It turns out Martin Amis wasn’t the only literary gamer. Check out this 1980 Intellivision advertisement in which George Plimpton uses his iconic voice to slam Atari’s lineup of sports games — a full two years before Amis’ book released.
Plimpton Really Would Try Anything
Dear and Dirty
Haven’t read our own Mark O’Connell’s great new essay at Slate? To mark the hundredth anniversary of Dubliners, Mark paid a visit to the James Joyce House, which led him to reflect on life in his native city. “If you live in Dublin, if you are yourself a Dubliner,” he writes, “no matter how many times you read the book, it will always reveal something profound and essential and unrealized about the city and its people.”
●
●
Who Are They?
Recommended Reading: A brief history of the gender-neutral pronoun “they,” from Shakespeare to Girls and The Argonauts.
This Charming Man
His music isn't letting him get what he wants, so Morrissey is turning to writing instead. After his autobiography, Morrissey, was more successful than any of his records, the musician is writing a novel next.
Choose Your Own Epiphany
With the help of the folks at Ploughshares and Medium, Year in Reading alumna Megan Mayhew Bergman is publishing a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure literary short story. To participate, read the first chapter (as well as the introduction) online, then tweet Bergman to tell her where the story should go from there.
●
●
4 comments:
Add Your Comment: Cancel reply
This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.
Forty Stories
The wonderful folks at Harper Perennial are giving away a free PDF of forty short stories from the likes of Adam Wilson, Blake Butler, Roxane Gay, Kyle Minor, and many more. On July 17th, the group will also release Forty Stories as a free eBook through “all the major retailers,” too.
●
●
Jesmyn Ward Two-fer
Electric Literature’s posted a story by Jesmyn Ward, author of the reigning National Book Award-winning novel Salvage the Bones, as part of their ongoing Recommended Reading series. It’s worth checking out. Likewise, I recommend getting your hands on the latest issue of Oxford American so you can check out Ward’s inaugural “Native Daughter” column.
●
●
And then there’s Plimpton’s video falconry, which you can play (and learn about) here:
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/571422
Ah, of course. And don’t forget the George Plimpton Hotplate. It’s perfect for soup!
http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lgw5whN1Uo1qgllp5o1_500.png
Hilarious, but also bittersweet. This is the era when you had artists and intellectuals on the Tonight Show, right there with Sonny and Cher or Charo. Can’t really think of anyone today with Plimpton’s calibre who has that kind of household name status.
It seems the only late night cable shows in the US to regularly bring on writers and intellectuals are The Colbert Report and The Daily Show. I would love for something like the UK’s QI with Stephen Fry to catch on in the States, but that’s a dream.
I’d probably laugh out of my chair if I ever saw Franzen endorse an XBox, too.