Roundup
Written by Edward ChampionPosted on October 23, 2008
Filed Under Roundup
- It is laughable that Sarah Palin considers herself an intellectual. That she “always wanted a son named Zamboni” is a sure sign that this nation is well on its way to a dystopia in which Gatorade has replaced water. (One thing that can be confirmed: Sarah Palin’s got electrolytes!)
- This John Updike profile would have played better with me, had Emily Nussbaum written in a manner suggesting that she had thoroughly read the book. But Nussbaum spends most of her time dwelling on Updike’s personal life, playing amateur psychiatrist like some chirpy undergrad hoping to coast through an elementary English lit class on hunches. (”It occurs to me that divorce is a central subject of The Witches as female psychology,” Nussbaum writes, but doesn’t cite anything from the text.) How different is Nussbaum’s article from a People Magazine puff piece? (via Mark Athitakis)
- Okay, something smarter: Richard Powers sequences his genome.
- Moby Lives appears to have returned in written form.
- Just because John Freeman declares the National Book Awards finalists to be “in dialogue with world literature,” this does not make it so. This is what’s known in logic as the bare assertion fallacy. The books themselves represent an output of consciousness, but this output is subject to interpretation by other people. Freeman’s sanction (”I say it because it’s true!”) does not mean that it is true, or that there is any foolproof answer. This is not what any “dialogue with world literature” I know is about. And on a more literal level, so far as I know, Aleksandar Hemon is not chatting with Elfriede Jelinek on the phone.
- Brian Lehrer is discussing Arts & Culture Funding on Friday’s show, and has set up a wiki to receive feedback from listeners. I’ve left my remarks, spurned on by Jacket Copy.
- Brian Francis Slattery’s Spaceman Blues — one of the best books of 2007 — is now available as a free download. (Caveat: You have to register with Tor to download it.)
- Chad Post observes that Wylie, quite late to the party, is getting his grubby and avaricious hands into Bolano.
- Philip Hensher confesses (more than he knows) that it’s difficult to have humility when you’re on the Booker shortlist. Is it just me or is Mr. Hensher quickly become the UK’s answer to Jonathan Franzen? Will we see a creepy Discomfort Zone-style essay in which Hensher sobs over Andy Capp’s hat? (via Mark)
- And finally, James Wood on Saramago’s new one.
Comments
7 Responses to “Roundup”
Leave a Reply
Books To Jump Up and Down Over
Beyond Heaving Bosoms by Sarah Wendell and Candy Tan. The famed writers behind Smart Bitches, Trashy Books have written a very funny and thoughtful volume about romances, both Old Skool and New Skool. Here is a book that any smug and humorless literary manboy beating his flabby passive chest over Banville or Bolano should probably read pronto, if only for the distant possibility that he might get over himself. While the Choose Your Own Adventure segment at the end caused me to have a very disturbing dream involving Shelley Long (don't ask), Sarah and Candy did have me rethinking many of my own misperceptions when I wasn't busy laughing. They're not afraid to take on the New York Times Bok Review or even the groupthink within certain sectors of the romance community.
Alice Fantastic by Maggie Estep. This wild and highly enjoyable narrative involves two sisters (presumably, the third one was still being rented out by Chekhov), a hippie ex-junkie mother who lives with seventeen dogs, a murder, gambling, and libidinous Hollywood actresses who live in Woodstock. But this is the wonderful Maggie Estep we're talking here. And what seems at first like a quirky yarn becomes something unexpectedly moving about connectivity. What I love about Estep's work is the way that she'll juxtapose an extremely astute observation (now that you mention it, why do cab drivers always have somebody to talk with on the phone past midnight?) with an often outrageous story development.
Generosity by Richard Powers. It doesn't come out until September 29th, but Richard Powers's latest will have anyone committed to books reconsidering their literary fervor. I foresee some animosity from the vanilla critics hostile to idea-driven novels, but book bloggers, YouTube chroniclers, and MFAs would do well to plunge into this chance-taking narrative, which introduces vital questions about what the reader's relationship is with media, scientific dissection, and "creative nonfiction." Are we rats fleeing to happy cities? Or can we find the humanism within the purported plague?
Pieces for the Left Hand by J. Robert Lennon. Lennon is one of the most underrated fiction writers working today. Much as On the Night Plain proved that Lennon had a lot more in the toolbox than heartfelt (and often very funny) suburban satire, this slim but fascinating volume juxtaposes 100 small-town anecdotes -- arranged by category -- in a manner that reads, at times, like Nicholson Baker's passions for minutiae and, at other times, Stewart O'Nan's concern for psychological detail. The result is fiction that makes us wonder about whether one person's subjective view of particulars can entirely be trusted. This book never found a publisher in 2005. But thankfully, Graywolf has released it in the United States, along with Lennon's latest novel, The Castle.
Wonderful World by Javier Calvo. This wonderfully raucous volume has been completely ignored by the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the Los Angeles Times. But it's probably one of the most delightful reading experiences I've had this year. Calvo cavalierly mashes up multiple genres and manages to mix up familial subtext with larger-than-life, almost cartoonish characters. (Indeed, one might argue that one mobster's penis is a character of its own in this sprawling novel.). This is not an easy thing to pull off, but Calvo makes it work. And it's helped immeasurably by Mara Faye Lethem's idiom-specific translation. (See longer post.)
The Means of Reproduction, Michelle Goldberg This thoughtful book tackles the complicated (and little discussed) subject of reproductive rights from numerous angles, which includes a number of unpleasant but necessary ones. The upshot is that there isn't a quick fix solution for declining birth rates and fundamentalist abuses. Just about every political faction has contributed to the friction. But you'll want to read this book anyway to refamiliarize yourself with the topic, but also to understand just what's occurred during the past several decades to get us where we are today. (See also podcast interview with Goldberg.)
Contact Ed by email.
Or send materials to:
315 Flatbush Avenue, #231
Brooklyn, NY 11217
Or send materials to:
315 Flatbush Avenue, #231
Brooklyn, NY 11217
- The Possibilities of Small
- Ben Macintyre: The Latest Sourpuss to Run Away From Possibilities
- Untapped Currency
- Reminder: Live Conversation with Sarah Hall on Tuesday!
- Five Three Oh
- The Bat Segundo Show: Marjorie Rosen
- When Parody Replaces Opportunity
- The Benefits of Notebooks
- Hate Mail Dramatic Reading Project #8
- Slowdown
Ed, if you get the chance, check out the new movie opening this weekend, “Ass.” It’s hilarious!
I would like to this Jacket Copy SPURRED you on. Spurning is so unkind!
Sarah Palin is a no good rotten scoundrel.
Carolyn: Au contraire. My remarks were indeed “spurned on” by Jacket Copy, because I was kicked into responding to the lack of emphasis on literature. Deliberate wordplay on this end. Me knew what me was doing!
Man, that was a brutal “Subscribe to GQ” interruption in the Richard Powers article. I was just getting really into it when they cut me off. Bastards.
Hiya, Hunksome (LOL): (Tough job, huh, cruisin’ Cyberia lookin’ for some intellectual stimulaughter and counting the horseshoes on my arse I can always count on you to come through with flyin’ howlers.)
Actually, it is to laugh, that whole palin’-to-black attack . . . almost impossible to believe or conceive of such an obscenely offensive dame being a heartbleat away from your country’s leadership, Ed.
You know, I recently came across the definitive smug shot of the wannabean-brain and thought you’d see what I see in it. On Daniel Finkelstein’s “Comment Central” Blog in The Times. Have a peek-see and I betcha you’ll agree with me:
http://tinyurl.com/scarahcuda
The pic speaks eloquent volumes in glorious peacock-livin’ pallor, don’tcha think ?
“Country First?” Egawds, gimme a brick! Both index fingers point in the opposite direction and reveal a hellarious truth hidden in the open book of that defining gesture (or, do I mean, posture, poseur wing-ding departmental thing?).
Given that over-weening ego, that fatuosity to the Nth degree, she’s gotta be the star of the me-me-meistic show (or else!), the one complemented by what must surely be her personal mantra / motto: “Spectaculorum procedere debet . . .™
IOW, Narcissistic Personality Disorder’s a bitch-glitch in pitbull’s loathing, lip-schtick division, any which way you “ice” it (hockeyistically speaking, natch).
On that, you can betcher near-pathological self-adoration “intellectual” permanent vacation when it comes to nation unification at the heart of the inner station, J. Conrad’s Efficiency Division. It’s a pukifying bonus she’s dressed in black; but, Lard help us all, Dear Friend, if she gets anywhere near the White House . . . Four years is a long time to hold one’s breath, eh? K . . . (Have an ice day
.)
–
http://www.booksinq.blogspot.com
Heh, briefo is me-me-meo to beo
. She’s warring with McCain’s message trackers and insisting she talk about . . . guess who? On CNN ’site today.
Palin’s off-script comments irk McCain aides:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/27/palin.tension/
OMGasp! She gunnin’ for runnin’ in 2012/16? I *know* Obama will make such a difference, there’ll be little room for her, et. ilk.; but, it’s still frightenin’. Scaraboo Barbie (and, that particular deployment of “Barbie” don’t ref the doll, not any more)? Talk heartbeat away from barbarity.
Hope you’re having a terrific one; and, judging from today’s posting, you seems to be so doin’ (with yer normal class ‘n’ panache splash, natch).
*winkie, winkie* (LOL.)
–
http://www.booksinq.blogspot.com