Ryan Bradley chats with Gary Amdahl, author of Visigoth, about fiction, “reality hunger,” and the current publishing climate.
“I’m more articulate then I was when I was nine, but I don’t know anything new.”
Davis Illustrated
Check out an illustrated adaptation of Lydia Davis’s “In a House Besieged” by Roman Muradov at The Paris Review Daily. Pair with a piece on Davis’s short short stories and Twitter.
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Imagination, Memory, a Dictionary
Would Vladimir Nabokov have considered you a good reader? Take this little quiz and find out for yourself. Then, allow Garth Risk Hallberg to explain to you why Nabokov’s Ada, or Ardor: A Family Chronicle is difficult, but well worth the effort.
Where Does He Get Those Wonderful Toys?
The Original of Laura offers a glimpse under the hood of the chromed and gleaming Nabokov machine, writes Sam Anderson of New York Magazine.
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Stalk Famous New York Readers
Have some fun with this New York specific feature highlighted by Atlas Obscura. The New York Society Library is private member-based library and it has some pretty famous members, going all the way back to Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton. Due to the library’s excellent record keeping you can trace these famous members reading histories. “In the early 20th century, Library staff switched from big, blank ledger books to index cards for record keeping. Henceforth they archived cards only for “prominent” members, discarding the rest. The gap is major, but the surviving cards offer a lifetime of book recommendations.”
On Goodreads, On Good Criticism
“Goodreads lets me capture and disperse impressions that occur as I read. I tend to track the sounds I make when reading, the chortles, gasps, growls, and LOLs. I try to figure out why I might not have liked aspects of a book, looking under the hood in a workshoppy way…” Lee Klein offers a defense of Goodreads and good criticism over at Full Stop.
Me and my ghost and my ghost ghostwriting
There was an article in the New York Times on cook book ghostwriters, and it called Gwyneth Paltrow out for not writing My Father’s Daughter. Then the actress cum gourmand denied having worked with a ghostwriter in a tweet. Now Sari Botton, a frequent ghostwriter, has tried to clear the whole thing up in an essay on The Rumpus on why ghostwriting is such a fickle business, and a tricky term.
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Toni Morrison’s Momentous Editorial Career
Arielle Gray reflects on the lasting legacy of Toni Morrison's role as an editor and how she ushered in a generation of writers during her 19-year career at Random House
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