What’s better than being a writer? A writer who gets paid. Manjula Martin and Jane Friedman have launched the new digital magazine Scratch, which gives writers information on how to advocate for their work. The preview issue is free and contains essays on what freelancers can learn from street vendors, Cord Jefferson on outgrowing his materialism, and an interview with Jonathan Franzen. You can subscribe here.
Up to Scratch
Curiosities: Hamsters in Jackets
Book lists galore: The Believer announces its annual book award winner, along with the always eclectic reader survey results; Forty of Nick Hornby's favorite books - he thinks you'll like at least a few; You may not be able to register for Zadie Smith's fiction seminar, but you can read the same books.Rushdie considers the art of the adaptation.And so it came to pass: the "pay what you want" eBook.A comic-book map of New York.Emily Bobrow digs Leanne Shapton's brains......where certain other reviewers the VQR could name might get hung up on her jacket photo.Whose tweets are these? I think I know.Tom McCarthy and the lovable lads of the International Necronautical Society are at it again.The Reagan diaries offer "scrupulous, concise, often remarkably good reading," says Open Letters Monthly.Anne Trubek at Good Magazine (and Oberlin College professor!) on "What is a Book?"Paul Maliszewski at Bookslut on "What is a Fake?"New features for the Kindle.We're digging the cover for Colson Whitehead's forthcoming novel, Sag Harbor.Wikipedia find of the week: Fakelore: "Fakelore is inauthentic, manufactured folklore presented as if it were genuinely traditional."Murakami's uneasy relationship with Japan: "He has been seen, and to some degree positioned himself, as a literary pariah in Japan, in part because of its tepid-to-negative critical reception of his work."Further reading: Check out the interesting Kindle pro and con in the comments of Max's Kindle/iPhone post this week; And check out the interesting discussion of the New Yorker's commitment (or lack thereof) to international literature in the comments of Garth's DFW post.And finally, a concrete step toward breaking our addiction to foreign oil.
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Remembering Ray Bradbury
A moving tribute to Ray Bradbury on The Paris Review Daily from his one time fact checker Stephen Andrew Hiltner: "Ray Bradbury, who never went to college and was entirely library educated, had what so many of the sophisticated, MFA-carrying writers today lack: passion, vitality, emotional awareness." Also: Wired has collected a bunch of reminiscences from science fiction writers, including Ursula K. Le Guin.
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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.
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Housing Works OWS Event
On Monday, November 7, at 7PM, n+1 and Housing Works will present the event "Occupy." Writers and activists will discuss the situation at Zuccotti Park--what it means, how it's going, and where to go from here. Panelists will include Meaghan Linick, Sarah Resnick, and Astra Taylor, and the conversation will be moderated by Keith Gessen. Free copies of the n+1 OWS-inspired Gazette will be on hand.
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While I think Franzen is a fine, fine writer, and there is much to be emulated in how he conducts himself, I can’t think of anyone worse to get advice from re: how to make it as a writer. Franzen has never had a day job, has no idea what it means to struggle, and has been a relative success since he was in his mid-20s. That’s like asking Ryan Gosling for tips on how to make it when you’re struggling as an actor. They know not of what they speak.