INTERESTING ARTICLES on books, authors, reading...etc - May/June 2009

Maya Jaggi reviews Tash Aw's latest book, Map of the Invisible World, in tomorrow's Guardian:

Islands of the mind: Indonesia in the 1960s provides a haunting backdrop for separated siblings

The Sunday New York Times Magazine has a feature article on Colm Tóibín:

His Irish Diaspora

Liesl Schillinger reviews Brooklyn in the NYT Sunday Book Review:

The Reluctant Emigrant

In the same issue, Colson Whitehead's latest book, Sag Harbor is also reviewed:

Visible Young Man

Just in case you missed Andrew's post on the previous thread... Carol Ann Duffy is chosen as next poet laureate in the UK

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/may/01/carol-ann-duffy-poet-laureate

bobmcconnaughey@155 of the March/April (previous) "Interesting Articles" thread:

The King's Last Song was excellent; I read it this year but somehow didn't manage to review it; must correct that.

A new, larger Amazon Kindle reader will probably be announced Wednesday.

Today's New York Times has an article about the Nigerian writer and activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, who was executed in 1995, primarily for speaking out against the Abacha government. Last week's PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature featured a panel about the author. Included was his son, Ken Wiwa, whose memoir In the Shadow of a Saint: A Son’s Journey to Understand His Father’s Legacy is on my list of books to read this summer:

A Writer’s Violent End, and His Activist Legacy

IF one places a Small Beer press order, make sure you get shipping charged. My initial order went off w/ the web page not processing the shipping charge and it was a little bit of a hassle getting shipping added on w/out redoing the order, though the Small Beer folk were v. helpful in linking the shipping for 8 books to the original order (he said optimistically)

Interesting discussion of Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go here, relating to class issues. Spoilers.

Today's New York Times reviews My Happiness Bears No Relation to Happiness: A Poet's Life in the Palestinian Century by Adina Hoffman, which is her biography of Taha Muhammad Ali, a working class Palestinian poet whose poems are published by her and her husband. This is reportedly the first biography of a Palestinian writer to be published in English.

A Merchant of Trinkets and Memories

Malcolm Pryce lists his 10 favorite expatriate novels in today's Guardian:

Malcolm Pryce's top 10 expatriate tales

>8 dukedom_enough:, dukedom, thanks for posting the link to the Ishiguro article. I loved Never Let Me Go and this commentary captures EXACTLY what I loved about it.

For those with access to British television the South Bank Show is showing a two-part series on Nigerian writers on 10th & 17th May. Sadly this will be one of the last SBSs as Melvyn Bragg is retiring after 31 years and to celebrate ITV are cancelling the programme. Another blow to the arts on mainstream television. I expect they will replace it with a something more contemporary, i.e., an arts show that uncritically looks at film and pop music, in all but 'mission statement' being a place to plug product.

Founder of Virago discusses non-fiction women's classics - True tales from a revolution.

Okay, this is kind of a stretch, since its an article about travel, but in this article about travel, the author mentions Idlewild Books in NYC, which is a bookstore devoted to travel literature and international fiction that is arranged by country. I checked out the website, http://www.idlewildbooks.com/ , and as Tiny Fey says "I want to go to there!" Has anyone ever been here? New York Club members?

Wow, I live in NYC and I never even heard of it. But I'm definitely going there as soon as I have a chance!

It's kind of cute that they named it Idlewild. For those too young to remember, Idlewild was the original name of JFK Airport in NYC; it was renamed after the assassination.

Elaine Showalter, the author of the recently released book A Jury of Her Peers: American Women Writers from Anne Bradstreet to Annie Proulx, has an excellent article in this weekend's Guardian Review about the lack of recognition awarded to American women writers relative to their male counterparts. In the article she briefly discusses the work of several outstanding novelists: Joyce Carol Oates, Jane Smiley, Annie Proulx, Marilynne Robinson, Anne Tyler, Jayne Anne Phillips, Bobbie Ann Mason, Mary Antin and Gish Jen.

The female frontier

Today's Observer Review has a fascinating article about the great effort that George Orwell exerted to finish Nineteen Eighty-Four while he was suffering from tuberculosis, which would eventually claim his life several months after its publication:

The masterpiece that killed George Orwell

13,14 - Idlewild is on my list of bookstores to visit. Unfortunately, I have to do some serious meditating before entering a bookstore as I cannot afford to actually buy anything. So I am waiting for a day when I am feeling strong.

This link was posted in a number of different groups relating to Jewish literature. It's an interesting article.

http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/features/2009/04/yiddishists200904

There is a review article in the current issue of The Brooklyn Rail about a new anthology of African writing, Gods and Soldiers:

Anthology: A Lot To Live Up To

I saw this anthology in a bookstore and passed over it, for the time being anyway, since it seems to include excerpts from a number of works, which always annoys me. But, thanks for the link; I'll read it when I have more time.

#20: Ah, I thought that you or avaland had talked about this book, but I couldn't find a post about it. Thanks for your comment, Rebecca. I may pass on it, too.

I read two interesting articles this morning. The first was a passionate recommendation by Kamila Shamsie of Michael Ondaatje's In the Skin of a Lion, which appeared on National Public Radio's All Things Considered earlier this week:

In Praise Of Ondaatje's Gloriously Intoxicating 'Lion'

And, The New Zealand Herald interviews Tash Aw, who won the Costa First Novel Award in 2005 for The Harmony Silk Factory. His new novel, Map of the Invisible World, will be released in the US next week.

Living in the margins

The longlist for the 2009 BBC Samuel Johnson Prize, "the UK’s most Prestigious non-fiction award", was announced today. The Guardian has an article about the announcement:

Science dominates Samuel Johnson prize longlist

#19-21, Now that I've read the article you linked to, Darryl, the anthology sounds more interesting, even with excerpts, especially as a way of discovering new authors whose works I might want to read more of. I'll have to look at it again.

Two other UK prize announcements were made today. First, the shortlists for the James Tait Black Memorial Prizes, the oldest of the UK literary awards:

Shortlists announced for James Tait Black Memorial prizes

And, the winner of the Independent Foreign Fiction Prize was announced in London this evening. The winner is the Colombian author Evelio Rosero for his novel Los Ejercitos (The Armies). It has been translated into English, and is currently available in the UK.

Colombian civil war story wins Independent foreign fiction prize

very interesting page, w/ good links, about current books of the street in Latin America that are sold outside of the usual distribution systems! Some are produced by collectives dedicated to the form and others by the proverbial man/woman in the street.



http://uncnews.unc.edu/news/humanities-and-social-sciences/exhibit-programs-feat...

The most interesting UNC self-promotional rag that i get, is "Windows" - which goes out to the Friends of the Library. For better or for worse they were publishing w/ the title before MS had released their first feeble attempts to head off the Mac interface. I'm sure that otherwise MSoft would have sued for copyright infringement!
--
bob mcconnaughey

Today's Guardian features an audio interview of Elaine Showalter, who discusses her latest book A Jury of Her Peers: American Women Writers from Anne Bradstreet to Annie Proulx:

The Guardian Books Podcast: Elaine Showalter on A Jury of Her Peers

>15 kidzdoc: Just catching up here. Thanks for the link to the Showalter article in the Guardian, kidzdoc! I've reposted it in about four other places. I've not read Bobbie Ann Mason or Jayne Anne Phillips...

>19 kidzdoc:, 20 Nope, wasn't me. While the book looks interesting generally, I suspect for some of us who have been reading African literature, it may be redundant. I will have to see if one can take a peek at the table of contents on Amazon.

>26 kidzdoc: and thanks for this post. I wasn't aware of the podcast and found a few others which looked interesting on their list besides the Showalter.

Lots of good stuff in today's Guardian Review, including a review of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's newest book The Thing Around Your Neck, a collection of short stories about "intelligent but unconfident" middle-class Nigerian women at home and abroad:

Endurance tests

a memoir by Gazmend Kapllani, A Short Border Handbook, about the desperate lives of those Albanians who live in their repressed country and who emigrate to Greece, where they are viewed as suspect and inferior:

Border syndrome

a novel by Amanda Craig, Hearts and Minds, about the lives of poor immigrants in modern London:

The lost

and, The Dark Side of Love by Rafik Schami, which the reviewer, the noted author Robin Yassin-Kassab, describes as "the first Great Syrian Novel":

Darkness and light

I found two articles about Caryl Phillips, whose new novel In the Falling Snow will be released in the UK tomorrow.

Postcards from society’s edge

Home truths

Great articles, Darryl, especially the second. Because of you, I have read The European Tribe and am currently reading Foreigners. I also have Cambridge waiting. His newest novel looks like a winner, too.

I've ordered In the Falling Snow from The Book Depository, and hopefully I'll get my copy next week.

#23, 27: Avaland & rebeccanyc, I bought a copy of Gods and Soldiers yesterday. It has contributions from 30 writers, which are primarily book excerpts. Seventeen of the authors were familiar to me, but only five of the excerpts were from books I have already read. It's about 340 pages in length, so it isn't overwhelming. I'll try to get to it sometime in the next month or so.

A Nigerian publication, NEXT, includes an interview of the Ghanian author Mohammed Naseehu Ali, author of the acclaimed collection of short stories The Prophet of Zongo Street:

Meeting Mohammed Naseehu Ali

It tends to be novelists that are linked to so here's a change - an article on Tom Stoppard.

Is Tom Stoppard's Arcadia the greatest play of our age?

And here's one about scandal and politics in poetry -
Padel 'acted as Walcott sex mole'.

Three Percent reviews The Ninth (A kilencedik) by the Hungarian author Ferenc Barnás, which will be released in the US next week, about life in 1960s Hungary told from the view of a nine year old boy:

The Ninth

Interview with Carlos Ruiz Zafon about his new novel -

Step inside Barcelona's Secret Library

#37: Thanks, jargoneer! I am impatiently waiting for The Angel's Game to be published in the US.

>38 kidzdoc: Tuesday, I think.

#39: I think the release date is tomorrow in the UK, but not until June 16th in the US (according to Amazon and Borders, anyway).

Today's New York Times reports that this week's cover of The New Yorker was created using an iPhone and a $4.99 application:



New Yorker Cover Art, Painted With an iPhone

Abraham Verghese interview on Diane Rehm

http://wamu.org/programs/dr/09/05/25.php#26626

The Guardian has an article about Alice Munro, who is the winner of the 2009 Man Booker Prize for International Fiction:

Alice Munro wins Man Booker International prize

This about "ATMs for Books" on NPR this morning:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104644575

Sad news to report: the Japanese-American professor and writer Ronald Takaki, who taught the first black history course in the UC system at UCLA and wrote Strangers from a Different Shore: A History of Asian Americans, which was listed for the Pulitzer Prize (and abook I would highly recommend), died earlier this week:

Ronald Takaki, ethnic studies pioneer, dies

Yesterday's New York Times has a lovely editorial article by VERLYN KLINKENBORG about the joy of re-reading:

Some Thoughts on the Pleasures of Being a Re-Reader

Today's Guardian Review has an extended article about Marilynne Robinson, whose novel Home is one of the favorites to win this year's Orange Prize:

A life in writing: Marilynne Robinson

The same issue also features a review of In the Falling Snow by Caryl Phillips, which I'll start either today or tomorrow:


Dislocation, dislocation, dislocation: Caryl Phillips's new novel covers three generations of emigrant distress

Interesting review of the new biography of Gabriel Garcia Marquez in a recent New York Times. I was very disappointed to read in it that Garcia Marquez's memory is beginning to fail, as I was hoping for a continuation of his fascinating Living to Tell the Tale, the first (and apparently now only) volume of his autobiography.

This week's New Yorker has an article about Bruno Schulz, who some of us read for the Reading Globally Poland theme read, by David Grossman. You can get to an abstract by following this link but you need to register for the site to read the whole article.

Today's Guardian has an article by Ian McKenzie, whose novel The City of Strangers will be available in the US later this month, about the "cross-pollination" between art and fiction. He includes 10 of his favorite novels that include art:

Ian MacKenzie's top 10 artworks in novels

Another great article appears in today's Guardian, about the benefits of listening to authors reading from their own works:

Is anything gained from reading aloud?

I especially enjoyed listening to Barack Obama read his first book dreams from my father. Though it was somewhat disconcerting feeling like," wow- here's the president of United States and he's reading to me in my ECHO."

Going back to the New Yorker. I find that I almost invariably enjoy most of the nonfiction feature articles a great deal; on the other hand I very rarely enjoy either the short stories or the poetry. I appreciate their book and movie reviews, although, especially with the movies, my opinion rarely jibes with Anthony Lane's ( back in the day when Pauline Kael was their movie reviewer I could almost always be assured that if she really liked a movie I would definitely dislike it - her review of Altman's "Nashville" was kind of a crystallizing moment in realizing how much we disagreed. I thought that movie was incredibly condescending and filled with banal stereotypes while she thought it was the greatest thing since..i dunno.. Charlie Chaplin.

Anyone who is a fan, or is thinking of reading David Foster Wallace, can find supplementary readings at

http://infinitesummer.org/archives/118

You wouldn’t run a marathon without stretching beforehand. And perhaps the mammoth tome that is Infinite Jest ought not be your first exposure to David Foster Wallace.

The Guardian interviews the Zimbabwean author Pettina Gappah, whose first book, An Elegy for Easterly, a collection of short stories, has garnered glowing reviews in the UK:

Interview: Petina Gappah

I was thrilled to learn that the African-American author Michael Thomas was selected as the winner of the 2009 Impac Dublin Award for his debut novel Man Gone Down, which was one of my favorite novels of 2007. The Guardian has an article about Thomas and the novel:

Debut novelist takes €100,000 Impac Dublin prize

I'm not the huge David Foster Wallace fan* that many are, but i really loved and still love his appreciation of Roger Federer. Since Wimbledon starts next week, this seems apropos.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/20/sports/playmagazine/20federer.html
"Roger Federer as Religious Experience"
(esp. as i agree with his central tenet: "Beauty is not the goal of competitive sports, but high-level sports are a prime venue for the expression of human beauty. " - esp. if it's a sport one's played, however poorly, at one time or another )

*kind of a dumb assessment based solely on giving up on infinite jest; i need to try a shorter book.

Interview with the Israeli author AB Yehoshua:

http://www.eurozine.com/articles/2009-06-09-yehoshua-en.html

I received an e-mail message today from Words Without Borders, "the online magazine for international literature", which included staff recommendations for summer reading. I've read several of these books, but quite a few others looked interesting.

Words Without Borders Staff Picks for Summer Reading

I just don't know where to post this so it gets maximum exposure and makes some sense :-)

Perhaps I will have to create a whole new thread on Great Quotes.

Here it is:

“Anyone who doesn’t read Cortázar is doomed. Not to read him is a serious invisible disease which in time can have terrible consequences. Something similar to a man who has never tasted peaches. He would quietly become sadder… and, probably, little by little, he would lose his hair.”

Pablo Neruda

I am off to read some Cortazar. I only have one vanity left: my hair. I will NOT risk losing any. :-)

Today's San Francisco Chronicle includes a review of Between the Assassinations by Aravind Adiga, whose novel The White Tiger won the Booker Prize last year:

'Between the Assassinations,' by Aravind Adiga

Today's Latin American Herald Tribune honors Ernesto Sabato, described as "Argentina’s greatest living writer", who celebrated his 98th birthday yesterday.

Argentine Novelist Ernesto Sabato Turns 98

Two book reviews from today's Guardian Review were particularly interesting to me. First, a review of This Is How by MJ Hyland:

The outsider inside: Justine Jordan is impressed by a novel of extraordinary power

And, The Solitude of Prime Numbers by Paolo Giordano:

Repeat numbers: A melancholy tale moves Tobias Jones