The Perils of Contact

At The New Republic, Andrew Wylie talks about how he made millions off strictly “highbrow” fiction, a category which (for those who are curious) does not include the works of James Michener and the late Tom Clancy. Wylie -- whose clients include Philip Roth, Martin Amis and Mary Gaitskill -- suggests that a modern literary agency “needs to be able to expand infinitely, like a Borgesian library.”

In case you were wondering why "old media" companies continue to cling to print: Based on ad revenue, a print reader is worth $709, while an online reader is worth just $46. (via)

Readers of the 1960s and 70s ran into many people who worried that writers were learning from television. In 2015, the concern is slightly different -- are writers taking cues from video games? At the Ploughshares blog, Matthew Burnside tackles the game-ification of books.