[contextly_auto_sidebar id="65McoqrzvnW78eClGabJ9zi1OijdJLHZ"] WRITERS and artists are notoriously difficult to corral; it's both built into the job description and something that keeps the creative class from asserting itself. But lately a number of scribes have united in an effort to resist the bullying of the online bookseller. The New York Times reports : Now, hundreds … [Read more...]
Happy Birthday to Philip K. Dick
This blog has drifted into Africa and Italy recently, so let me return for a moment to our West Coast home ground: Today would be the birthday of one of America's most intriguing, frustrating and brilliant writers -- Philip K. Dick.It's hard to know where to start on a figure like this, but let me defer to David Gill, a Bay Area lecturer who runs the clever and instructive Total Dick-head site. … [Read more...]
Eight Decades of Ursula K. Le Guin
TODAY one of the most innovative and intriguing writers in the english language marks her 80th birthday. there aren't many novelists who i enjoy as much today as i did when i was in elementary school; ursula le guin is one of them. here is the recent LA Times piece i wrote on her after visiting her in portland and re-immersing myself in her body of work and the debates around it. she was a very … [Read more...]
Ursula Le Guin Vs. Oliver Cromwell
SOMEHOW, without quite knowing it, i wrote two brief pieces on ursula le guin, and both have recently gone up.the first is mostly an extended intro to my LATimes profile, which adds some excised lines from author/ essayist/ cosmopolitan pico iyer as well as sci-fi scholar/ critic annalee newitz.the second, here, is the seed of what i hope is a bigger project some day on the transition away from … [Read more...]
The Wonderful Worlds of Ursula K. Le Guin
ONE of the greatest thrills of my professional life was the chance to interview the novelist ursula le guin last summer at her home in portland. HERE is my piece, which runs sunday in the LAT.le guin is one of the few writers from my childhood -- 5th or 6th grade i think, for the "earthsea" books -- who gives me the same pleasure, if in a different key, as an adult.in person, i found her -- at … [Read more...]