Updike writes about dying writers, but is this a wry way to respond to Terrorist critics? “Melville’s sentences, a little arthritic and desiccated decades after the headlong prose of his prime, and marked, the manuscript (at Harvard) reveals, by many hesitations and revisions, may sometimes grope, but his plot, the Christlike martyrdom of his ‘fated boy,’ moves unflinchingly.” (via Bookninja)
Michael Allen believes the William Morrow mystery book is a Macluay Culkin memoir. But will anything Culkin has to say “make news all over the world?” Unless, of course, the Home Alone movies have contained subliminal messages urging the American public to flagellate any man resembling Joe Pesci or Daniel Stern.
There’s a B.S. Johnson symposium going down in London on Thursday, August 17. Looks interesting.
How to respond to Moleskine critics. Look, Moleskinerie, I love you and all, but aren’t you being a tad defensive? Love the lovely Moleskine books and let the critics’ bitter and moribund rasps send them to an early grave.