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25 May ' 13:29
May 25, 2012
The English translator of the superb HHhH writes about the indirect road he took to becoming a translator of a language he was resistant to learn.
While it is undoubtedly an advantage to spend time in the country of your source language (France, in my case), living there full-time can have a deleterious effect on your target language (English), because French expressions and ways of phrasing can come to sound natural when they are, in fact, slightly strange in English.
In a revelation that should surprise absolutely no one, it turns out that Orlando Figes is the subject of an investigation at the Nation for falsehoods and fabrications in his book The Whisperers: Private Life in Stalin's Russia. It's not the first book to come under suspicion, and as he is now maybe most famous for Amazon.com review shenanigans -- that he first tried to pin on his wife -- you have to wonder about his latest book about life in the Gulag, released just this week. (Also, why he isn't publishing poison yet.)
"So they have courses teaching you foreign languages and ballroom dancing and etiquette and cooking. But there are no classes to learn how to be by yourself in a furnished room with chipped dishes, or how to be alone in general without any words of concern or familiar sounds."
That's from Irmgard Keun's The Artificial Silk Girl, and the basis of this week's Kind Reader column, about living alone for the first time.
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24 May ' 17:04
May 24, 2012
Paul Fussell, the wide-ranging, stingingly opinionated literary scholar and cultural critic whose admiration for Samuel Johnson, Kingsley Amis and the Boy Scout Handbook and his withering scorn for the romanticization of war, the predominance of television and much of American society were dispensed in more than 20 books, died on Wednesday in Medford, Ore. He was 88.
I was gifted Fussell's The Great War and Modern Memory not too long ago. Amazing piece of work.
May 23, 2012
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23 May ' 13:49
Strangely, the preview I was worried about is not the one causing my current conniption fit. Trailers have been released for adaptations of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great GatsbyHenry James's* What Maisie Knew. If both cause distress, wash it down with a little totally-not-about-L. Ron Hubbard Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master
* I mean, I'm assuming it's loosely based on the Henry James, at least has some strands of his DNA in there? Although the soundtrack alone would have made his blood curdle.
Berfrois has a good review of Gerard Toal and Carl Dahlman's Bosnia Remade, one of those books I long to read but know I will never have the time to sit with it. Probably. I would like the electronic add-on to my brain now that allows me to download huge amounts of information from nonfiction texts directly into my consciousness. Thanks. That's gotta be just six months away by now, right? Until that happens, detailed reviews of books I will probably never read offer the best substitute.
But while we're on the subject of the Balkans, probably best to note that the Atlantic website, bless their corrupt little hearts, has huge excerpts from Rebecca West's masterpiece on the region, Black Lamb and Grey Falcon. Even so, it's probably only about 10% of the full book, as it's 900+ pages. And every single one worth reading!
Violette dreamt of milky baths
Of gorgeous gowns of fresh bread
Of gorgeous gowns of pure blood
One day there will be no more fathers
In the gardens of youth
There will be strangers
All the strangers
Men for whom you are always brand new
And the very first
Men for whom you can escape from yourself
Men for whom you are nobody's daughter
Violette dreamt of undoing
and undid
The hideous vipers' knot of blood connections- Paul Éluard, quoted in Sarah Maza's Violette Noziere: A Story of Murder in 1930s Paris
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23 May ' 02:17
May 23, 2012
I don't know if you've heard, but Alain de Botton, hot on the heels of his book How to Think More About Sex, is going to reinvent porn. I know! There's no use making any jokes about it, Hadley Freeman has already made all the good ones.
For those who believe that philosophy is, by and large, little more than stating the obvious with extra jazz hands, De Botton's porn manifesto will not persuade them otherwise. Similarly, to those who see De Botton as a precious philosopher with little connection to the real world, again, you should brace yourselves for your opinions to remain utterly unchanged.
How I hate doing this stuff on the blog, but we're being practical.
So! Looking for subletters for my Berlin apartment for July and August, possibly in the fall as well. It's a nice, quiet space in Prenzlauer Berg, a 3 minute walk from public transit. Full of books, obviously, in English and German. There's also a Russian book that I just found the other day, of unknown origins. Maybe you can tell me if it's good or not.
Email me if interested in talking about it. It's a nice little place to get a lot of writing done in the day and then do a lot of street drinking at night.
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22 May ' 15:10
This week's Kirkus Q&A is with Alix Shulman, regarding her caustic little novel Menage. We talk about what makes a piece of fiction feminist, and the corrosive powers of money in art.
as a fiction writer I have always balked at restrictions imposed by various prescriptions about what feminist fiction should be. In fact, I wrote an essay exploring what feminist fiction is, The Taint, reprinted in my new collection, A Marriage Agreement and Other Essays. In it I quote Naomi Weissteins broad definition: Feminist fiction is fiction that does not admire patriarchy or accept its ideology. Nor does it accept its male characters as necessarily more exciting, important, or valuable than its female characters. In addition, the female characters... whether they be villains or heroes...are neither necessarily nice nor necessarily beautiful. In this way feminist fiction challenges the patriarchal belief in the fixed and eternal nature of men and women.
May 21, 2012
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22 May ' 03:44
May 22, 2012
Ahmet Sik, a Turkish journalist and author recently released from prison, says he is working with his lawyers to prepare for June 18, his next day in court, as he fights accusations that he was part of a plot known as Ergenekon, aimed at toppling the governing Justice and Development Party.
During an interview on the campus of Bilgi University, where he teaches, Mr. Sik said Monday that whether he was convicted or exonerated, it would not change the oppression of the media in Turkey.
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21 May ' 16:57
May 21, 2012
How to become a magician, circa 1882.
This article by Philip Kitcher has the saddest god damn subtitle: "Why history and the humanities are also a form of knowledge." The fact that someone felt the need to actually say that out loud, as if it's not already obvious to everyone, it hurts the heart. The piece -- the main title being "The Trouble with Scientism" -- is good, and maybe in a world where all you need is to slap NEUROSCIENCE somewhere on your book to get it taken super seriously and unquestioningly it's necessary.
Kate Summerscale is all over the place these days, everyone is excited about Mrs. Robinson's Disgrace: The Private Diary of a Victorian Lady. (I haven't gotten round to it yet, I've a couple booksabout murder to get through first. It's all nastiness in my apartment lately.)
She's profiled at the Guardian, where she talks about her days working the obituary desk at the Telegraph. And she's at the Independent, talking about her days working at the obituary desk at the Telegraph. (Remind me, if I decide to do a Q&A with her for Kirkus, to find something else to talk about.)
A group of fraternity brothers from Lousiana Tech University burning their textbooks in celebration of the end of the school year are believed by local authorities to have caused a fire that burned down their fraternity house.
May 18, 2012
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18 May ' 18:11
Eavan Boland, who wrote the lovely memoir A Journey with Two Maps: Becoming a Woman Poet, talks about why those words "woman" and "poet" needed to be in the subtitle. (via)
The "Status of Woman" clause in the Irish Constitution, which clearly defines a woman's contribution to the state as that of a homemaker, added to the tensions that Boland encountered as a young writer. "The Irish Constitution is one of the very few in Europe that enshrined the woman's place as being in the home," she said. Thus, both state and societal expectations made it difficult for her to realize her dream early on.
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18 May ' 08:20
May 18, 2012
I was dismayed but not truly surprised to read New Yorker editor Elizabeth Minkel's essay at the Millions explaining why she rarely reads books by international authors:
Three Percent is trying to revive May as World in Translation Month, and its an obviously laudable goal. But it remains to be seen how they or anyone can effectively market an entire world of literature thats still failed to catch on amongst the majority of the American reading public. Ive seen the attempts: articles, blogs, word-of-mouth from friends or booksellers, offering up blind recommendations, the authors name, title, and original language, and I dont know how to parse it. Im guilty myself: just the other day, halfway through Cheikh Hamidou Kanes Ambiguous Adventure, the first book in translation Ive read in a long while, I found myself trying to talk about it with a few friends. Hes Senegalese, I said. They looked at me expectantly, waiting for something more helpful than nationality. Its about colonialism. They nodded. It was translated by the woman who did The Little Prince, I tossed in. Ah! one said. A relief: a cultural frame of reference. I give most books a hard sell, but I had so few tools at my disposal, reading a Senegalese book translated from French half a century ago, and fault here lies with me, not with Kane, whose book is extraordinary and subtle and philosophical and unlike anything else Ive read about the colonial experience, which, coming from a person who essentially majored in postcolonialism, is saying something.
There's something about this whole piece, and you should read the whole thing, that indicates that she doesn't like reading books that everyone else isn't already talking about -- she doesn't want to be left out of the literary conversation. I know I am reading way too much into this. But it seems like that is the problem with the New Yorker and fiction anyway. They are waiting for other people to tell them what's good. Rather than using their position to establish and lead the conversation themselves.
This kind of blends in with a new study about book reviewing, which shows that the larger publications are actually less likely to review unestablished writers. They wait for publicity to build before they jump on triumphantly. Now, the study is flawed as fuck. (They use Metafilter.com -- a site that only halfheartedly at best tracked book reviews and then only tracked major publications and books that got several reviews in different outlets. Whyyyy would they do that.) But it does say something about how lazy the establishment is, and how timidly they wield their power.
A federal judge dismissed a class-action fraud lawsuit on Monday against Greg Mortenson, co-author of bestselling book "Three Cups of Tea," that accused him of fabricating much of his story about promoting education for girls in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
I think you are now caught up on the major literary controversies of 2011.
Ruth Wiesler, one of two sisters claiming to be the heirs of Franz Kafka's manuscripts, and who had been battling the state over their possession, has died at age 80.
I hope you have been keeping up with the Kafka case, as it has been reliably entertaining for a year now. (Judith Butler's essay on the subject will thoroughly catch you up.) Anyway, now it has escalated to this point:
Wiesler's attorney, Harel Ashwall, said: "The legal hearings in the case made a decisive contribution to the deterioration of her health."
So, Kafka killed this poor woman. The cats who peed all over the documents, however, all seem to be doing okay.
May 17, 2012
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17 May ' 12:47
May 17, 2012
The publisher behind the steamy New York Times bestseller "50 Shades of Grey" is coming out swinging against libraries that have banned the book -- claiming the censorship violates readers' First Amendment rights*.
Okay, it's nice and all that someone is fighting back against these stupid decisions to pull books off of library shelves, but does it have to be this book we're rallying around? They still yank To Kill a Mockingbird, you know.
* I know that link goes to TMZ. I KNOW. I'm sorry, okay?
Around 50 campaigners have gathered outside Kensal Rise library in north-west London after Brent council workers began removing books from the closed library, which has become a key battleground in the fight over local authority cuts.
At around 7.30 on Wednesday morning, three lorries and eight council workers, accompanied by Brent's head of libraries, Sue McKenzie, arrived to begin packing up books. Protesters then blocked the library doors, and the council workers have remained inside for the last few hours.
On this day in history... well, Christ ascended bodily into heaven and that is why I can't buy milk at the grocery store.
But also, Heloise was finally buried alongside Abelard, reuniting the poor pair in death. The Daybook pays tribute
Okay, so this is what I want: I want, when someone changes their mind about something, for them not to go ideologically swinging to the far other side. I was reading some reviews of Mark Simpson's Male Impersonators: Men Performing Masculinity, and there are some of former feminists writing about it. And when I say "former" I mean "anti." We're taking PhDs in women's studies who have suddenly realized men are people, too, and they are also oppressed by our patriarchal structure, and so that means we have to wipe out decades of feminist thought, because obviously the two cannot coexist.
Someone can explain to me why this is later, I have tickets to the opera tonight and I have a feeling it's going to take a while. In the meantime, I have a Smart Set column up about Male Impersonators, Ken Corbett's Boyhoods: Rethinking Masculinities, and Mattilda Bernstein Sycamore's Why Are Faggots So Afraid of Faggots?. (Bookslut reviewed Sycamore last issue.) It's all about masculinity in crisis, why I prefer a genderly liquid gentleman, the pathologization (totally a word, spellcheck; I think) of male femininity, and why the comments sections at Men's Advocacy Groups scare the shit out of me
Alan, in the documentary, complains about the duties of masculinity the providing, the sacrifice, the achieving, the marriage and fathering of children. He has decided life should be more fun, that men should have other options. If you start spending some time on the websites of mens advocacy groups, things can quickly turn anti-women, with men calling their ex-wives bitches, railing against womens cold hearted natures, ranting about how the system is stacked against them and in favor of women. Simpson says to Alan, Many all-male communities that get together and talk about common interests, activities whether thats fucking or surfing is based on a kind of exaltation, a kind of worship, of the masculine and a denigration of the feminine, whether thats the feminine embodied in women, or whether thats the feminine embodied in so-called effeminate men, men who, either in terms of where they put their dicks or how they dress or cut their hair, dont conform to that masculine ideal.
May 16, 2012
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