{"id":4142,"date":"2010-08-27T14:20:55","date_gmt":"2010-08-27T18:20:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=4142"},"modified":"2010-08-27T20:00:25","modified_gmt":"2010-08-28T00:00:25","slug":"staff-picks-star-trek-swede-levov","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2010\/08\/27\/staff-picks-star-trek-swede-levov\/","title":{"rendered":"Staff Picks: Star Trek, Swede Levov!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

You must<\/em> look at this casting sheet<\/a> for Star Trek: The Next Generation<\/em>. Wesley Snipes as Geordi? I mean, come on! Talk about parallel universes. \u2014Thessaly La Force<\/strong><\/p>\n

I am always eager to read a new essay by Doubleday editor Gerald Howard. His latest<\/a> (in Tin House<\/em>) is about depictions of working-class life in new American fiction\u2014or really, the lack thereof. \u2014Lorin Stein<\/strong><\/p>\n

I’m reading American Pastoral<\/a><\/em>, which has elicited startling responses in public. The quantity and sheer magnitude of the comments I get! One time I opened the book near a window in a coffee shop. A passerby stopped dead, peered at the cover for confirmation, and then starting banging on the window shouting, \u201cSwede Levov! Swede Levov!\u201d \u2014Daisy Atterbury<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dan Engber has written a delightful cultural history of quicksand<\/a>. \u201cTime was, a director could sink a man in the desert and still win the Oscar for best picture. Today, that gimmick has been scorned in third-rate schlock.\u201d What the heck happened? I say: bring it back. \u2014Thessaly La Force<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have also been catching up on the posts of (sometime diarist<\/a>) Rita Konig. Rita blogs about decorating for The New York Times<\/em>. Her current post<\/a> is about washing machines. I have never owned a washing machine. I have never thought about owning a washing machine. I have no interest in washing machines. And yet I find Rita’s interest addictive. (No doubt Gerry would have something perceptive to say about that.) \u2014Lorin Stein<\/strong><\/p>\n

I’ve just finished The Rings of Saturn<\/a><\/em>, W. G. Sebald’s entrancing account of a walking journey through Suffolk, England. This sublime work doesn’t just confound traditional literary taxonomies: it actually exposes the slightness of the very question of genre. \u2014Mark de Silva<\/strong><\/p>\n

In honor of the upcoming U.S. Open, I’ve been rereading David Foster Wallace’s on tennis\u2014the Times<\/em> piece on Roger Federer<\/a> and the Esquire<\/em> piece he wrote on Michael Joyce<\/a>. His sense of wonder is almost childlike. \u2014Miranda Popkey<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You must look at this casting sheet for Star Trek: The Next Generation. Wesley Snipes as Geordi? I mean, come on! Talk about parallel universes. \u2014Thessaly La Force I am always eager to read a new essay by Doubleday editor Gerald Howard. 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