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Tuesday
October 31
- DOES HYPE PAY OFF? Do the books publishers spend huge
sums marketing and generating pre-publication buzz for actually
end up with the readership and popularity that was hoped for?
Here are some real sales figures on some of the most recently
hyped releases. Inside.com 10/30/00
- THE
UNFORTUNATE LOT OF POETS: As a parent, one of my greatest
fears is having my children tell me they've decided to be poets.
Is there one profession in the world that offers less chance to
generate an income? Perhaps repairing Beta video recorders."
Sydney Morning Herald 10/31/00
Monday
October 30
- TWO
APPROACHES TO WRITING A LIFE STORY: Recent biographies of
John Updike and Saul Bellow take two very different approaches
to their subjects. James Atlas "meditates on Bellow's controversial
role as a public intellectual, maintaining a remarkable level
of objectivity," while "William H. Pritchard, on the
other hand, shies away from the personal details of Updike's life,
openly deriding 'talk show revelations and displays'. He argues
that 'such events pale in interest when put next to [Updike's]
writings, products of all those hours sitting at the desk with
pencil or typewriter or computer'." Chronicle
of Higher Education 10/30/00
Thursday
October 26
- RESEARCH
WEB: So what will the web mean to academics, always on the
lookout for places to publish their work? "The biggest change
is that publication is suddenly cheap. Academics have always had
much more opportunity to write than they've had sponsorship for
publication so books and articles have had to be concisely focused
- optimised - to deliver the most information using the fewest
words. The Web allows an entirely new, discursive style of presentation,
where an author can take however much space she needs to be as
clear as possible." The Idler 10/25/00
- READING
HAITI: "Whatever its roots, Haiti’s extraordinary literature
provides an occasion for this sad country to transcend its own
instability, and discern possibilities beyond its current disasters.
To tread a razor’s edge between poetry and disaster. To come to
Haiti in search of its literature is to fall in love with the
place–even if, sometimes, this passion is followed by a great
deal of pain." Boston Review
10/00
- WHO
REALLY WROTE "NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS'? Did Clement Clarke
Moore really write the beloved Christmas poem "Twas the Night
Before Christmas" back in 1823? A Vassar scholar says he's
uncovered evidence Moore did not. "He marshals a battery
of circumstantial evidence to conclude that the poem's spirit
and style are starkly at odds with the body of Moore's other writings."
New York Times 10/26/00 (one-time
registration required for entry)
- CALL
MY AGENT: As the world of publishing slices and dices, recombining
in multimedia mega-companies, the role of an author's agent is
changing. What are the new rules of the road? New
York Times 10/26/00 (one-time
registration required for entry)
Wednesday
October 25
- WHY
PEOPLE USE LIBRARIES: "Statistics clearly demonstrate
that many people rely on libraries for their stories, and generally,
librarians know what gets checked out. Unfortunately, librarians
have little knowledge of why people read what they do. As a result,
they lack a deeper understanding of how libraries already serve
readers, and they miss evidence that they could use to convince
state legislatures and other sources of financial support that
spending money on stories is important." Chronicle
of Higher Education 10/254/00
- A
TALE OF TWO LIT AWARDS: "The shortlists for Canada's
most prominent literary awards are often described like rival
high school cliques. Giller Prize nominees are the cheerleaders,
football captains and student council presidents with perfect
teeth who wave out from the convertible at the head of every homecoming
parade. Poor Governor General's Awards nominees, on the other
hand, enjoy far less prestige, like the nerdish greasers and trenchcoat
types who hang out behind the portables, the jocks coming round
every once in a while to bloody their noses and smash their Gothic
punk CDs." National Post (Canada)
10/25/00
- WOODSTOCK FOR WIZARDS: J.K. Rowling drew the largest audience
ever to turn out for an author reading to hear her read from her
Harry Potter series at Toronto’s SkyDome as part of the International
Festival of Authors. An estimated more than 12,000 people attended.
Yahoo! News (Reuters)
10/24/00
Tuesday
October 24
- CANADA'S
GOV GEN AWARD FINALISTS: Finalists
for Canada's Governor General's Awards for literature are announced:
Michael Ondaatje for "Anil's Ghost," David Adams Richards
for "Mercy Among the Children" and Eden Robinson for
"Monkey Beach". "Margaret Atwood for "The
Blind Assassin", currently on the shortlist for Britain's
Booker prize. And Austin Clarke for "The Question".
Ottawa Citizen (AP) 10/24/00
Monday
October 23
- WHO
CARES ABOUT THE FRANKFURT BOOKFAIR? "Among the merchants
who had come together in Frankfurt, it was not possible to determine
whether they were doing any business at all. Everything that was
dismissed here in the name of the entire publishing business ("...did
all that in New York before the fair") found powerful confirmation
elsewhere ("...after New York, there's always something new")."
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 10/23/00
- SECOND
CAREERS: What is it that has got so many of Britain's commedians
writing novels? "Of course there's cachet in having published
a serious novel, but what jumps out from the current batch is
how much there is to praise in many of them." The
Telegraph (London) 10/23/00
- THE
COMICS' TOPSY TURVEY RUN: While the business of selling monthly,
comic books flails, "its companion, the graphic novel market,
especially in traditional bookstores, is booming. There are more
hardcover and paperback collections of comics material than there
have ever been in America before, and their sales have never been
better." Publishers
Weekly 10/23/00
Sunday
October 22
- E-BOOK
AWARDS: "E.M. Schorb and David Maraniss shared the grand
prize for best original e-book at Friday's inaugural Frankfurt
eBook Awards, the first designed to recognize achievements in
the emerging e-book industry." Wired
10/21/00
Friday
October 20
- A LONG WAY TO MAINSTREAM: The e-book publishing community
thought it was finally going to receive some overdue recognition
at the first annual International eBooks Awards ceremony last
week in Frankfurt. That is, until the list of finalists was announced.
"Almost all of the books on the shortlist were by acclaimed
print authors from big publishing houses The controversy highlights
some pressing issues for e-publishing - Will e-books offer a way
for writers who've been snubbed by the big houses to find success
marketing their books directly to readers? Or will e-publishing
simply present the same books and authors currently found in bookstores,
only in a different, less tangible form?" Salon 10/19/00
- NEW
INDIE E-BOOK AWARDS ANNOUNCED AT FRANKFURT FAIR:
"When the majority of Frankfurt finalists were traditional publishers
and best-selling authors, we saw it as missed opportunity. At
that point we decided to step in and do something for the independents
who do offer quality work but don't have the finances to promote
them." Wired 10/20/00
Thursday
October 19
- POP
CRITIC WONDERS ABOUT THE HONESTY OF REVIEWS: The world of
popular culture is filled with profanity. But you'll never read
any of that included in newspapers' accounts of pop music events.
Isn't the absence of same leaving out a part of the story? "Do
readers really think that the sight of an f- over their morning
coffee will have them unwillingly rubbing shoulders with Satan?
Will an s- send them spiraling downward into a sweeping, swirling
eddy of moral despair?" San
Jose Mercury News 10/18/00
- WHO'S
CONTROLING WHAT WE READ? Publishing has gone to hell, says
a senior publisher. And why? "Five major conglomerates control
80 percent of American book sales," he says, speaking of Bertelsmann,
the mammoth German firm that owns Random House; Rupert Murdoch's
News Corp.; Time Warner; Disney; and Viacom/CBS. In 1999, the
top 20 publishers accounted for 93 percent of sales."
Washington Post 10/18/00
- WRITERS
- WHO OWNS YOUR WORK? "The press would have you believe
that the worst copyright infringement occurring on the Internet
is by lone hackers sitting at their computers. However, corporate
owned and controlled newspapers and television news organizations
are hardly disinterested parties in this story. It may turn out
that individual writers (which, potentially, could be anybody)
have more to fear from people in suits trailing phalanxes of lawyers."
*spark-online 10/00
- BRAVO
BOOKER JUDGES: "One of the complaints often levelled
against Britain's premier literary prize is that it functions
as a kind of club, nominating a certain kind of 'literary fiction'
chosen from a limited pool of potential 'Booker' writers. Deliberately
or not, this millennial short list has turned its back on a number
of established writers, any one of whom might, in another year,
deserve a place on some other ideal Booker shortlist.
Daily Mail & Guardian (South Africa)
10/18/00
Wednesday
October 18
- THE
MORE THINGS CHANGE… E-books are poised to transform
the infrastructures and revenue structures of the publishing industry,
but can the developments really be called a "revolution?"
"These new technologies will alter the way books are transmitted,
but the author's task will remain essentially the same as when
Homer sang the Odyssey and Dickens presented his novels, chapter
by chapter, before enchanted listeners."
New York Review of Books
11/02/00
- THE
MORE THEY STAY THE SAME: "Gutenberg's printed paper
book will continue to hold its own," said an organizer of
the Frankfurt Book Fair, dispelling fears that we’ll soon be curling
up to read e-book screens. Yahoo!
News (Reuters) 10/17/00
Tuesday
October 17
Monday
October 16
Sunday
October 15
- LITERARY
DETECTIVE: John Sutherland is a detective of literature. He
examines, "with forensic precision, neglected details and
apparent anomalies in classic novels and plays," wondering
- was Heathcliff a murderer? Or, posing a full evidenciary hearing
about whether or not Shakespeare's Henry V, was a war criminal?
His books have become best sellers. The
Age (Melbourne) 10/14/00
Friday
October 13
- CORPORATE
READ: "American life is affected by the seemingly never-ending
growth of large corporations... Will it change fundamentally the
way we read and what books are available to us? The big publishers,
who comprise some eighty percent of all publishing volume, are
largely owned by media conglomerates who are accustomed to earning
profitability ratios of their other media holdings. Book publishing
often disappoints those expectations and has to turn to a kind
of publishing that will 'please their parents'." Feed
10/11/00
- CHINESE
GOVERNMENT CLAIMS POLITICAL BIAS IN AWARD: The Chinese government
says that awarding this year's Nobel Prize for Literature to Gao
Xingjian is a political act. "[This] shows again the Nobel Literature
Prize has been used for ulterior political motives, and it is
not worth commenting on". Gao's works are banned in China.
BBC 10/13/00
- WHO
IS GAO XINGJIAN? Gao is considered the leading contemporary
Chinese dramatist. His plays, which combine Zen philosophy and
a modern worldview, have been performed all over the world, from
China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan and Australia to the Ivory Coast,
the United States, France, Germany and other European countries.
China Times (Taiwan) 10/13/00
- A
TRUE EXILE WRITER: Those familiar with Gao's work say
he rankles the pro-democracy movement as well as China's communist
government. Washington Post 10/13/00
- WHO,
AGAIN? "Xingjian is apparently the creator of Chinese
oral theatre as well the author of a classic novel, 'Soul
Mountain'. I have never heard of him and neither - shameful
to relate - had anyone else whose opinion I canvassed in the
half-hour or so following the announcement, but then neither
had many westerners heard of the Egyptian novelist Naguib
Mahfouz before his triumph in 1988 or Polish poet Wislawa
Symborska in 1996." The Guardian
(London) 10/13/00
Thursday
October 12
- CHINESE
DISSIDENT WINS NOBEL: Gao Xingjian, an exiled dissident author
whose works are banned in his native China, won the Nobel Prize
in literature on Thursday - the first Chinese to win the award
in its 100-year history. Ottawa Citizen
(AP) 10/12/00
- BIG
NAMES FOR NATIONAL BOOK AWARD: The 20 nominees. Washington
Post 10/12/00
- HANDICAPPING
THE NATIONAL BOOK AWARDS: Sontag and Oates the early favorites
for the Lit prize? Inside.com 10/11/00
- THE
NEW NEW YORKER: Editor David Remnick says the magazine is
becoming more focused on New York, that it doesn't yet make money
but will someday, and that the New Yorker will soon be available
on the web. Inside.com 10/12/00
Wednesday
October 11
- BANNED, NOT ONCE BUT TWICE: South African novelist Christopher
Hope holds the rare distinction of having had his work banned
by both his government’s old and new regimes. Wasn’t apartheid’s
pervasive censorship supposed to end with the transition to democracy?
"It goes on - this urge to shut people up. Anyone visiting
South Africa and looking at the papers or the TV will catch, before
long, a whiff of paranoia in the air." The
Guardian (London) 10/11/00
- WHEN "BIBLIOMANIA" IS AN
UNDERSTATEMENT:
When Seymour Durst died five years ago, his book collection about
New York City had outgrown his five-story townhouse. Last month,
his vast collection was donated by his family to the City University
of New York's Graduate Center, "to honor [his] wish to keep
his 10,000 books, 20,000 postcards, 3,000 photographs and stacks
of other New Yorkiana together under one roof." New York Times
10/11/00
(one-time registration
required for entry)
- THE
60s IN POETRY: An upcoming academic conference on poetry in
the 1960s gives one of the first glimpses at "how the academy
- or at least the progressive/experimental poetry wing of the
academy - will be canonizing the period." Accordingly of
the 200 papers to be presented, "there were 151 US poets
in the 1960's who are now worthy of study. Twenty-seven are the
subjects of multiple papers." Exquisite
Corpse 10/00
Tuesday
October 10
-
WORD
MACHINE: Stephen King is a writing industry. He writes 2,000
words a day and churns out a new book every three months or
so. "According to Forbes magazine, he makes in excess of
$50,000,000 a year (and I didn't accidentally add a few zeros)."
The
Age (Melbourne) 10/10/00
-
POET
OR FRAUD? Andreas Karavis has become something of a literary
sensation, with his work turning up in prestigious publications.
But he's never granted an interview, and some wonder whether
he exists. Poet David Solway, who speaks on Karavis' behalf
"may well simply be the man who discovered Karavis and
been responsible for promoting his work in Canada. Or, according
to a growing body of conspiratorial thought among the literati,
he and Karavis may be one and the same."
The Globe and Mail 10/10/00
-
POWER
OF THE PRESS: In China, an editor is arrested as his subversive
publication is distributed everywhere. "I understood that
the Chinese government was more and more angry that this issue
was everywhere in the country, in the cities and outside. They
said they saw it everywhere, even in bookstores, and they didn't
like it."
New
York Times 10/10/00 (one-time
registration required for entry)
Monday
October 9
-
THIS
YEAR'S NOBEL LITERATURE PRIZE... The Nobel committee failed
to reach a decision last week on a winner for this year's Nobel
Prize for literature. "Margaret Atwood and Alice Munro
are among a list of contenders for the $1.35-million prize that
includes Chinese writer Bei Dao, Belgian author Ugo Claus, Trinidad's
V.S. Naipaul and Ireland short story author William Trevor."
National Post (Canada) 10/09/00
Friday
October 6
- NOBEL
EFFORTS: Last week Czeslaw Milosz and Günter Grass traveled
to Vilnius Lithuania to unveil a plaque commemorating Joseph Brodsky.
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 10/06/00
- ATWOOD
IS BOOKER FAVORITE: Margaret Atwood's new book, "The
Blind Assassin", is the early favourite to win Britain's
Booker Prize. London bookmakers posted her as the 2 to 1 favorite.
National Post (Canada) 10/06/00
- POTTERMANIA
HITS CHINA: Harry Potter has come to China, creating the same
sensation as it did in the rest of the world. Parents lined up
for hours outside bookstores hoping to buy the latest accounts
of "Ha-Li Bo-te," as Potter is known in China. BBC
10/06/00
Thursday
October 5
- BOOKER
PRIZE FINALISTS ANNOUNCED: Finalists for the literary prize
are: Margaret Atwood - "The Blind Assassin," Trezza
Azzopardi - "The Hiding Place," Michael Collins - "The
Keepers of Truth," Kazuo Ishiguro - "When We Were Orphans,"
Matthew Kneale - "English Passengers," and Brian O'Doherty
- "The Deposition of Father McGreevy"
BBC 10/05/00
- LARGEST
DONATION EVER TO LIBRARY OF CONGRESS: Billionaire John Kluge
is donating $60 million to the Library of Congress. "Kluge's
money is the largest single gift in the institution's 200-year
history. The donation, according to a source close to the project,
will be used to establish the John W. Kluge Center for scholars
and a $1 million annual prize for lifetime achievement in scholarly
endeavors. The center will be located in the library's Jefferson
Building and, like a university, will have endowed chairs in a
number of fields." Washington
Post 10/05/00
- TRADEMARK TREPIDATION:
Independent electronic publishers are watching with concern the
fate of a recently filed application by Gemstar-TV Guide International
to trademark the word "EBOOK." "I think we independents are not
nearly cut-throat enough. We should have copyrighted every doggone
e-book term we came up with back in the mid '90s." Wired
10/04/00
- HIT
A POET WHILE HE'S DOWN? "It seems churlish to complain
that poetry is receiving publicity, however dishonestly generated.
Sales and readerships are very low; I read recently that 3% of
all book sales are of poetry, and even that figure seems surprisingly
high. But might we not be in danger of an inflationary rhetoric
with regard to contemporary poetry, where so many superlative
epithets - 'best poet of their generation', 'best American poet
currently writing', and so on - are scattered like confetti over
the whole crowd? The Guardian 10/05/00
- GILLER
PRIZE FINALISTS ANNOUNCED: Great excitement in Canada about
the announcement of finalists for the Giller Prize (one of Canada's
top literary prizes). A few reactions? "All the books have brown
covers except one." "Bleak, bleak and bleaker." The list showed
"big themes, big ideas and a few surprises."
The Globe and Mail (Toronto) 10/05/00
Wednesday
October 4
- THE
ALLURE/DANGER OF PARIS: The French capital, for a poet, is
seductive. But for an American, is there danger in losing one's
voice in that seductive quality? C. K. Williams, the New Jersey
native who won this year's Pulitzer Prize for poetry is quite
hip to the dangers. The New York Times
10/04/00 (one-time registration
required for entry)
- CANADA
TO SUBSIDIZE MAGAZINES: The Canadian government announces
a $150 million fund to help Canadian magazines compete against
American media selling their wares in Canada. The money will go
to subsidize Canadian publications because "American magazines
can sell ads more cheaply than Canadian competitors because the
magazine's costs have already been covered by advertising and
sales in the United States." The
Globe and Mail (Toronto) 10/04/00
Tuesday
October 3
- E-BOOK
'EM:
Publishers anxiously at an e-book conference watch Napster case
for clues to how publishers can protect themselves. "Keynote
speaker Dick Brass, vice president of technology development at
Microsoft, predicted that although 50 percent of all new books
will be electronic in form within 10 years, widespread piracy
could cripple the market." Wired
10/02/00
- NEWS
ON COMMISSION: "The worst-paid journalists on earth live
in Nigeria. Because of this, Nigerian journalists do on a daily
basis what would constitute a firing offence in Canada - they
accept money from the people they write about. These payments,
called 'commissions', are paid by companies, individuals, organizations
and governments when journalists come to call." The
Globe and Mail (Toronto) 10/03/00
Monday
October 2
- WRITING
BEHIND THE CURTAIN: Dissident writers in the old USSR had
to be wary. Since their work could not be printed at home they
memorized it "The two most important phenomena in dissident
writing in the Eastern bloc surrounding Samizdat and Tamizdat
were the underground press in the authors' own country and the
opportunities for publication abroad." Frankfurter
Allgemeine Zeitung 10/01/00
Sunday
October 1
- THE
NEW LIT CRIT: "Run mostly by thirtysomething writers
and editors, this latest generation of New York literary journals
are stylishly packaged, serving up a mix of prominent names, undiscovered
aspirants, and lost treasures from the vaults. Each has staked
out a different aesthetic territory, but between them they cover
a wide swath of contemporary literature." Village
Voice 09/00
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