Continuing her ongoing instructional column for The New York Times, Constance Hale gives some pointers on the sweet science of writing for the ear.
Alliteration Works, See?
A Big Week for the NYPL
Congratulations to the NYPL for restoring $36.7 million of the city’s proposed $40 million budget cut. Today also marks the first day of new NYPL president Anthony Marx. (Pro-tip: when you want to skip the wait list for a popular book, reserve the large-print version!)
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Finding Peter Cat
We already knew that Haruki Murakami was a writer and runner but a former jazz club owner, too? Aaron Gilbreath visited Murakami’s 1970s jazz club, Peter Cat, and found “a drab three-story cement building. Outside, a first-floor, a restaurant had set up a sampuru display of plastic foods.” For more Murakami, read our review of 1Q84.
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Saunders Meets DFW
Sometime Millions writer Frank Kovarik plumbs the connections between George Saunders’ recent story in The New Yorker and David Foster Wallace’s suicide.
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Don’t Let Amy Tan Walk All Over You
Sometimes things get a little kinky at Rock Bottom Remainders shows, the little known rock band with some big members including Amy Tan, Stephen King, and Dave Barry. Tan’s signature song is “These Boots are Made for Walking.” “For ‘Boots’ I’m especially gifted. I wield a whip and at the end of the song, I tell the boys to bend over,” she told The Daily Beast for a “How I Write” interview.
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Who Wants to be a Millionaire Poet?
There’s an oxymoron for you: “Rich Poet.” But the new fortunes of Emirati poet Saif Al Mansouri prove that with talent, grit, and a live television audience, truly anything is possible. The UAE show “Millionaire’s Poet,” in its sixth season, awarded $1.3 million (the Nobel Prize. for comparison, is $1.2 million) to winner Al Mansouri, and perhaps something even more valuable – a global audience of up to 70 million, actually tuning in.
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