Scott Esposito examines W.G. Sebald’s On the Natural History of Destruction* in the wake of this May 2003 Vollmann review of the same.
* — Apologies for the previous error. Been reading ’bout dat crazy Darwin guy.
“Killing Me Won’t Bring Back Your Goddam Honey!”
Robert Anton Wilson Dead
Aw man. No words other than this: I suspect it was a conspiracy.
Slim Jim Roundup
- The big stories from Publishers Weekly today, closely related to the AMS bankruptcy, is Perseus’s surprise purchase of Avalon. Avalon was PGW’s largest client and is headed by Charlie Winton, who was one of PGW’s co-founders. Perseus CEO David Steinberger claims that he’s developing a plan with Winton to assume distribution for the remainder of PGW clients. Well, “developing a plan” is all fine and dandy. But with PGW’s largest client moving to an entirely new distributor, this doesn’t bode well for the now limping PGW or the indie publishers left in the lurch. In fact, the cynical folks at Radio Free PGW have already penned a PGW obituary.
- Matthew Tiffany has the scoop on Twin Peaks, Season 2: April 10, 2007, six discs, twenty-two episodes. This will be of great comfort as I spend most of my spare time sobbing as I do my taxes at the last minute. In fact, what this DVD release needs is a marketing tie-in for April 15. What better way to put tax time in perspective than dancing midgets, deaf FBI bureau chiefs, and one-armed men?
- Brian Boyd on bioculture vs. literary theory.
- Richard Horne has been found dead of an apparent suicide. (via Brockman)
- Sobol may be dead, but these schmucks have started a new literary contest. First Chapters? It may as well have been called the Gorgon.
- A William S. Burroughs doc. (via Jeff)
Not What Daphne du Maurier Had In Mind
The Australian: “Thousands of birds have fallen from the skies over Esperance and no one knows why. Is it an illness, toxins or a natural phenomenon? A string of autopsies in Perth have shed no light on the mystery. All the residents of flood-devastated Esperance know is that their “dawn chorus” of singing birds is missing.”