Bibliomania
In Kanye Land
What happens when you put one of the biggest literary egos together with music’s biggest ego? A movie. Bret Easton Ellis is working with Kanye West on a film. “He came and asked me to write the film,” Ellis told Vice. “I didn’t want to at first. Then I listened to Yeezus…I thought, regardless of whether I’m right for this project, I want to work with whoever made this.” This is an interesting pairing because Kanye definitely isn’t a reader.
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On Tour
Noah Charney writes for The Atlantic in defense of book tours, which “mostly entail maneuvering to get on radio shows or TV programs, and less glamorous elements, like attending bookstore readings where hardly anyone shows up.”
Not Just a Book Party
St. Mark’s Bookshop won their desired rent reduction, and is throwing a party to celebrate! (via.)
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Žižek’s Take on Baltimore
Philosopher and flower hater Slavoj Žižek comes late to the “let’s discuss The Wire‘s greater cultural significance” party, but he does bring some excellent points with him. For the record, he doesn’t believe it’s the greatest TV series of all time. And the entire thing is worth hearing if only for an in-depth analysis of this [NSFW] scene.
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Fitzgerald’s Football
“F. Scott Fitzgerald is known as one of America’s greatest authors, but was he also responsible for one of football’s most important strategic advances? Maybe. Possibly. Probably not.” Kevin Draper writes about Fitzgerald’s love and possible genius for the game.
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Blake’s Collected Poems… I was in Exclusive Books in Johannesburg, with the book in my hand, when the lights went out, the music stopped… You can imagine the rest. I was severely punished (by my conscience of course!). It was years before I could read Blake.
That’s freaky. I was going to comment that I stole a collection of Blake’s poems from my school library way back. I still have the book.
Well I have never stolen a thing in my life! But let’s say hypotheticly (sp), there is a place in town where you can take 1 book but you have to give a book. I slipped 2 books in my bag & never gave one. Damage by John Lescroart and Kill Me by Stephen White.
I stole Loitering with Intent (without intent). I happened upon it in a library of which I am a member and said to myself: at last I will read Loitering with Intent! To have borrowed it properly, the only requirement would have been to sign it out. But I must have had an unconscious premonition (or intent) that I would lose it, because I quietly slipped it into my bag, intending a long train journey in a place with few books in English. As far as I know, it’s still on the train, in a seatback flap, traveling 900 miles each way every day on the bullet train.
One night during my study abroad program in Mexico, there was a blackout in school. I was at the library, it was 2am, it was exam week and everyone was dying (trying to formulate a scenario to make my action excusable). I was flipping “Le Corbusier: Moments in the Life”, which has amazing photography by René Burri. It was for an architecture assignment, and the book was too captivating. So we all had to go home when the entire library went pitch black: the security guard chased us out with his torchlight. And then I realised, if the lights are off, the alarm at the library exit must be off too.
I walked home happily. It was cold, but the book was safely tucked under my sweater.
I stole The Moth Diaries from my old local library. I’d borrowed it and kept renewing it and then I moved and I accidentally signed up with a different library (same local library, but different branch with my new address). I had fallen in love with the book. It made me realise what kind of novels I want to write; I’d fallen in love with the Epistolary format and I read it a few times a year, now.
I also accidentally stole a few novels from my ex. when I kicked him out, but not sure that counts as I paid for them.
I borrowed a book on Yeats from my college library in the mid 90’s with a vow to return the “favor” by making some kind of redeeming project from it. But still working on the vow, and still plan to return it afterwards. Maybe I should’ve just let it be.