Category / Roundup

by Edward Champion

We’re Not In…

  • We’re not in New York, but if you are, Emily Gordon points us to a Katrina benefit going down this Sunday at some place called Camaje.
  • Again, we’re not in New York, but if we were, then we’d definitely check out “The Jonathan Ames Show” going down on October 25 at a place called Mo Pitkin’s. Tickets can be found here. Photos of previous show can be found here.
  • We’re not in Chicago either, but Golden Rule Jones points to the Chicago International Film Festival, which starts today.
  • Neither are we in Los Angeles, but, lo and behold, we’d be remiss Mr. Sarvas notes that Wendy Lesser will be reading at Three Lives tonight at 7PM.
  • We’re not even in Boston, and yet, there it is happening again, Jonathan Lethem on November 3.
  • We are in San Francisco, and we can tell you, based on last Saturday’s Litquake experience, that Robert Coover is every bit as charming a reader as he is a writer. He is adorably small and has a voice somewhere between Wallace Shawn and Bob Wilkins, which he employs to great effect during a reading. But the McSweeney’s people should be ashamed for not giving one of the great pomo pioneers so much as a bottle of water for a one hour reading.
by Edward Champion

Roundup

  • Frances Dinkelspiel covers the Northern California Independent Booksellers Association.
  • This week, in the City, it’s Litquake. We’ll be crawling ourselves this Saturday, in more ways than one.
  • Word on the street is that the long-delayed Nobel Literature Prize will finally be announced this Thursday. Apparently, one of the Swedish intellectuals lost a few meatballs along the way. Knut Ahnlund gave notice that he was quitting in disgust over last year’s winner, Elfriede Jelinek. Ahnlund said that Jelinek’s work was “whinging, unenjoyable, violent pornography.” Well, that’s all very fine, Knut. But why wait a year to pull out? There’s still the risk of impregnating the proceedings with spurious seed. There’s been some speculation that Orhan Pamuk might be this year’s Nobel winner and that Ahnlund’s resignation has something to do with this year’s choice. But if my experience with self-important people serves as any guide, I’m guessing that Ahnlund wanted to sabotage this year’s proceedings by raising a stink and that the real winner will be someone completely unexpected. Let us hope that it’s as edgy a choice as Jelinek.
  • And speaking of awards, I’m not sure what to make of the Blooker. The Blooker hopes to award books that are based on blogs. But how many “blooks” are there? Certainly not enough to create a longlist. Further, are any of these really readable, much less enduring? More importantly, does Wil Wheaton really need another silly trinket?
  • Another day, another Dave E—- profile. His latest cause? Granting teachers more pay. While he’s at it, he may want to champion offering his volunteers some recompense. He’s also getting the little tykes to read every periodical in America, presumably to keep tabs on any naysayers. Child slave labor too? Why, in a parallel universe, Dave might very well be the literary equivalent of Phil Knight!
  • Four-Eyed Bitch wants to know why literary readings are so dull.
  • A new Internet radio station devoted to poetry has been launched by Brian Douthit.
  • Also worth looking into: Circadian Poems, a poetry blog.
  • Can pop culture be tracked in the 21st Century in book form? Encyclopedia of Pop Culture authors Michael and Jane Stern (among others) say no.
  • Literary critic Wayne C. Booth, author of The Rhetoric of Fiction, has passed on.

[UPDATE: The Complete Review has the full story on Knut “I Like My Literature Non-Pornographic” Ahnlund. Apparently, he’s not even a bona-fide Nobel judge and, whether he likes it or not, Ol’ Knut Basket Case won’t get his much vaunted reprieve until he meets his maker.]

by Edward Champion

Morning Nibbles

  • Mr. Rake spends an evening with Zadie Smith.
  • Robert “Two Sheds” Birnbaum gets busy with Stuart Dybek.
  • Haggis holds a contest.
  • For a morning roundup, this is looking very much like one of those dastardly Mouseketeer Club intros. So I’ll cop and fess that, despite the fact that while these are all links worthy of your attention, the motivation, the raison d’etre as it were, for this post is to tell the world that yes I am indeed alive and to fulfill the basic obligation, which is at least one post a day. The idea being that if I were to miss a day, you (the audience and concerned friends) would conclude that there was something wrong: that I had jumped off a ledge or checked into a monastery or registered as a Republican. Of course, if one were to simply declare one’s self alive, this would not be of much interest (“I’m alive! Boo yah! How you like them apples?”), as it would not fulfill the basic requisite, which is to cover literary happenings or things of related interest. So instead I’ll conclude as gracefully as I can and report that I’m quite, quite, quite busy (nothing wrong, mind you, just highly diligent!) and I’ll try to check in with something thoughtful later, don’t know where, don’t know when.
by Edward Champion

Set ‘Em Up

  • Over at Maud’s, Tayari Jones (of whom we approve) weighs in on the Jim Crow approach to literature seen in Barnes & Noble and other places. Ghettoization, it seems, is not limited to genres. And Ms. Jones’ response is quite interesting.
  • Robert “Is That a Tape Recorder in My Pocket?” Birnbaum talks with Paul Collins. Strangely, the recipe for a Tom Collins isn’t revealed during the course of the interview, leaving us with only one possible conclusion: Paul Collins is a bore at a cocktail party.
  • Mary Lee Settle, founder of PEN/Faulkner, has passed on. Considering her last name, let us hope that the copy editors aren’t cruel with their obit headlines.
  • Michael Crichton adds another role to his list of achievements. Doctor, hack novelist, cheeseball filmmaker, antienvironmentalist, and now…Senate witness. One only wonders if Mr. Crichton’s writing will improve or his ire might abate if he were to add the role of gigolo.
  • Is Joyce Carol Oates in the running for the Nobel? Or will it go to Milan Kundera or Adonis?
  • Charles Dickens + Roman Polanski. It’s time for the wild accusations to begin!
  • And the tireless Dan Wickett (or one of the seven Dan Wicketts I’m aware of) hosted a chat with first-time authors.