all the news that's fit to steal...

Another Happy Return

2004-06-18T12:01:00.000-07:00

A few, final, Ulysses-related-links:

Yeah, Bloomsday is, finally past us, and I figured I take an opportunity to post a few more links culled from my "Wake" reading list.

I spent most of the day studying for a test, but I did get a chance to watch the Ulysses movie, which is, really, the greatest, unnecessary film I have ever seen. There's a lot of French New Wave and Fellini influence in it, but yeah, they do everything they can to capture every bit of the text, making the film, itself, ridiculous for the sake of completeness, but yeah, it helped smooth over a lot of holes in my own understanding.

I, also, just finished reading The Moviegoer (I might, actually, finish a review of it) and I'm, currently, working on The Complete Henry Bech and William Gibson's Idorou.

Also, it appears quantum physicists are making teleportation/long-distance communication advances (stolen from technovelgy, again.

Plus, a bonus for Unix users out there, a allegorical/metaphorical meditation on the windows-unix rivalry by Neal Stephenson and a picture of the Hole Hawg (which was mentioned in the aforementioned excerpt, swiped from Jason Rhode's baroque little blog.

Expect Nothing but Joyce for a While...

2004-06-13T21:02:00.000-07:00

Despite The New York Times's unfortunate reputation with book reviews, lately, it's produced two links for me, today. My Finnegan's Wake reading list (the link's head to find, so look in previous Joyce-related posts for it) has redirected me to this story, which, like most stories regarding Bloomsday, speaks rather critically of it. However, it leads off with a rather lovely anecdote about a young, Irish "lad" reading Ulysses, that's really worth reading.

Another Joyce Link...

2004-06-13T11:49:00.000-07:00

This one stole from the modest, but respectable, j_joyce community on Livejournal.com about the dwindling population of Jews in Dublin. Take a look. It's lovely.

Reagan...No Thoughts...Just Links...

2004-06-11T16:07:00.000-07:00

With his recent demise, it seems like everyone has something to say about Reagan. Slate, I think, provides two, interesting, perspectives.

Another, interesting, Reaganonema, apparently, there was a video game called SDI made for the commodore 64, based on the "Star Wars" plan. That's really amusing and...creepy (information, anyone?)

All I Want for Christmas

2004-06-11T11:51:00.000-07:00

Is the Ulysses Audiobook put out by Naxos (which has managed to be one of the most ambitious (and one of my most-favorite) classical labels, around. Practically everybody's making a fuss about it, including The Guardian, that heaps laurel, upon laurel atop the durn thing. Personally (not that this is an unpopular opinion), but I see this as the only good thing coming out of the hundredth Bloomsday.

But, yeah, now I need to get a job, or sell blood, or something, to cover the expenses of that beautiful sheaf of CDs.

The Only Book News I Can Find...

2004-06-05T19:57:00.000-07:00

Everyone's struggling for book news, right now, with two huge book festivals hogging all the credit. While I haven't seen much talk about it in the other blogs, newsagents are going ga-ga over this Rule of Four. The book-in-question is based around the infamously unreadable, Hypnerotomachia Poliphili, the Resnisance's answer to Finnegan's Wake that, apparently, tells a love story in a series of nesting dreams.

Don't get too excit though, this isn't some scholarly study, just the next big crypto-thriller, in-the-spirit of The Da Vinchi Code (I'm not going to prove you a link for that one because, really, I'm pretty sure you can find it on your own) or The Cryptonomicon.

While more avid readers (of books, any books) will probably shake their head at this project, it'll probably convince one bored housewife to read the Hypnerotomachia, and that, sorta, makes this whole code novel fad seem more worthwhile.

Another Meaningless Booklist and a Little Music Coverage

2004-06-05T01:20:00.001-07:00

Well, the Hay Festival is still going on, along with, like the American Book Expo, or something, I dunno, I'm not one to pay much attention to all this talk about trade shows (though it seems to be in-vogue, across-the-blogs). While I'm allergic to hay, everyone likes a good list (or even a bad list), so I thought I'd link you to this list of "Orange Essentials", compiled at the aforementioned festival (and swiped from the literary saloon. This is a list of 50 essential books from the past century, compiled by festival attendees and online voters (the site remains open, for some reason, even though the vote is closed).

To save your eyes, 100 Years of Solitude ranks #1, Roth performs respectably, Atwood has too many books for her own damn good, Grass (in a beautiful display of disrespect) makes the forties, and even though everyone's going ga-ga over Updike at hay, he only lands #38 (it's a shame, people just don't like to read him, do they). But yeah, interesting little list, as lists go.

Also, for those of you who like reading music, or music, period, I've been searching out a lot of wonderful MP3-only labels and would like to direct your attention to earlabs. This site is an excellent MP3 label of electronica (modern and classic) that also serves as a hub to dozens of other MP3 labels (including Kikapu and Fukk God Lets Create, both-of-which, are amazing). I've discovered so much great music, today, and I implore you to, too.

Roy Wins Big...Again!

2004-06-02T23:30:00.000-07:00

Probably no-more-than-a-week after I discover (or, I should say, realize) that Arundhati Roy has political interests, she's been awarded the Sydney Peace Prize, which will fit nicely on her mantle, alongside the booker she took home for The God of Small Things.

Oh, the Guardian and their Hay...Thing...

2004-05-31T23:53:00.000-07:00

The Guardian loves to promote its Hay Festival, which seems like an insanely fun time, really. But yeah, today's Guardian Books has a couple amusing articles on the festival including this tiny collection of drawings by authors and a story about a game of scrabble between the guardian and authors.

However, the real meat of today's Guardian comes in the form of an entertaining, racous article about Colin Wilson's autobiography. I've always liked the guy, half-because he's a great writer and half-because he's such an odd fucker (even though I don't get his whole UFO/occult thing).

Really, it's been a while since an article's made a want to read a book so bad, or at-least read that copy of Poetry and Mysticism that's been sitting on my shelves for unknown years.

Anna Karenina Makes Booksnob Banned List

2004-05-31T11:50:00.000-07:00

Scooped from a certain Livejournal, the new Oprah's Book Club book is none other than
Anna Karenina, one of the books that been on my queue to read, and one of the books that I will, probably, now, have to read in-secret.

I guess the question is why do readers-of-books hate Oprah's Club so much. Its really hard to say. I'm saying, she does good thing for America, I guess, arms soccer moms with a greater body of literary knowledge, but I dunno, I think the real problem is the fact that people are reading these great novels (because all the selections she's made for her "new" book club are great novels), but they're reading them because a celebrity wants them to read them. Book people read for the love of the book, you know, because they pick it up in a store and they're so engrossed in it that they find themselves reading it on their way to the counter, because the reviews (we love reviews, mind you, we hate celebrity endorsements, but we seek out book reviews like starving (wo)men) give us starry-eyed hopes of how great it must be, and because our friends track us down and beg us to read it (often making forcible loans that they may/or may not get back. That's, more-or-less, how book people operate, in my mind.

Plus, I think, part of it is because Oprah's readers, generally, don't aspire to greater heights (though some of them do, I've known a few, and they've become passionate bibliophiles). Oprah's readers remind me of kids who sit in fashionable coffee shops and read Chuck Pallinuk (sp?) novels and the Confessions of a Wallflower (or, whatever it's called) with their lips moving. They do it to appear hip or interesting and don't move on from their little bubble of Oprah books. If, I think, people moved on to Love in the time of Cholera or Travels with Charlie and In Dubious Battle, I'd be a bit happier about it, but right now, it seems like a celebrity (though, probably, a well-intentioned one), stealing books from famous bodies of work and making them their own.

Plus, it's Anna Karenina, the sorta book that gets bibliophiles misty-eyed, the book that Tereza's book. It feels like she's stealing our memories, and while I (and all the other bibliophiles who will whine about it) are asses for saying so, it hurts, a little.

P.S. Please ignore grammar, this was intended as something-of-a-rant.

The Length Only Masks the Lack of Content or A Request

2004-05-29T20:07:00.000-07:00

My computer's been down for a few days, so I've been unable to update. I've been making a lot of progress through the Foundation Trilogy (I'm on Second Foundation, right now), and I'm enjoying it, terribly. There may, or may not, be a review of it, written by my own hands, up in the next few days (I've written so few book reviews in my life, so I'm, really, not confident of my ability).

Right now, I'm trying to find information on this fight between HG Wells and Henry James. A fellow I just met was telling me about it in the bookstore and it seems that Henry James and HG Wells drew the battle lines for the modern novel during a discussion they had (James thought novels should be about what happens in a character's mind and Wells thought they should be about what, actually, happens). I love James, and while I know precious little about Wells, I am quite the fan of science fiction (even if I'm a recently-returned fan to the genre). So far, I can't find the dialogues, however, I have managed to find This Extensive Page of James Links and this quote...

When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race. - H.G. Wells

The quote is, I believe, from The Wheels of Chance, a bicycling pastoral he wrote. As a fellow who still hasn't learned to drive a car into his twenties, I support any and all velocipedic literature.

If anyone knows where I can find more on the debate, please tell me. Thanks.

And Now, the Shallow End of the Grapevine...

2004-05-27T01:34:00.000-07:00

The LA Weekly just put out their less-than-weekly review of books, according to The Elegant Variation. After I get my housecleaning done, I'm gonna give this a good read (and I'd advise y'all to do the same) because unlike most irregular reviews-of-books, this one seems to include a lot of interesting-looking titles that are neither obscure and academic nor familiar to me.

The same new source (well, The Elegant Variation, anyway), also reports that William S. Burroughs is getting a creek named after him in Kansas City. Personally, I think he'd prefer a sewer.

Read Now, Coatzee Later...

2004-05-26T12:14:00.000-07:00

I can't even remember how I was linked to the first one, but The Literary Hipster's Handbook has just entered a new volume (swiped from Return of the Reluctant without cause or provocation.

Big News for Span-Lit Fans

2004-05-25T18:07:00.000-07:00

Gregory Rabassa, who continually fights Edith Grossman for the status of the world's most celebrated translator of Spanish, is about to put out a book of memoirs according to the New York Times. While the article lacks sufficient meat, it does, offhandedly, mention the amazing work he did on Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis's The Posthumous Memoirs of Bras Cubas, a book that deserves a lot more attention than it has received. As a fan of Spanish writers, translators, and their memoirs, I'm looking forward to seeing how this one turns out.

Arundhati Roy Signs Album Deal, Pink Cadillac to Follow...

2004-05-25T02:47:00.000-07:00

I'm pretty abilities, but Alternative Tentacles (possibly my favorite record label of all-time) has put out a political spoken-word album by Arundhati Roy, who wrote The God of Small Things, a book I can't recommend more highly. I'm a little worried 'cause that wanker, Howard Zinn, is involved, but I may just have to add this to my proverbial Christmas list.

I Swear, We're Not Just a Sci-Fi Blog...

2004-05-24T22:58:00.000-07:00

Well, the Hugo Awards Shortlist is out. A lot of the stories have links to the full-text, so enjoy (I may read a few, myself, pretty soon).

Probably the most honest review I've ever read.

2004-05-23T23:18:00.000-07:00

So much has been said about Ulysses that it's hard to find anyone who has an honest, original opinion about it. There may, however, be one, notable, exception:

Not Enough Suspense, October 16, 2003

Reviewer: A reader from Sparks, NV

The author kept getting bogged down in details instead of moving the strolling along, because we don't need to know everything about the characters, just enough to keep reading until the climax of the story; if you compare it with something like the Hunt for Red October you'll see what I mean, there the author knows to advance the plot and doesn't waste his time and ours. Here there is way too much information when all the reader wants is to solve the plot and find out what happens. I expected it to be a lot more fast-paced because of the reputation.

Also, where was the editor? A book shouldn't be hard to read but there were run-on sentences and bad grammar in some places.

This was sent to me by someone in my Finnegan's Wake newsgroup (yes, I'm actually in a Finnegan's Wake newsgroup and someday a woman will love me for it) sent me this review, which they, in turn, found on Amazon.com.

I, somehow, doubt the review is real (in fact, I playfully suspect it may be the infamous Roddy Doyle-in-disguise), but if this is, honestly, what you think sir/ma'am, I salute you.

Next Year, He's Expected to Take the Breeder's Cup...

2004-05-22T01:59:00.000-07:00

The Alien Online, has, recently, put up this interview with Ted Chiang (though I'm not sure how recently, I just began exploring their site, recently). Why should we care about him? Well for one thing he's managed to win two Hugo Awards and at-least two Nebulas (including one for his first short story), as-well-as the Sturgeon, Campbell, and Asimov awards across the span of a fourteen-year career. This might not be suprising except for the fact that he's only written eight stories.

While this isn't, exactly, the greatest interview I've ever read in my entire life, it should, at-least, introduce you to a man who I will, immodestly, call a master of the modern short story.

There, actually, seems to be a host of other, often better, interviews with him, online (just google search him, I swear). I'm quite obsessed with Mr. Chiang so I may be posting up links to many of the aforementioned articles sometime soon.

I told him I was going to write about meeting him but I'd make him a Jehovah's Witness and have him bring guns.

2004-05-21T22:44:00.000-07:00

The newest Powells Newsletter features a lovely little article by Garrison Keillor about finishing a novel. It's classic Keillor, really, I promise you will enjoy it.

P.S. That book he mentions, The Better Angel, looks really interesting...

Updike in the Guardian, Again!

2004-05-21T21:16:00.000-07:00

While modern American readers and writers (other than me and an intrepid few) seem to be lukewarm on Updike, it seems a month can't pass without a story about him showing up in the Guardian. Luckially, this profile of him is a bit better than most I've read.

P.S. Check out the attached page of links to previous Updike-related reviews/articles in the Guardian, they're all very worthy.

Phillip Roth Goodies on the Way...

2004-05-21T16:04:00.000-07:00

Big things are happening for Phillip Roth, beloved American comidocumenter of injustice (and my favorite author in high school). According to a rather dated Bookninja post, The Telegraph reports that there is, indeed a Phillip Roth biography, in-the-works by Ross Miller, the fellow who is collecting his work for the Library of America (which, I believe, will make him the second author to recieve this honor within his lifetime, provided he doesn't kick the bucket between now-and-then). Roth, who is famous for writing the stories of quirky, persecuted people, was famously persecuted by his ex-wife, Claire Bloom, in her memoirs. While Roth has already made his own counterpoint in, I Married a Communist and his quasi-fictitious memoir, The Facts, among other places, Ross apparently wanted to make Roth's case a little stronger by writing what is, most assuredly, something of a counter-biography.

Moreover, The Alien Online (a link found by my own research, mind you) reports that a new Phillip Roth novel, titled The Plot Against America, is coming out in October. The book which, thankfully, has nothing to do with the Bush Administration, is set in an alternate past where FDR loses the election to Charles Lindbergh, who uses his presidential powers to seek peace with the Nazis and persecute Jews, in-turn. While this book will probably do less-than-nothing to help the case against Roth being a "whiny Jewish intellectual," I'm quite excited about it and will, surely, make a point of boning up on my Roth back-catalog in upcoming months.

Sundry Science Fiction Links

2004-05-20T15:04:00.000-07:00

I'm something-of-an unabashed fan of sci-fi, so I figure I might-as-well put up some interesting links "in science fiction news," as it were...

Quicksilver by Neal Stephenson won England's Arthur C. Clarke Award, of course, it's not that suprising, considdering the competition.
A Popmatters Tribute to Douglas Adams lifted from The Elegant Variaton
The Hitchhiker's Guide Infocom text adventure that won the heart of the above reader and my own (I'm also a big fan of text-based gaming).
And The 42 Shirt, which I've already begged for in my other blog
And, if you haven't seen it yet, Technovelgy, my new favorite blog

So enjoy that, true believers.

First Major Theft

2004-05-19T23:22:00.000-07:00

I was going to hold off posting for a while, but The Complete Review's Literary Saloon has reported that the english translation of the new Amélie Nothomb novel is out.

The Character of Rain was in my last Amazon order, and I thought it was pretty interesting, not exactly worth the 11 dollar cover price, but definately worth borrowing from someone. I'm saying, it had some advantages, it was nice, brief novel with a quasi-fanciful premise (a girl who is a vegetable from birth wakes up at the age of two-and-a-half and experiences her last-half-year of divinity, since the japanese, apparently, believe that a child is an incarnate god until the age of three), and while one could argue that it was just another French with attempts at continental philosophy, we could always use more of those. I've, frankly, been meaning to see how her later ones fare and the announcement of an even newer one (than the one that came out last year, I think), makes me curiouser and curiouser (as Alice would say).

Absolutely Nothing Here for Now...

2004-05-19T22:47:00.000-07:00

Yeah, I've been meaning to make my Livejournal Devoted to Books into a blog, propper, for some time.

The difference between livejournals (and their ilk) and blogs (and theirs), as-I-see it, is that blogs provide one with the useful redirecting of information, on a worldwide scale, journals give somebody a forum to talk about themselves. I already have a livejournal for that, so I figure I might-as-well give myself a more interesting, stylish information dump than the ones I have made before, and one made more for the purpose of entertaining the average reader than boosting my own ego (tho I think there's nothing wrong with giving one's ego a little boost).

I mostly plan to lift stories from other places (and cite them), as-well-as add some of my own, origional content, including reviews of books. Think of this as a literary blog of the lazy, personal sort, along the lines of Collected Miscellany, instead of something like The Literary Saloon, or any of those other blogs designed to "scoop" book news. I'm, frankly, not that good ;)