Over at the New York Times, Jennifer Schuessler previews a forthcoming collection of Robert Frost’s correspondence. It’s a collection, she says, that will go a long way toward rounding out the flat “monster myth” that’s subsumed the poet’s afterlife.
Rounding Out Frost’s “Monster Myth”
Joe Kubert Dies at 85
Joe Kubert died this week at the age of 85. Perhaps best known as the DC comics legend responsible for such characters as Sgt. Rock, Hawkman, Enemy Ace, and Tor, Kubert was also the founder of The Kubert School, the only accredited trade school for comic book artists in the country. You can check out a video of Kubert talking about digital comics over here.
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Taking Her Measure
“What traits make Austen special, and can they be measured with data? Can literary genius be graphed?” The New York Times tackles the question of why, 200 years after her death, Jane Austen is still so popular. (One finding: the author“used intensifying words — like very, much, so — at a higher rate than other writers.”) See also: our interview with Curtis Sittenfeld, whose most-recent novel Eligible is the ultimate literary tribute, an adaptation of Austen’s Pride and Prejudice.
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Plagiarizing James Bond
Little, Brown & Company has pulled a mystery novel from the shelves after passages in the book were found to have been plagiarized from “a variety of classic and contemporary spy novels,” like James Bond novels and books by Robert Ludlum and Charles McCarry.
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Quick Links
A teacher’s charming poem in which he winds the imaginative grammar and spelling of his students into a feast of clever words. (via)A cornucopia of palindromes. “Rot can rob a born actor” and many, many more. And don’t miss the Palindrome Drama at the end of the page.Stephen Schenkenberg looks at how people find his blog… “how+do+you+construct+buried+alive+escape+tunnel” ???The 13-number ISBN is the book industry’s Y2K. For more details, see my post from 2004.Ed plumbs bad Amazon reviews, a never-ending ending font of humor.
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