Superagent Andrew (“The Jackal”) Wylie disses the e-book and modern publishing’s “wild weekend in Las Vegas approach” to book acquisition in the Wall Street Journal Magazine. But the best part is an online slide show depicting Wylie’s journey from a wild-eyed hippie cabbie in 1971 to the uberwasp wheeler-dealer that he is today.
The Jackal Speaks
Contemplating a Cross-Country Drive? Grab the Proust Audiobook
Do you have 153 hours to kill? Do you love long French masterworks? If so, the folks at Naxos AudioBooks might have something up your alley. At 120-discs, publisher Nicolas Soames believes his company’s unabridged audiobook for Marcel Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past might just be the longest audiobook in existence. (Note: that means you’d still have 23 hours of the audiobook left after making this drive around the country.)
●
●
Some Notes on Sexism and Reviews
Breaking Up with God author Sarah Sentilles responds to some of her memoir’s critics. “Reviewers’ words about my book,” she writes, “demonstrate how sexism shapes responses to women’s writing, in particular women’s writing about God.”
●
●
Poetry From Hanoi Hilton
Bill Keller discusses John Borling’s Taps On The Walls, a collection of poems “tapped out in code, letter by letter, on the walls of a wretched cell in Hanoi during his 6 1/2 years as a prisoner of war.”
Plan for American Writers Museum Revealed
The American Writers Museum, until this point nothing more than an idea floating around the mind of its board members, now has a concept plan laid out in a lovely 32-page booklet (pdf).
●
●
Never Comfortable
Recommended Viewing: On the improbable triumph of a young black lesbian poet and the efficacy of mentorship.
●
●
The Women Warriors
“As I read her words, I experienced a feeling previously unknown to me: recognition. I had always turned to books for pleasure, as portals to other places. Reading The Woman Warrior, for the first time I saw myself on every page and in every word.” For Catapult, Alexis Cheung writes about representation, being an Asian-American writer, and reading and interviewing Maxine Hong Kingston. From our archives: Kingston’s work was featured in Alexander Chee‘s 2015 Year in Reading.
Welcome, Il’ja!
The Millions is delighted to welcome new staff writer Il’ja Rákoš, whose deep dive into the work of László Krasznahorkai publishes today. He is the author of an essay collection in Ukrainian, Os’ Khristianska Vira, and has previous published an interview with and appreciation of Nobel laureate Svetlana Alexievich at the site. He lives in Kyiv.
●
●