If you spend much time reading the various book blogs, you probably came across this National Book Award blind item at Beatrice. I did and I couldn’t stop wondering who this slighted author was. Speculation abounded at Tingle Alley, and I was stumped, too. But after stumbling upon a clue in the comments of a post at Mad Max Perkins, I did some snooping around, and I can now reveal that the slighted author is Jim Shepard. His books, Project X and Love and Hydrogen, were not submitted for consideration for the NBA because, according to Beatrice.com, his publisher did not follow the proper procedures. Now, I’m not so sure that either of Shepard’s books would have made the cut. But you never know. And you also have to wonder if everyone would be making such a big fuss if one of our women from New York were a man from Massachusetts.
Blind No More
Kazufumi Kodama
I got a free cd through work the other day. It's called Stars and it's by Kazufumi Kodama. I've been trying to track down more info on this guy, but so far I haven't uncovered much. The music, though, is wonderful. It has a dub base to it, but it's skeletal with computerized beats and the spare plinking of steel drums and xylophones. Over top of all that is a soaring layer of trumpet. At times it reminds me of the background music to video games back before they had their own soundtracks full of real songs. It is a very interesting listen though. I haven't heard much else like it.
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For Our Reference
The other day I found a fascinating blog devoted to words, linguistics, languages and other related topics called Languagehat. I have been meaning to mention it for a while, and today I have good reason to. I don't often talk about reference books on The Millions even though I use them every day. Lucky for us, Languaghat keeps track of these sorts of things. Today, he posts links to interesting reviews of new editions of two popular reference books, The Chicago Manual of Style, 15th Edition and Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 11th Edition.
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Making the Case for Classics and Against Blogs
Why is it that so many people are turned off by the classics? Is it because would-be readers are afraid they won't "get it?" Or does reading a well-known tome on the subway or in a cafe exude an air of pretentiousness, when it's more likely that the reader just never followed through on that English lit assignment?In talking about his latest book, Classics for Pleasure, the Pulitzer Prize winning critic, Michael Dirda, said he not only hopes to make the classics appear less daunting and more accessible to the general public, but he also wants to "encourage people to read more widely."Dirda, a columnist for The Washington Post's Book World, said his goal is to get people to "read beyond the recognized classics and read beyond the contemporary." He made his remarks Tuesday during a lecture, co-sponsored by the English-Speaking Union, at the Women's National Democratic Club in Washington, D.C.Classics for Pleasure consists of about 90 essays, written by Dirda, that describe the importance of lesser-known authors such as Sheridan Le Fanu and Abolqasem Ferdowsi as well as literary giants like Henry James and Christopher Marlowe.Each essay, ranging from two to five pages, serves as a primer on the era and author, with excerpts from famous works. They also offer some much-needed perspective, even for the seasoned reader, and are grouped together with topical headings such as Realms of Adventure, The Dark Side and Love's Mysteries.But why should these classics, or any others for that matter, deserve a kind of sacred reverence?"Truly distinctive voices, once heard, ought never to be forgotten," Dirda writes. "More than anything else, great books speak to us of our own very real feelings and failings, of our all-too-human daydreams and confusions."From Dirda's point of view, some of those failings and confusions are commonplace on the Web, perpetrated by those who dabble in his trade. He said that while "blogs and the online bookish universe are a wonderful thing... there are no oversights for the most part," meaning no editorial review like the kind he gets from The Washington Post.He went on to say that some online book critics have a tendency to make a name for themselves by writing "vulgar, rude, outrageous" reviews, and such pieces should not be the standard for literary criticism.While that eventuality seems unlikely, Dirda's nonetheless uses the book to re-establish his high bar for criticism while drawing in readers to "discover" the classics of yesteryear. One is certainly easier to achieve than the other.See Also: Classifying Classics; Nothing is Dead Yet: The Era of the Trusted Fellow Reader; Literature and History
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