David Shields’s Reality Hunger, which claims to be a manifesto of sorts, is an interesting read—around 600 epigrams illustrating something or other about the demise of fiction. Actually, I am still not sure what it claims, which may cause you to stop reading right here. I have talked
To that small but mighty cadre of the readers concerned with literature in translation, the republication of Suzanne Jill Levine’s seminal The Subversive Scribe: Translating Latin American Fiction (Dalkey Archive Press) is (or will be) welcome news. Levine, herself an able and well-regarded translator of Latin masters such as
Speaking of translation (see recent item), New Directions has an interview with poet/essayist/translator Elliot Weinberger (What Happened Here: Bush Chronicles). Of the many gems and nuggets to be found there is this: New York Times It should not go unmentioned that What Happened Here contains a compelling indictment
There may be a tendency to dismiss intra-left political conflicts with a version of the old saw about literary squabbles—that is, the reason they are so impassioned and contentious is they argue about so little. Though there are jokes to be made about the apparent self-destructiveness of the Left
My first impulse upon encountering this article, found in/on the ostensibly British Guardian newspaper/website penned (forgive the old-school locution) by their Manhattan correspondent Ed Pilkington, was dismissal. And upon short reflection my view remained unchanged. I’m not sufficiently acquainted with current brain science (actually not familiar at
As is occasionally the case, I owe (and I hope I speak for his Washington Post readers) a debt of gratitude (whatever that is) to Jonathan Yardley for apprising me of the publication of Mencken on Mencken: A New Collection of Autobiographical Writings, edited by Mencken scholar S.T. Joshi
Though I am not convinced that most writers’ lives are particularly interesting, there is no dearth of biographies of writers nor is the supply of new offerings dwindling. There is a subset of field of inquiry that examines the lives of a writers identified with a literary clique or cadre—
My personal ambivalence regarding artistic awards and other swimsuit contests (e.g., the Oscars, Pulitzer Prize, National Book Award, Nobel) is summed up by Pulitzer-winner Gail Caldwell’s observation “that the prize didn’t mean much until you win it.” I am in no danger of winning one of those
Pearl London was a beloved teacher and writer at the New School. In 1970, she started to invite guests to her seminar that over 25 years became called “Works in Progress.” Guests included Maxine Kumin, Robert Hass, June Jordan, Galway Kinnell, Muriel Rukeyser, Charles Simic, Ann Carson, Paul Muldoon, Robert
In Brigham Young creative writing professorPatrick Madden’s new collection of essays Quotidiana (U of Nebraska Press), we are immediately disabused of equating the ordinary and commonplace with the trivial by the two epigrams that welcome the reader to this bounteous volume of erudition and rumination. Montaigne observes, “From the
It makes sense that all those pointy-headed intellectuals (a quick search of the Internet and my claim will be confirmed) would flock around George Scialabba and his new anthology of essays and reviews, What Are Intellectuals Good For? (Pressed Wafer Press). If that smallish chorus doesn’t congratulate each other,
If there are non-English speaking writers who have made as big an impact on the literary world as the late departed Chilean, Roberto Bolaño, I am not aware of them. The onslaught of posthumous publications, which include The Savage Detectives and 2666 has fed a large appetite of the growing
The notion of style is a matter confounding even the most nimble thinkers—so it is, at the least, convenient to have some guideposts in this tricky terrain. And for the unfortunate and benighted individuals whose calling is writing or whose intention is a clarity of communication in English, one
J.C. Hallman, editor of an inspired anthology, The Story About the Story: Great Writers Explore Great Literature (Tin House), has already exhibited a commendable ambidexterity with his nonfiction (soon to be a useless descriptor) tome The Devil Is a Gentleman: Exploring America's Religious Fringe, a companionable investigation
Now that I am more kindly disposed toward The Paris Review--the literary institution founded by George Plimpton and a cohort of his pals back in the wild and crazy 1950s--since they have dropped the hyperbolic "DNA of literature" slogan, I am pleased to pass on the news of
Merce Cunningham's recent death at the age of 90 reminded me that--except for the New York Times and colonial outposts of New Yorkers--the passing of nonagenarians (save Walter Cronkite) of great accomplishment rarely receives much attention in our brave new 24/7 world. Arthur Miller, the great 20th
Considering the marginal contribution literary fiction makes to the commercial publishing engine’s so-called bottom line, I am ever astounded so many literary biographies, writers’ memoirs, and authors’ correspondences are published. In the fullness of time I expect to talk about some recent literary marginalia, but in the meantime I
