Cause for the female members of the Amherst College graduating class of 1993 to don funereal attire
The Rake notes that David Foster Wallace is engaged to be married. Carrie’s been weeping buckets all day. I can hear her from here.
Letter-writing cranks R Us
In early April, Laila Lalami broke the news that, after many delays in naming winners, Zoo Press founder Neil Azevedo cancelled the first two Zoo Fiction contests via email.
Azevedo explained that the company had already spent the entry fees ($25 per manuscript) to advertise the now-defunct contests in prominent magazines and would therefore be [...]
Overdue books
In an effort to recoup funding lost with budget cuts, public libraries are assigning overdue library book collections to debt collection agencies. The New York Public Library has been doing this for at least three years — er, so I hear.
Back in 2000, I read that some Detroit libraries were issuing arrest warrants for [...]
Soft Skull Superman
Elizabeth Woyke profiles Richard Nash, the man who turned around Soft Skull Press. The small publishing company is responsible for Get Your War On and The Sleeping Father. (Via Beatrice.)
Have some cleansing tea on hand, in case there’s a lexicographer in the room
Zadie Smith’s recent lubricant advice for young people (unscented) reminds me of her A-Z list, which includes a tip on discussing hash in mixed company:
CHARAS
It’s important to know the right word for things. Say hash and you say hash but somewhere somebody is using the mid-nineteenth century term charas and getting away with it. I’m [...]
Love is a Dog from Hell
Litsa Dremousis suggests titles for Charles Bukowski’s children’s books:
Why Is Grandpa Heaving?
The Years Will Fly Like Hummingbirds and One Gray Day You’ll Die
Love Turns to Crap Like a Sandwich
The Alley Cat and the Wounded Dog Share Scraps of Bird and Dung
Other, recent lists from McSweeney’s: J.D. Finch’s Downsized Works of Literature (including A [...]
Chaon going the distance?
A Denver Post reviewer contends Dan Chaon’s debut novel, You Remind Me of Me, doesn’t stand up to his short fiction. (For a different opinion, see the Christian Science Monitor.) Chaon’s “Big Me,” originally published in The Gettysburg Review, is one of Stephany’s favorite short stories. She has excerpted it here. (Links via [...]
Harry Potter and the something-something
The title of the sixth Harry Potter book — Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince — has generated more news stories than you can shake a stick at, although the novel has yet to be written.
While we’re on the subject, last week Daniel Radosh reported on a “fractured yet oddly literary retelling” of [...]
My Pet Goat: no such book?
Richard Grayson notes in email that “nearly every article that refers to the scene of Bush in the second grade classroom in Sarasota on 9/11 — the scene shown to great effect in Fahrenheit 9/11 — refers to the ‘book’ he was reading with the class as My Pet Goat.” Determined to track down [...]
He takes pleasure in the pain
Richard Ford is having some difficulty winding up the last novel of the Independence Day trilogy, despite what he calls his “particular genius” — “to know how long a book will be once he has worked on it for about a month.”
Graham Greene on the problem of “I”
On Saturday I did my semi-annual rereading of Graham Greene’s The End of the Affair and was struck as always by its perfection. Greene himself had many regrets about the novel. If you can brave the bad design, here’s the text of an essay he wrote about it:
Many a time I regretted pursuing [...]
Sedaris uncertain whether fellatio techniques help make him funny
Gawker’s man in Atlanta reports on a recent David Sedaris Q&A session. After calling the “pack a day or more” smokers to the front of the line, and getting everybody settled, Sedaris fielded the first question:
“Why do you think there are so many funny gay people?” To which Sedaris answered, “Just so everyone heard [...]
Candy everybody wants
The paperback rights to Steve Almond’s bloated and self-obsessed (but generally well-regarded) Candyfreak have been auctioned to Harcourt for $150,000. (News via Publishers Marketplace.)
Imagine that: in Ireland, journalists learn to interview, rather than fellate*, their subjects
While I was away last week, Irish reporter Carole Coleman raked Bush over the coals — which these days means simply that she questioned him like a reporter rather than a PR whore. Mr. Maud recited the interview nearly verbatim upon my return and after we finished cackling with glee I tracked down all [...]
Boozy bookstores
Assisting those of us* at MaudNewton.com in our quest to track down a bookstore where we can get hay hook-wielding drunk on whiskey, Sarah Groff-Palermo of Soft Skull reports that Washington D.C.’s Kramerbooks serves liquor and brunch. “If only they would let me set up a cot in the basement, I would vacation there twice [...]
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