September 25, 2012 On the Shelf Trashing Tolkien, Finding Tom Sawyer By Sadie Stein The real Tom Sawyer. Courtesy Guardians of the City, San Francisco Fire Museum. The people have spoken, and the Best Word Ever is … diphthong. A map of Zadie Smith’s NW. And speaking of interactive tours: explore the Roald Dahl Museum from the comfort of home! Tom Sawyer was apparently based on a real person. His name was Tom Sawyer. He was a volunteer fireman from Brooklyn, and he and Mark Twain used to go out drinking. Billy Connolly: “I could never read Tolkien. I always found him unreadable … I didn’t read [the books], and I normally don’t like people who have! The people who love it, they’re kind of scary. They talk all this gobbledygook and they think of it as the Holy Grail.” Dáin Ironfoot clearly doesn’t know who he’s dealing with. [tweetbutton] [facebook_ilike]
September 24, 2012 On the Shelf Doyle’s Journals, Rowling’s House By Sadie Stein Check out the journals young Arthur Conan Doyle kept as a ship’s surgeon. “I bought my wedding dress in disguise.” J.K. Rowling on the perils of fame. Speaking of Ms. R, you can now buy her house, should you have a few million pounds handy. The full trailer for Ang Lee’s highly anticipated Life of Pi adaptation is here. Of late, “bloggers and booksellers have converged on the idea of telling people what they should read.” [tweetbutton] [facebook_ilike]
September 21, 2012 On the Shelf Books for Readers, Nonreaders By Sadie Stein A retired bibliophile in Manila has turned his home into a public library. He also runs a “book bike” to book-deprived areas. “As a book caretaker, you become a full man,” he says. Remembering the late, legendary Knopf editor Ashbel Green. Authors: consider working naked. Books for nonreaders. (Not illiterates; those who don’t enjoy books.) From MoMA, the A to Z of alphabet books. [tweetbutton] [facebook_ilike]
September 20, 2012 On the Shelf Fake Books, Fictional Detectives By Sadie Stein “Would anyone go and ‘consult’ him? One feels not.” In a rediscovered Agatha Christie document, the author admits to a love-hate relationship with her creation, the debonair Belgian detective Poirot, and critiques other mystery writers. The Marquis de Sade wanted even more days of Sodom? Unfinished novels of great writers. “Wanting for some unknown reason to fill a space in his study with a selection of false books—complete with witty names he thought up himself—[Dickens] wrote to a bookbinder with a list of ‘imitation book-backs’ to be created specially for his bookshelf.” Now, the New York Public Library has re-created several of these fake books. And speaking of the NYPL! Thanks to a donation, the library has reconsidered its controversial plan to relocate many of its books. [tweetbutton] [facebook_ilike]
September 19, 2012 On the Shelf Kids Are All Right, Like E-books By Sadie Stein Onscreen writers “can be cynical hacks, genre stars or dislocated sportswriters. In romantic comedies, the writer is often a witty Lothario or a good-natured wimp. Either way, the profession’s primary function is to provide the character with plenty of free time.” Jane Austen can stimulate brain function. Presumably, so can other authors. “I am posting this for people who have Kindles, are in the U.S., and might want to get this. I am not posting this for people to tell me that they hate Kindles, hate all e-books, or are grumpy because they do not live in a country where they can download this.” Neil Gaiman makes a PA on Facebook. You know who loves e-books? Kids. As for the old-fashioned, paper kind, well, nowadays they’re less “reading material” and more “business cards.”
September 18, 2012 On the Shelf Beat Letters, Literary Ink By Sadie Stein Check out this letter from Jack Kerouac to his editor, in which the Beat presses for publication of On the Road. Librarians with literary tattoos! While we’re at it, writers in underpants. (No exclamation mark.) Books You’ve Never Heard of By Authors You Have. (Spoiler: you may have actually heard of a few of them, but you get the idea.) “An audio version [of Gravity’s Rainbow] does exist, though it came from the time of cassettes, not MP3s. The book was recorded in 1986 by George Guidall … it runs to 34 hours.” [tweetbutton] [facebook_ilike]