Regardless of your Valentine’s Day plans, do not take advice from Nate Piven, the protagonist of Adelle Waldman’s The Love Affairs of Nathaniel P. Ron Charles asked Waldman to write another scene of Nate’s romantic saga. “He decided it would be best to hedge his bets by getting her something ‘ironic.'”
My Ironic Valentine
With A Grain of Salt
Charles Baxter doesn’t believe in writing routines, but he does have some odd superstitions. “I don’t like to spill salt. I throw it over my left shoulder. But if I spill salt in the morning, my day is fucked,” he told The Daily Beast.
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Don’t Just Stand There
Choire Sicha discusses the use of the phrase “from the sidelines.” (h/t The Awl)
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The Roberto Bolaño Bubble
“The continued publication and popular packaging of [Roberto Bolaño’s] incomplete work may actually be diluting his reputation as a writer of varied talents and fearless ambition.” Sam Carter is wary of The Roberto Bolaño Bubble.
Kanye West, Philosopher + Author
Kanye West is back on Twitter. And in literary news, he’s decided to write a philosophy book, Break the Simulation and publish excerpts (or maybe the entire thing) on Twitter. There appears to be no release date or publisher attached so stay tuned.
Cocktail Hour
“0.5 hrs: Read this week’s New Yorker fiction. 0.7 hrs: Hated on New Yorker writer with her derivative characters & mise-en-scenes. 0.1 hrs: Looked up ‘mise-en-scene’ on Wikipedia. 1.3 hrs: Phone call with writer friend; discussed how much New Yorker fiction sucks. 0.5 hrs: Drafted & emailed query letter to New Yorker (for super postmodern story).” The good people at McSweeney’s imagine an impossibly tedious world where writers and poets bill by the hour.
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Appearing Elsewhere
Prospero, the new arts and culture blog of The Economist, has just posted my piece on literary Brooklyn, which explains how New York’s trendiest borough has become a vertically integrated factory for the production of fiction and poetry.
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