London Times: “Small independent publishers are rarely reviewed in the broadsheets even though their books are frequently as good as those from the big publishers. It is hard, often impossible, for you to find out which books are coming soon and whether they are good, bad or indifferent. This dearth of support from the established media has led to some wonderful resources on the internet as disgruntled readers take it upon themselves to debate, discuss and enjoy new writing.”
Month / August 2006
Meanwhile, the Average American Worker is Likely to Get Ten Vacation Days for a Thankless ob
New York Times: “Instead of parking here for the whole month, Mr. Bush, who arrived Thursday night, will spend just 10 nights before returning to the White House.” (via Ghost in the Machine)
Otto Peltzer Wants to Run Away
[EDITOR’S NOTE: This post, as you’ve probably already gathered, is a parody of Otto Penzler’s New York Sun column. But since Mr. Penzler has threatened me by email, I have added this note to state that THIS POST IS A PARODY, and it is reflective of a character named “Otto Peltzer,” not Penzler.]
It was just as I was trying to figure out another way to hate myself and the world at large when I stumbled upon something called a graphic novel. I’ve been told the graphic novel is “hot with the kids.” But I have yet to apply the thermometer to some near-homeless urchin hanging outside my great island of choice.
When I was a kid (or perhaps “kiddish”) back in 1985, my great imprint, The Mysterious Press, published Raymond Chandler’s screenplay Payback. I have no idea why anyone needed to publish again. I, Otto Peltzer, had the final word. I was the great mystery tastemaker. There were learned and entertaining people writing learned and entertaining introductions back in those days. And I was the one making these learned and entertaining business choices, which were, in turn, certainly more learned and entertaining than these young upstarts at Arcade Publishing, who think that by drawing crude diagrams that they can somehow “reinvent” the genre. Without a doubt, this choice may be considered “entertaining” by a few declasse individuals. But it is far from learned. Need one say more?
As everyone knows by now, there is a bestselling author named Dan Brown. His first name is Dan, his last name is Brown. These two names aren’t as interesting as my own. Perhaps the time has come to use the Russian patronymic to Manhattan culture. It would certainly help me keep track of various bloodlines on Father’s Day.
I’ll sign off with words of wisdom from Alfred Shinola, a writer who I alone have read: “Life is a terrifying ordeal and, if one cannot abide by the first priority of run away, carrying a frown and holding grudges are satisfactory seconds.”
The First Step Against Propaganda
Imagine If All Those Energies Went to Deconstructing the Text Instead of Harassing the Poor Man
If you think litbloggers have too much spare time, check out this obsessive video, whereby a bunch of Pynchon freaks dissect a shadowy two-second video image of Pynchon walking down the streets of New York. So Pynchon’s an “aging hipster” and may be wearing a baseball cap containing a cartoon character. Who cares really? (via Black is the New Blood)
Ed’s Punkass Three Foot Shelf
Mark compiled a three foot shelf reading list, based on books he’s seen written up by James Wood. I think this is great idea and that it can also be applied to litbloggers. Here then is my Punkass Three Foot Shelf, a guide to titles that have been great sources of literary inspiration over the past few years:
Margaret Atwood, Cat’s Eye (for perspective)
James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room (for grit and pain)
John Barth, The Sot-Weed Factor (for satire and voice)
T.C. Boyle, World’s End (for ambitious narrative juggling)
Fyodor Dostoevsky, Notes from Underground (for perspective)
William Gaddis, The Recognitions (for amibition)
Allen Ginsberg, Collected Poems (for prose and voice)
Knut Hamsun, Hunger (for voice)
David Lodge, Small World (for comic clarity)
David Markson, This Is Not a Novel (for experimentalism and minimalism)
John P. Marquand, Sincerely, Willis Wayde (for perspective and clarity)
Don Marquis, archy and mehitabel (for the heart)
Ian McEwan, Atonement (for sumptuous subterfuge)
Henry Miller, The Rosy Crucifixion (for honesty)
David Mitchell, Cloud Atlas (for accessible ambition)
George Orwell, Collected Journalism (for clarity)
Mervyn Peake, Gormenghast Trilogy (for description)
Richard Powers, The Gold Bug Variations (for ambition)
Carol Shields, The Stone Diaries (for giddiness)
Gilbert Sorrentino, Mulligan Stew (for experimental narrative)
William T. Vollmann, The Rainbow Stories (for perspective, courage and honesty)
Colson Whitehead, John Henry Days (for perspective)
Richard Yates, Revolutionary Road (for prose, minimalism and editing)
Rats
I shot out of bed this morning at 3:30 AM and I haven’t been to bed since. This is saying something because I am a deep sleeper. I was woken this morning by a rat who scurried under my futon. The rat was about six inches in length — likely a Norway menace — and its slimy curlicue tail swirled about a foot away from my head. I have heard the rats (there are many of them) scurrying through some of my papers. I have heard them in the walls and it is just as scary as Lovecraft’s story. Where did they come from? They stormed my apartment in one parasitical burst.
I am now in a coffeehouse. The exterminators are coming this afternoon. I have no desire to return to my apartment, although I have been brave and did some work while keeping my legs under my ass. I have tried to do more work, but it has been to no avail. The exterminators tell me that it will take repeat visits to rid the apartment of this infestation, but that the vermin should be exterminated in about two to three weeks. They offer a 90 day warranty, which I find interesting, given that the service involves destroying rather than preserving something.
I did not expect this to happen to me. I am certainly not a heroin addict nor do I welcome squalor. I may be messy, but I am not a total slob. Certainly the apartment has been in worse shape than it is in right now and the rats did not come. I suspect that the rats were attracted by the recent bathroom leak. Sewage is their natural habitat. And there was a hole in my bathroom ceiling for several days. Put it together.
I know there is a hole behind one of my bookshelves, for that is where this morning’s rat came from. Thankfully, it did not give two shits about me, but I let out a considerable squeal and vowed to kill the bastard. Unfortunately, I was unarmed and, even if I had possessed a weapon, I had no wish to catch the bubonic plague. I know there is another hole somewhere in my closet and I have kept that door shut. I hear the rats scratching from behind the heater. Christ, how many of them are there?
I will be staying in a hotel tonight. I have cracked many rat jokes, but there is still something unshakably menacing about the vermin. These damn things copulate several times a year and produce a litter of twenty or more. There are more rats than humans on this planet.* I am operating off of two hours of sleep and am keeping myself awake with Americanos.
I look upon the exterminators as my private mercenaries, my comrades in arms. I know that we will defeat the bastards.
But if it’s quiet around here for a while, you now know why.
* — I have since learned that this is false. Blame my understandable anxieties here.
[UPDATE: The exterminator has arrived, sealed off openings, and laid down traps. Apparently, the mice were coming through openings in the garage, which have now been sealed. The remaining ten to twenty mice will die in the next seven days. There’s a funny story here for a future post. I talked with the guy for a while. But it will have to wait. Needless to say, I now have a deranged respect for exterminators.]
And Chattel is Just Another Word for Fillet Mignon
Seattle Times: “Recently, however, Eric posted an ad on craigslist indicating he was willing to trade marijuana for sexual favors from women or money from men. Men who offered up a woman for sex would get a discount. ‘It’s not prostitution,’ he said, noting he had completed a few transactions in response to the ad. ‘It’s like a date, just weed instead of dinner.'”
A Vlog Along These Lines Had to Happen Sooner or Later
Dr. Gabriele: “Dr Gabriele, a German psychologist and filmmaker, is discussing and demonstrating different aspects of erotic powerplay, erotic roleplay, consensual bdsm, fetish play etc.”
Honorable Literary Oblivion
Stephen Henigan takes a look at James Agee and concludes, “he brought his readers a changing America with insight, bracing sarcasm and an original style. There can be few more honourable literary oblivions than that of James Agee.”
O Frabjous Day!
November 14: new Joanna Newsom album, featuring arrangements scored and conducted by Van Dyke Parks!
Remainders of the Day
But It’s a Different Kind of Sexist Assumption. It Comes from a Television-Obsessed Yokel at the Kansas City Star.
Aaron Barnhart really should know better: “But she’s a different kind of nerd. Brainy, pretty and ironic, Wagner blows away the stereotype of the pasty-skinned white male with a closet full of comic books that once defined this convention that is expected to draw 100,000 over its four days.”
East Bay Express Parrots Litblog for “Investigative” Piece?
This week’s East Bay Express includes a lengthy piece by Anneli Rufus about Cody’s. The literary blog Dibs, of course, all over this last month (and Flares Into Darkness’s post is quoted as “one blogger” in Rufus’s article). But Rufus’s article doesn’t add much to the conversation that hasn’t been said already. There are some insinuations as to Andy Ross’s motivations about opening the San Francisco store (along with some quotes from Ross himself), with some memories of what Cody’s used to be (or what people believed it to be). But for a purportedly investigative article, there’s little here beyond conjecture. No efforts to obtain documents, no tough questions directed at Ross about his net worth and why he expanded when the banks continually turned down his loan. It’s almost as if Rufus stole Dibs’s angle, spent an afternoon wandering around Berkeley interviewing people and then banged out this piece for an easy payday. And they call blogs the leeches.
Roundup
- Danielle Torres offers this intriguing guessing game: Which author slept in which house? But I don’t think the game is entirely fair. Where are the garrets? The leaking faucets? The empty cabinets? In short, where are the midlisters?
- I don’t know what’s sillier: the notion of Bruce Willis appearing in another Die Hard movie or the ridiculous title.
- Novelist Geoff Nicholson has written an expose on sex collecting. Nicholson couldn’t get an interview with Paul Reubens, but he got a dinner date with the late Linda Lovelace. It is rumored that the book’s original title was My Dinner with Bukkake.
- If you haven’t had your fill of lists (and let’s face it: after X number of shopping lists, one pines for anything outside the norm), Penguin and The Times present a list of bests pertaining to the Penguin Classics. But I’m going to have to disagree on The Old Curiosity Shop as a “Best Tearjerker.” I’m about as crazed a Dickens freak as they come and when I first read Curiosity many years ago, I admired its interesting parallels with The Pilgrim’s Progress, but even I must side with Oscar Wilde for the book’s ridiculous sentimentalism.
- Continuous partial attention applied to fiction writing? “But what grabs the attention of unsuspecting passersby is a warm, inviting smile and a sign that reads, ‘I’m writing a novel. If you’d like, please come talk to me about it.'”
- The Globe and Mail reports that heavy Internet users don’t socialize with their loved ones and spend less time doing household chores. But the difference is only about 30 minutes. In other words, someone who is spending 30 minutes more on the Internet is spending 30 minutes less doing other things. Brilliant detective work, Statistics Canada! Can I buy you an abacus? (via Scribbling Woman)
Self-Delusion: Couldn’t Have Happened to a Sleazier Guy
New York Observer: “The question is less how Mr. Lieberman lost The Times than whether he ever had the paper at all. Throughout Mr. Lieberman’s Senate career, the establishment-minded Senator and the establishment newspaper have been in sync only intermittently, at best.”
The Guardian: “Lamont, a political novice, has support from 54 percent of likely Democratic voters in the Quinnipiac University poll, while Lieberman has support from 41 percent of voters.”
Tony Perrottet Pulls a Fast One
I learned that a “new book” from Tony Perrottet called Pagan Holiday was out. I had enjoyed Perrottet’s previous “book” Route 66, an attempt by Perrottet to retrace the routes of the Romans in contemporary times with a pregnant girlfriend in tow.
But in turns out that Pagan Holiday is, in fact, the same book as Route 66. Same contents, different title. If this is an effort by Perrottet to pull a fast one, he won’t get my dollars. I still have the hardback of Route 66 in the Reluctant Library, thank you very much. And I know a good con when I see one.
But for those who missed out, here’s an interview with Perrottet where he discusses the trip.
Feds Refuse to Honor Fourth Estate and Fourth Amendment
New York Times: “A federal prosecutor may inspect the telephone records of two New York Times reporters in an effort to identify their confidential sources, a federal appeals court in New York ruled yesterday. The 2-to-1 decision, from a court historically sympathetic to claims that journalists should be entitled to protect their sources, reversed a lower court and dealt a further setback to news organizations, which have lately been on a losing streak in the federal courts.”
Meme
From Kate’s Book Blog:
One book that changed your life: Lexus, Sexus and Nexus by Henry Miller. I read The Rosy Crucifixion when I was 23 and this trilogy, perused in one mad gulp, gave me invaluable lessons about clinging obstinately to my dreams, remaining true to myself, and being unapologetically honest and passionate. Sure, there was a lot of sex in the three books and that didn’t hurt either. But before Henry Miller, I was a nervous and bumbling kid. I emerged on the other side with the beginnings of an unstoppable impetus. (Other authors I read during this time committed to these self-same truths: James Baldwin, James M. Cain, Jim Thompson — a lot of Jims for some strange reason. But, his narcissism aside, it was good ol’ Henry Miller who I am most indebted to.)
One book that you’ve read more than once: Many, but Richard Powers’ The Gold Bug Variations and William Gaddis’s The Recognitions come immediately to mind.
One book you’d want on a desert island: I hate to pilfer from Jenny D, but The Riverside Shakespeare is truly the only option.
One book that made you laugh: John Barth’s The Sot-Weed Factor
One book that made you cry: William T. Vollmann’s The Rainbow Stories, in large part because Bootwoman Marisa reminded me of someone I once knew who had gone down a horrible path because she was misunderstood.
One book that you wish had been written: A three-way tie between Dickens’ unfinished The Mystery of Edwin Drood and the fourth and fifth books that Mervyn Peake had hoped to write in his Gormenghst trilogy with an elderly Titus Groan.
One book that you wish had never been written: Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. While this novel contains undeniable (and certainly unintentional) comic value, perhaps the Rand disciples, who cling foolishly to Rand’s tenets the way flies flock to feces, might have put their energies towards something more humanist. This book, in addition to being a plodding mess I read through to the very edge, is pretty much my ideological opposite.
One book you’re currently reading: Scott Smith’s The Ruins, a good romp after a lot of high-octane literary fiction.
One book you’ve been meaning to read: Doris Lessing’s The Golden Notebook, which has been sitting around unread for years.
Proud Sponsors of BlogHer
I, Asshole: “I heard innumerable women redub this stuff ‘Ass Water.’ I didn’t try it, and was pretty irritated that in eighty-five degree weather my choice was to go into the hotel and drop a dolla sixty-five for a bottle of filtered water, have iced tap water from a pitcher at the back of the panel sessions, or I could have as much Ass Water as I could hold. That’s kind of backhanded for the men who were there, too. ‘Here, Man, have some Lady Water. Fatty.'”
Birnbaum Alert
Further Proof That William Goldman’s Rule Holds True
Oliver Stone’s World Trade Center has a MySpace page. Presumably to tap into the youth market.
Dave Winer to Migrate from Slackjawed to Head Exploding
Wired: “Diamonds are no longer a girl’s best friend, according to a new study that found three of four women would prefer a new plasma TV to a diamond necklace. The survey, commissioned by cable television’s Oxygen Network that is owned and operated by women, found the technology gender gap has virtually closed with the majority of women snapping up new technology and using it easily.”
But Without Dependable AI, Won’t This Be As Useless As Autofocus?
New Scientist: “Now a shape-shifting lens has been developed that alters its focal length when squeezed by an artificial muscle, rather like the lens in a human eye. The muscle, a ring of polymer gel, expands and contracts in response to environmental changes, eliminating the need for electronics to power or control the devices.”
Google: Putting the Pussy Into Pussycat Journalism?
East Bay Express: “Unfortunately, when Google withholds advertising it also withholds the accompanying revenue, cutting off money whenever Web sites publish stories it deems too violent or tragic. Regardless of how important a story may be, the company’s algorithm pulls its advertising whenever it detects too much carnage. Asked if Google would display ads next to stories about the recent Israeli massacre of Lebanese children, for example, Ghosemajumder says, ‘That’s an example of something that is very difficult to find sensitive advertising [for].’ The larger Google gets, and the more indispensable it becomes to news-related Web sites, the bigger this problem will become.”
Wikipedia & Colbert
Stephen Colbert has been banned from Wikipedia. Apparently, he raised quite a ruckus by modifying pages in the name of “wikiality” and did this on air. The hilarious part of this is that Colbert encouraged Internet users to claim that the elephant population had tripled in the last six months on his show and they ended up doing just this.
Malingering Genius
Work Friendly converts any URL into a Microsoft Word document. This reminds me of the boss key in many of those old Sierra games.
On the Roll?
It’s been widely reported already that Kerouac’s original manuscript of On the Road will be published next year. But I’d like to put forth a proposal to Viking. Why not a limited facsimile edition of Kerouac’s original roll? Come on, Mr. Slovak. If you’ve got the moxie to publish another 1,000 page Vollmann volume, surely there’s some way to get the text into bookstores in roll form. I know there’s enough crazy bastards around to buy it. And besides it would be the ultimate homage to the papyrus rolls in the Alexandria Great Library.
DIY Book Design
Lionel Shriver is so fed up with the lack of original art on her book covers that she’s decided to design her own.
Aquaman Pilot
Lee Goldberg notes that the Smallville guys made a pilot for Aquaman. The series, alas, wasn’t meant to be. But the pilot is available for download through iTunes and has apparently proven quite popular. Aquaman, as comic book geeks may recall, figured prominently in a Smallville episode a few years ago.