet, and I’m dancing as fast as I can. For those of you awaiting the Andrea Barrett interview, Curled Up has also talked with Barrett. (via Chasing Ray)
James Marcus has his National Book Awards report up, and he is right to observe that Didion’s voice “was like hearing somebody play a piano with only two keys–C and C-sharp.” And here’s Levi’s report. Jason has begun posting several videos, where he’s asked many writers what their first job was. He even got Hitch on tape, who I understand told Jason that he hadn’t been asked that question in a very long time.
I’ve been asking the same question: Where is the new Gawker blog involving Annalee Newitz?
Granta 20 author Adam Thirlwell has, at long last, followed up Politics with a new volume, Miss Herbert. But another Granta 20 Phillip Hensher doesn’t care for it, calling it “a rambling and highly egocentric work of criticism, about a bunch of unconnected writers whom Thirlwell happens to have read, and with whom he wants to associate himself.” Actually, he’s made me more curious about the book. Is it possible that Thirlwell has styled a Nicholson Baker’s U and I for this decade? We’ll see.
USA Today now has a voluntary buyout offer for 45 staffers. Presumably, this means later firings. I hope that Bob Minzesheimer, the amicable staffer who sat with us at the bloggers’ table on Wednesday, isn’t one of the casualties when the blade comes down.
There are currently some excited rumblings for Robert Williams, a Manchester bookseller who recently enticed Faber for a partially completed first novel for teenagers.
Poetry at the movies. (via Bookslut)
No kvetching from you, Wheeler. This blog’s reading level is elementary school, likely due to the rudimentary crudity of recent live-blogging reports. Or perhaps the truth has finally come out that I’m actually a nine years old prodigy who has been grounded to his bedroom for the past four years and is regularly beaten on the schoolyard for his recurrent use of “jejune” in everyday conversation.

Roundup

Will Self walks from LAX to Watts Towers: “It’s not the money, it’s the principle.”
Mark Sarvas offers a thoughtful post on where we’re now at in this whole print and online business and he has now added a sidebar containing his reviews, presumably named in relationship to one of John Leonard’s early volumes of criticism. (As for my own reviews, I plan to fix the sidebar for pieces that have now disappeared online soon.)
A video highlighting organized labor and screenwriters. (via The Publishing Spot)
The Rake on writer taxonomies and Mr. Tata’s recent thoughts.
Vidiot offers a jumping point for anyone interested in the legalities behind showing your ID to police. Much more here.
The Furious Passions of Norman Mailer.
Jeff Parker reads Ovenman (via Erin)
New York is Book Country, which hasn’t done anything in the past three years, is now slated to run the same day as the Brooklyn Book Fest. The NYIBC people haven’t even had the decency to respond to Brooklyn borough president Marty Markowitz’s letter. Well, if one has to choose between Tore Erickson’s ego and Johnny Temple’s efforts to get books out to the people, I’d say that this is a pretty slam-dunk decision.

Roundup on the Run

Now listen up, folks. The Oxford Word of the Year is “locavore.” I haven’t used this word at all this year — not in writing or conversation — and now I’m feeling some pressure to insert this in my everyday vernacular in ways that that the Oxford people, much less the progenitors of the word, haven’t possibly imagined.
When I think of literacy, Jenna Bush is one of the last names that come to mind. But all this makes me wonder how Dan Quayle is faring these days. (By the way, did you know that Quayle ~~is the only~~ was one of the few vice presidents in American history never to be nominated for the presidency by his own party?)
While the rest of you folks are getting all excited about the National Book Awards, the New York Daily News has been talking with Joseph O’Connor.
A rare first edition of Wuthering Heights will go on sale in London. One of the top bidders is rumored to be six-year-old Dalia Stafford, daughter of a tobacco tycoon. Stafford hopes that Daddy will bid on the book because she’s grown tired of commonplace coloring books and hopes for something a little more exotic to use her Crayolas on.
Marvel has kick-started an online archive of 2,500 back issues.
Writers warped on the big screen! It goes without saying that a writer’s life is far less glamorous than you think. (via Tayari)
Dan Green: not a fan of late Ian McEwan. Nor Steven Augustine.
Red beans and rice on Amtrak? What next? Tofurkey burgers? I’m not going to rest, folks, until I can order a tofurkey burger with a side of nacho cheese. I have no intention of eating this, mind you, but I want to teach Amtrak a lesson. (via Henry Kisor)
McSweeney’s 2? WTF? (via Tao)
I didn’t know this until today, but Dave Lull has a blog.
The ghosts of Conan Doyle.
Apparently, reading aloud helps the heart, the soul, and the mind. But the jury is out on whether it will help you get laid. Nevertheless, in light of a soliloquy I wrote for a play involving the benefits of counting, which had the character spouting off a lot of bullshit science, it’s funny to see that this character wasn’t too far off.
A report from Chad Post on a translation panel.
The Top Five Online Art Videos of 2007.
Kevin Holtsberry wants to know what makes a good blog. Do drop by and offer your thoughts.
Finally, the Other Ed is in great distress! He is trapped, Collyer brothers-style, in his apartment, and needs someone to excavate all the galleys and ARCs that have immersed him there. I have been spending the morning getting quotes from mercenaries. The best quote I have is from Oswald Grizzaldi, who can throw a few grenades into Mr. Park’s apartment for about $275. Which I think is a pretty reasonable price. Unfortunately, Mr. Grizzaldi cannot guarantee that Mr. Park will escape unmaimed. And Mr. Grizzaldi refuses to offer insurance for his operation, telling me that I need to keep him on retainer for at least six operations in order to ensure that nobody will get hurt. My thinking here is that a few other souls face the same plight that Mr. Park does. So if you need Mr. Grizzaldi to throw some grenades into your apartment, let me know and we’ll see if we can’t extract a few literary people out of their respective piles. In fact, maybe what’s needed here is a special forces unit dropping a few machetes in by chopper, along with an instruction manual titled HOW TO HACK YOUR WAY OUT OF A JUNGLE OF GALLEYS. The unexpected bonus? An unstoppable force of professionally trained machete-hackers who might find their skills called upon when the next revolution goes down. If you have any better ideas, please let me know. This is a matter of delicacy and urgency.

Roundup

Having recently examined Hermione Lee’s Wharton biography, I sure do wish I could make this tonight. Alas, other engagements await me. But if you’re interested in Wharton’s New York, you might want to check this out at The Tenement Museum.
Eric Reynolds has strong words in response to this Scott Mitchell Rosenberg profile — in large part because Rosenberg manipulated the Entertainment Weekly comic bestseller list. And I have to agree. Ehrenreich’s reportage suffers from pulled punches. What could be a more perfect stomping ground for Ben Ehrenreich the Journalist than Rosenberg’s market manipulations, built and maintained by the Platinum empire? I’m surprised that nobody at EW was contacted for this piece to comment upon what safeguards have been put up to prevent this unethical business practice from occurring again.
Lost showrunner Damon Lindelof on the writers strike. (via Laila)
21 good albums that could have been great EPs.
Have I mentioned how fun Girl Talk’s mash-ups are? Check out the defiant appropriations of Elton John and Neutral Milk Hotel.
Mitt Romney, Cylon.
The top ten political sex scandals.
The strange case of Jean-Claude Van Damme. (via Quiet Bubble)
Also from Quiet Bubble, Bill Watterson’s college work.
Carolyn quite rightly takes David Denby to task for his failures in understanding the silent era.
Are libraries becoming more like bookstores? (via Bookstore Tourism)
If you missed Roy Kesey reading “Interview” on the road, Dzanc Books has a video up.
The 12 Devices of Peanuts. (via Derik)
The Twenty (Intentionally) Funniest Web Videos of 2007.
Stephen Fry on the iPhone.
Are we losing the fight for porn?
Susannah Breslin’s “Hardyman.”
One other thing about Girl Talk: it takes effrontery to mash up Wings’ “Silly Love Songs” with 2 Live Crew’s “We Want Some Pussy,” as he does on “Peak Out” And Wikipedia is sometimes good for something. Here’s a complete list of samples used, although I find it more enjoyable to guess.

Roundup

Need your recent literary adaptations info spoon-fed into infographs? USA Today is there for you!
So if you’re like me, you’re probably contemplating which book recommendation came from the “distinguished” shrink. I certainly have a few ideas. Here’s a hint: When you’re down and out, you need a really funny read. Miguel Ruiz? Not exactly a laugh riot. Since I am an undistinguished litblogger, I have to say that, if you’re looking to titter, you can’t go wrong — off the top of my head — with Vonnegut, Wilde, Wodehouse, Dorothy Parker, Mark Twain, Jonathan Ames, Hunter S. Thompson, Martin Amis’s Money, David Lodge, Russo’s Straight Man, Terry Pratchett, and a good chunk of Christopher Moore. But what’s your funniest book or writer?
Daniel Green replies to Jane Ciabattari’s hubris. And he’s right. If you’re using the words “business savvy” and “digested by the websites of larger newspapers” in relation to the litblogosphere, chances are you have as much joy and purpose as lima beans on a dinner plate.
Orthofer finds wealthy writers in China.
A showdown between the world’s largest and the smaller dogs. By my calculations, that big dog is about 3.5 feet tall. Let us hope, for the sake of Boo Boo the Toy Chihauhua’s happy existence, that Gibson the Great Dane does not adopt a cannibalistic appetite. (via Jenny D)
Must all women who marry later be pigeonholed into “the Carrie Bradshaw lifestyle” for these silly articles?
The Champions is being turned into a film.
Now here’s a strategy that should get Levi’s attention: Picador is planning to release new fiction in both hardcover and paperback form. This decision comes after hardcover sales have floundered. Is it possible that we’re at the end? Perhaps better book design and better paper might be an idea to consider.
You know, for all their purported pro-capitalism, these neocon authors really don’t know how to mind the store. Kassia has more thoughts.
Another reason why advertising and phone numbers in books are a bad idea. Although on the bright side, if this keeps up, this may allow some kids to confirm the veracity of Dumbledore’s sexual orientation. (via Bookshelves of Doom)
It appears that the new Batman movie is causing problems in Hong Kong.

Roundup

I am now reading more books than you would believe one man could read. And I have only myself to blame. While things have not yet escalated to the point where exercising the espresso option on my coffeemaker becomes mandatory, they are certainly getting there. And if I start to cackle wildly in the forthcoming weeks or you see some balding man attempting to scale the side of the Grand Army Plaza arch in desperation, don’t say I didn’t warn you. In the meantime…
Sacha Arnold considers The Three Paradoxes.
Of all the astute pens for hire, why the hell did Tanenhaus opt for Rex Reed? But it is good to see Good Man Park make the cut.
318 different covers of War of the Worlds. (via Paul Collins)
Edith Wharton in Esperanto.
Here’s the problem with current literary journalism: “I’ve since read the book–and liked it a lot, it’s one of my favorite books of the year–and I must say I’m completely flummoxed by the apparently controversy that’s surrounded the book.” What is the point of talking with an author if one has not read the book in question? An extended conversation along these lines is useless for both author and audience if the interlocutor has not bothered to read the book in full. That Nissley remains “completely flummoxed” because he has not bothered to use his deficient noodle is not much of a surprise. Nor is it particularly earth-shattering to discover that his questions are more generic than Akiva Goldman’s best attempts at narrative. Is this cheap blanket advocacy an effort by Tom Nissley to cope for his clear shortcomings? Or could it be that the Amazon blog is about as journalistic as a golden globular quid pro quo afforded to the Hollywood Foreign Press Association? Here on the Internet, we have a great medium to deflect this sort of thing. And Nissley’s blown it because he prefers being a toothless tool.
Sarvas on Shalom. McLemee on Mailer.
If all goes according to plan, I hope to make my thoughts known about Judith Freeman’s The Long Embrace in a rather unusual manner. But for the moment, check out Richard Rayner’s review in the LATBR.
Bob Hoover believes that “[s]uccess as a novelist is found between the pages, not the sheets.” But cannot success in the latter lead to success in the former? Or are stopperage-specific muses inherently worthless?
Anita Thompson ain’t a fan of the Jann Wenner HST oral history. Apparently, Wenner took her out of the book because “she has an exaggerated sense of who she was in terms of Hunter. She had another kind of role.” Which leads one to wonder what Wenner perceives that role to be. Handmaiden perhaps? (via Likely Stories)

Roundup

Since Tao is chronicling all, here are the windows currently open on my screen: Windows Explorer (open to a directory of audio files), OpenOffice Calc (containing a spreadsheet that lists what I have to do this month), Windows Explorer (Search — I was trying to find a graphic that I created years ago and did not think to Alt-F4 this window), Audacity (a file that I’ve been intermittently mixing for the past thirty hours, working on it five minutes at a time), Thunderbird, Firefox (Bloglines), and Firefox (the window in which I am now typing this post). This represents a pretty typical setup, although I generally work with about ten windows open. In typing this post, I’ve decided to Alt-F4 the Search window, because there was no reason for me to keep it open. I suppose this was laziness on my part, and I guess I should apologize or something, perhaps to the computer. I haven’t downloaded any audio files like Tao, but I suppose I should probably do this soon. I finished reading one of the books I have to review about an hour ago. I have not eaten or drank anything in about six hours, although I succumbed to a few handfuls of peanuts. Before that, about twelve hours ago, I had kingfish (sauteed with a bunch of produce)*, broccoli, and rice — which I cooked myself and was quite tasty. (And there’s some leftover fish in the fridge I may cook up later this week.) I do read Ron Silliman’s blog, and in fact found a semi-interesting link to it, which I included in this roundup. I’m going to be interviewing an author today. I’ve only slept about four hours and I may go back to bed. But I’m strangely excited and ready to tap dance or something. Alas, there are very few places to tap dance at six in the morning. And I don’t want my neighbor downstairs to wake up when she hears my thumping from her ceiling. Never mind that she and her boyfriend sometimes fuck at 3:30 AM and are quite noisy and sometimes actually turn me on a tad and make me smile because of the beautiful sounds they make. But I keep odd hours. So I don’t mind. Right now, it is relatively silent. There is no fucking going on, but there’s a minor din of traffic I can hear just off Flatbush. I often hear the roll of trucks and even the pleasant horn of a semi even at this hour. There is no Death-O-Meter, however. In large part because I don’t think many people have been killed near this section of Flatbush. But I am only offering speculation and not facts, and you should probably not believe me. For all I know, people have been killed — perhaps many of them — and I’m just allowing my optimism to get in the way of ferreting out the facts.
Josh Getlin asks whether Hollywood is playing it safe in acquiring books to adapt into films. Particularly those pertaining to Iraq.
Memo to Chip McGrath: What the hell does Edmund Wilson’s sex life have to do with his criticism? If you care so much about who Wilson was boffing in his seventies (two paragraphs!), maybe you’re the one who’s the “literary hobbyist.” (Found via this article, via Wet Asphalt)
Speaking of which, here’s what Updike has to say on the subject: “When an author has devoted his life to expressing himself, and, if a poet or a writer of fiction, has used the sensations and critical events of his life as his basic material, what of significance can a biographer add to the record?”
So are any of these characters gay? Or will we learn about their sexual orientation years after this book is released and sales have dropped?
This year’s Guardian First Fiction shortlist. (via Three Percent)
Are you kidding? Romance is perfectly appropriate for Halloween! (he said days later)
Does Guy de Maupassant’s “Le Horla” rank alongside Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw?
If you think Depp’s assaults on books is bad in the atrocious Roman Polanski film The Ninth Gate, consider Polanski’s assaults on Arturo Perez-Reverte’s great novel, The Club Dumas, arguably worse in dumbing the book down.
Physicists on ghosts, vampires, and zombies.
Sorry, kids, the Led Zeppelin reunion has been postponed. Both Robert Plant and Jimmy Page are suffering from a case of fractured hubris, and hope to perform once their collective egos have been amped up to 11.
Harper Lee has been awarded the highest civilian honor from the President: 24/7 access to the Lincoln Bedroom. And this only hours after the President finally had one of his advisers finish reading To Kill a Mockingbird. But it’s the thought that counts.
The Winter Blog Blast Tour.
How exactly do you read Ed Baker? (via Ron Silliman)
Another of your favorite children’s shows, The Electric Company, is being recycled. (via The Shifted Librarian)
When a dinner costs more than a half & half from a high-priced callgirl, “actually quite a deal” is the most telling sign that you’re cut off from democracy and common sense. Particularly when you’re the Best Young Sommelier in America.

* — Speaking of kingfish, I have to say that I like this photo quite a lot. Not just because the woman in the photo is fairly attractive in a Naomi Watts sort of way and probably having a good time (although these are admittedly factors), but because that is a very big kingfish and its horizontal juxtaposition is absolutely incongruous with the attempted cheesecake pose.

Roundup

Recovering from many martinis.
An effort now, a day after the lovely holiday, to atone for the lack of literary news. Of late, this place has been an unapologetic dumping ground for YouTube videos and decidedly non-literary subjects. The most recent Segundo podcasts have tilted towards more nonfiction authors. I leave loyal readers to speculate as to whether this represents a certain fatigue towards fiction on the part of the proprietor or merely an effort to stretch out. If the former conclusion stands, permit me to register my dutiful plaudits for Jess Walter’s excellent novel, Citizen Vince, which was accidentally purchased a year ago instead of The Zero, thanks to a certain devious bookish person who led me astray in the right way. Vince has lived up to its accidental promise. (Let this be a lesson for all of us. Too often we are mired in the latest contemporary titles and the collective foci views “contemporary” as “the last six months.” But there are plenty of great titles extending well before!)
With Halloween in mind, I had intended to offer an audio reading of H.P. Lovecraft’s “The Rats in the Walls.” Alas, time and deadlines got the better of me, and I was unable to finish this in time for October 31. Nevertheless, in considering the many horror writers who have thrilled and tingled, you can do no better than this archive of H.P. Lovecraft’s work a day later and a fun-size Snickers bar short.
Scott is correct to point out that the latest issue of the NYRB has only one fiction title under review (unless you count Eugene O’Neill) and that it is — yawn, he yawned — Alice Sebold’s latest title. That one of our most seemingly august publications would abdicate its fiction coverage for wonky wankage, obvious choices, and, to douse the bleeding mess with copious salt, hire the perspicacious Larry McMurty to squander his acumen on an eccentric Hollywood actress’s photography is indeed a sign that the NYRB is, at least with this issue, neither seeming nor august. If this is the NYRB’s new way, then it would seem that Bob Silvers may be an even greater fiction-reviewing offender than Sam Tanenhaus in running a publication with both “New York” and “Books” in the title. Further, one must ask where all the women are? Eighteen pieces here and only two women. It seems that Tanenhaus isn’t the only one interested in stag clubs. Okay, Silvers, you’re now on watch.
As the good Orthofer notes, there ain’t no fiction coverage in the New Republic these days. (And that sentence could be worse. I stop at double negatives. Others go further.)
Jim Thompson’s lost Hollywood years. Let us not forget that it was Jim Thompson’s ear for dialogue that helped Kubrick immensely in his early days. Thompson was the co-writer of the great films, The Killing and Paths of Glory. The latter film isn’t often associated with Thompson, but I have a feeling that it wouldn’t be hailed as a classic without Thompson’s input. Aside from the story structure devised by Thompson, consider the line: “See that cockroach? Tomorrow morning, we’ll be dead and it’ll be alive. It’ll have more contact with my wife and child than I will. I’ll be nothing, and it’ll be alive.” Can you imagine anyone but Thompson writing that? (via Sarah)
A hot new issue of Hot Metal Bridge. At auspicious times like this, I wish I were a sexy woman with a white Marilyn-like flowing skirt strutting my sinuous legs dangerously across a metal bridge to draw greater attention to the offerings inside. Alas, I’m merely a balding thirtysomething in Brooklyn with an odd voice. Of course, if someone can offer a sufficient argument that me wearing a white Marilyn-like flowing skirt will draw greater attention to Hot Metal Bridge, I might be persuaded go forward. Halloween may be over, but that won’t stop me from dressing up. Although I’d need an hour to get the lipstick right.
Speaking of one the parties involved with the last item, Carolyn points to this inside dirt involving the Quills. Yes, indeed, Ann Curry cares too much. I can feel her solicitude strangling me from beyond the screen. Then again, when you’re a homophobic anchor, perhaps “caring too much” involves not really caring much at all.
Joshua Glenn has a toothpick conspiracy involving Henry James and thankfully he isn’t snobbish about the toothpick.
And your pal the Rake wonders whether Denis Johnson talks real talk. I’ll have to agree with the Rake that the quoted exchange sounds like a bunch of macho types planning to contemplate a foot massage. I likewise don’t mind stylized dialogue along these lines. But I will say that Johnson’s dialogue is more real than the breathless dialogue (thank you, Aaron Fucking Sorkin, for spawning this regrettable trend!) that one encounters on television with troubling frequency these days, which leads me wondering if the real-life antecedents for these characters are cokeheads, chowderheads, or people terrified of revealing their mistakes or insecurities. You know, the way real people do. But I have every faith that the beats will go on. One of these days.

Roundup

There are more Beatles books now than at any other point in human history. And this considerable sum shall likewise continue to accrue so long as pop music is heralded worthy of discussion. Two months from now, there will be even more Beatles books than there are now. Two years from now, who knows how many people will probe inside George Harrison’s solitude or give John Lennon’s assassination yet another dissection? USA Today’s Anthony DeBarros says that the secret ingredient is context. But how much context do we need? What hasn’t been investigated elsewhere? I say this not as someone who dismisses the Beatles, but as someone who is drastically concerned about easily spending a good year trying to read the three hundred Beatles books that have come out in the past two years. The Beatles’s many niceties are now almost as difficult to keep track as a major war. One must, as a matter of course, become a pop music historian. So much has been written about them and so many volumes have been produced that I’m almost hoping for a book about Beatles books, or perhaps something that breaks everything down. Because I don’t have enough time in my life to read yet another Beatles book. Unless you grant me a sinecure somewhere.
The ebullient Jason Boog has singled me out again, and I shall address his question shortly after my head explodes.
They aren’t all elitist assholes who don’t believe that New York is the center of the universe in Manhattan. Having had some experience in the jungle, I can assure you that Manhattan wildlife does not always sneer at the good people of Cleveland. Besides, we all know how the bugs chomped at the Yankees.
More controversial words from Doris Lessing.
I’m about as skillful at balancing as I am at ballet dancing, although I’ve been told that I possess a certain savoir faire when wearing women’s clothing. (Don’t ask, but I am not wrong about this sort of thing.) One of these days, I will master my equilibrium. Indeed, I have so much faith in my innate physical ineptitude that I will master it the same day that I win the Nobel Prize. For now, there are these words to consider. (via Gwenda)
Saddlebums interviews Ed Gorman.
Callie Miller has been quite busy. In addition to interviewing Mark Danielewski for the LAist, she’s offered another of her award-winning reading reports — this time, of Junot Diaz.
A reconsideration of the late G.K. Chesterton — an underrated writer who more people should be aware of. (via Hot Stuff Esposito )

Jay McInerney: proving once again that he writes unconvincingly about human anatomy. (via Bestill My Swooning Heart Sarvas)
Attention all Vegas pimps: a new advertising market opened up! Pop open the champagne! Newspapers are getting as desperate as your johns! Regrettably, the Vegas edition of the PennySaver remains closed to licentious solicitations. A proud salute then for the PennySaver’s stalwart holdouts, who would rather inundate you with ads for $25 television sets and lonely personal ads from the incarcerated than the smut that the lonely are too willing to pay for.
Finally, I regret that I have not set foot in Chowchilla, California. Not only does Kim reveal this town’s apparent dark past, but let us consider pragmatics. Why not walk around right now and say “Chowchilla, California” over and over again. I just walked around the apartment saying “Chowchilla, California” twenty-six times and, already, I feel energized! I’m ready to file a small claims suit on flimsy pretext! Or to speak loving words to an abandoned dog on Flatbush Avenue! And it’s all because of these two magnificent words! You think I’m prevaricating here, but I assure you that it is highly doubtful I will encounter two words more pleasant than “Chowchilla, California” before the sun sets over the landscape and the abandoned dog in question is revealed to be a rabid runt prepared to tear out your throat because nobody’s bothered to feed him and the last thing he saw on his doggie dish was a gizzard.

Drive-By Roundup

Crazy day. Thus, brief summations.
Inflate your numbers much, publishers?
Apparently, DHS digs Death Cab for Cutie.
This 75-year-old woman hammered the point home. Good on her. (via the Other Reluctant)
Chris Pine will play Kirk in the forthcoming Star Trek movie. Who?
Mailer’s in poor health.
No surprise. Tanenhaus and company have demonstrated themselves as incompetent editors, failing to confirm a pivotal plot point against the book. (I can tell you that other publications I’ve written for are far more arduous about this basic journalistic practice, even when I’m in the personal habit of making the fact checker/editor’s life a little easier by providing page numbers for all quotes.)
The Existence Machine quibbles with Pinker.
Why aren’t there more women in the music scene? (via Kevin Smokler)
Can you believe a book review?
Another controversial Jerry Fodor article — this time on natural selection.
It seems that all the big boys are coming out to review the Michaelis book: next at bat is John Updike. (via The Millions)

Roundup

USA Today’s Mike Snider has it wrong. Conan the Barbarian was not “brought to life more than 25 years ago” by Arnold Schwarzenegger. You see, there was this guy named Robert E. Howard who wrote stories for Weird Tales. Back in 1932, he created a character called Conan the Cimmerian and brought him to life through words. Howard, of course, is mentioned in the piece. But I wonder: Does USA Today really believe that Conan was dead before Arnold and John Milius got their hands on it? Or are they somehow conflating Howard’s suicide with the presumed lifelessness of pulp fiction?
Over at Litkicks, Marydell has been offering some fascinating figures and revelations about the publishing industry. There are even some spreadsheets outlining the basic financial elements. Do check it out if you’re interested in the financial niceties of publishing.
Poor Richard Johnson! After the New York Post blowhard realized yet again how small his cock was, he proceeded to show his true misogynistic colors by suggesting: “The male half might take her someplace private and disprove her theory, but we don’t like a woman with a mustache.” Maybe he just can’t handle the truth.
Apparently, Howard Davies used the Booker platform to attack book reviewers for failing to use more “critical skepticism…together with greater readiness to notice new names.” Hmmm, maybe this is what litblogs are for. (via Orthofer, who has more links on the subject)
In defense of Los Angeles. (via This Recording, a multifarious blog recently discovered, which was added to Bloglines upon discovery of the sentence, “It’s a sad thing when you lose all respect for someone who used to be a genius.”)
A crime drama with zombies carrying on a post-coital discussion? Good lord, why didn’t CBS sign on for such inventive madness immediately? This is exactly the kind of craziness that television needs! (via Inter Alia Ed)
There are more cartoonists getting published in Parade, but does this fit into the fucktard consensus?
Jeff VanderMeer has some thoughts on a writer friend giving up. No, you should not give up at all. No matter how hard it gets. No matter how many setbacks there are.
And I’ll have an update on the pledge drive right around the point we hit the 24 hour mark. Thanks to everyone who has contributed so far.

Roundup

To paraphrase Sam Tanenhaus, who profits if Bill Watterson doesn’t write it? Clearly, not the NYTBR. The WSJ has coaxed the reclusive Bill Watterson out of retirement for a review of the new David Michaelis’s Charles Schulz biography. Meanwhile, the Schulz family has cried foul. Although now that I’m almost finished with the book, I can tell you that Michaelis’s portrait of Schulz, while certainly interesting, is hardly the devastating portrait one finds in a Robert Caro biography.
Michael Hirschorn, momentarily surfacing above the Atlantic paywall, asks if we are suffering from too much quirk. Which makes me wonder if “quirk” is the new postmodernism and whether the current spate of articles hostile towards those writers (John Barth was responsible for the abandonment of sentiment in literature? Really?) who dare to walk to an idiosyncratic beat represents the latest trend by critics to take all the fun out of literature. (via Wet Asphalt)
Speaking of Barth, The Sot-Weed Factor has been thoroughly messing with Darby Dixon’s head. Darby is right to point out that Neal Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle would have been infinitely improved had Stephenson taken himself less seriously. In fact, the next time an author comes out with a big fat Historical Novel of Significance, I think the Sot-Weed Comparison Test might be the apposite yardstick.
Jason Boog talks with author Allen Rucker about becoming paralyzed at fifty-one. (Which is not to say that Boog himself is paralyzed or fifty-one, unless he has been pulling a fast one on us or looks very good for his age. But he does get some interesting answers from Rucker on the subject.)
Were the between-the-wars Bright Young People nothing more than helpless hedonists?
What’s better than a takedown of a fatuous band riding too long on its past achievements? Well, a smackdown of the biographer who takes the band too seriously. (via Slushpile)
I was thinking the same thing. I do hope the WaPo book editors aren’t having relationship troubles these days.
Ron Silliman believes that this year’s National Book Award poetry nominations are a scandal.
It’s good to know that dildos have received the appropriate Library of Congress categorization. I was getting a bit worried. What’s even more fantastic is that there is apparently a geographical taxonomy, leaving one to ponder the advantages of an East Coast dildo over its West Coast counterpart.
Mr. Wheeler, for the good of humanity and letters, I must insist that he sure as hell ain’t any generation’s premiere rock critic.

Roundup

As I write these words, I’m up early waiting for the Nobel literature announcement. I’m fully expecting the choice to be somewhat anticlimactic and not an American. But I could be wrong. We’ll find out soon enough.
Tom Christensen offers a list of books most valuable in relation to publishing and writing. Notably absent from the list is the Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude. You think I’m joking, but writing’s a pretty damn lonely business sometimes. (via Messr. Junker)
More New Yorker tidbits from Emily Gordon.
Norman Mailer is interviewed about God, which is to say that he suffers delusions of Mailer. (via The Valve)
John Freeman has a surprisingly decent report on the Frankfurt Book Fair.
“This is just a lifelike, likable book populated by three-dimensional characters who make themselves very much at home on the page.” Oh dear. This is the kind of sentence one expects from a Madison Avenue slogan writer, not a literary critic or even a book reviewer. The time has come to make some choices. I’ve had enough of Janet Maslin. I cannot continue to read her nonsense in good faith. I do this because there are too many good things in life to enjoy and, frankly, Maslin’s deterioration as a critic (she was a perfectly fine film critic) is too much for me to bear. Do yourself a favor and give up Maslin too. Your blood pressure will lower in minutes.
Some excerpts from Kurt Cobain interviews. Who knew that Cobain was such a fan of Queen’s News of the World?
Richard Grayson is running for Congress in Arizona.
Linda Richards uncovers a lost silent version of Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.