- Why the war on endnotes? Personally, I find it extremely valuable to see where an author, fiction or nonfiction, culled his influences. (In fact, this issue came up recently in a Segundo interview that will be released later this month. The author was asked if another author had been particularly influential. As it turns out, they were both residing in the same building.)
- Douglas Coupland is now shilling for BlackBerry.
- Trouble in Edinburgh?
- Mr. Asher talks with Susan Winters Smith.
- Marilynne Robinson is offering tips to prisoners. Under the pretence of a fiction workshop, Robinson has been serving up cake recipes with unusual ingredients that should effectively elude X-rays.
- The Australian continues the tedious debate on litblogs vs. mainstream media. It gets many things wrong, but among the more preposterous claims is the idea that Critical Mass emerged because of the Litblog Co-Op. I know from talking with John Freeman that this was not the case at all and that he simply wanted to give the NBCC an online presence. Would it have killed Genevieve Tucker to get some actual quotes instead of speculating as she went along? (Oh wait! That would involve actual journalism!) The problem with Tucker’s article is that she insists upon a Manichean view of the literary critical world, when it is a far more complex tableau, often with considerable overlap.
- :A board game from 1825! (via Weekend Stubble)
- I’m unaware of the Volkswagen commercials because I don’t watch TV, but Scott gives me another reason not to.
- The complete Ray Harryhausen creature list.
- Grow a spine, Gwyneth.
- Far less ho-hum year-end book lists can be found at the TLS.
- Pete Anderson is composing clerihews.
Prof FuryGorjus takes in The Hold Steady. Yes, they are that good live.- ShoStoWriMo?
- Greg Johnson reviews Robert Sheckley’s Mindswap.
- Here’s something new: a film criticism blog-a-thon. (via The Quiet Bubble)
- NYRB goes blogging.
- Novelists? In Houston?
- I concur with Mark Boyer.
- The Corsair on Jay McInerney. I agree. They really don’t make asshats this size at the milliner’s.
The “I’m a Cranky Bastard” Roundup
– December 5, 2006Posted in: Roundup
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. (
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. (
If Norman Mailer goes to hell, hell for Norman Mailer will be a loop of James Wood’s saying “That’s terribly off-putting”
Ed! Thanks for the link, but I have to give credit where it’s due: that HS review is by PF co-founder Gorjus!
Thanks for the Ray Harryhausen link. Good stuff!
Hello, Ed!
Hee, hee, so I am a journalist already??? Do you know, I sent Bud a link to my article, and he had it read and posted before I got the print version from the milk bar this morning. Ahhhh, the Internet, where would we be without it.
I’m a litblogger who’s been recruited to write for a newspaper, rather than a journalist. I’m not a US writer, so it didn’t occur to me to talk to people I don’t know about Critical Mass. But many thanks for the information, I’m happy to be corrected as well. It was important for me to try and get some international perspective into the article, rather than just concentrating on US blogs, but it’s good to know who John Freeman is and I’ll be sure to follow that up. Might get another story out of it.
By the way if you are interested in my suggestion that blogging might be one way of restoring the public conversation about writing to critics and readers, rather than restricting it to the book press and mainstream media, Ivor Indyk’s rather fine essay is still up at my website.
“I’m a litblogger who’s been recruited to write for a newspaper”
Guess what, that automatically makes you a journalist. But that’s also part of the larger bloggers vs. mainstream critic conversation too, I suppose…
Well, I think I’m happy enough to let readers be the judge of whether my piece is as Manichean as Ed makes out – I do wonder if he got past the first 250 words though.
There’s a tradition here in Australia where academics and others who write for the literary pages are not automatically proclaimed journalists upon their first publication. It takes a hell of a lot more to be considered a qualified journo here, I think.
I’m enjoying trying to keep my pieces (four reviews besides this article) as ‘small magazinish’ as I possibly can, but the editor who is commissioning from me is moving on – so I may not be a ‘journalist’ for very long at all.
Australia’s population is too small to sustain the breadth of media publications you have in the US – it’s a different story here really. I’m glad you’ve had a look at my work, and I hope you haven’t missed what I believe my main point is, about the opportunities book blogs offer for a richer and more varied public conversation on writing. If you have missed that, then obviously I still have a great deal to learn