“Bigger than the Zuckerberg Bump, bigger even than the Colbert Bump or the Oprah Bump—arguably the most historic bump in English publishing is the Sam Weller Bump.” A look at the surprising and overwhelming success of Dicken‘s first novel, The Pickwick Papers, from The Paris Review.
“The Sam Weller Bump”
True Coffeeshop Story
“Literary interviews became popular in the eighteen-eighties, but Richard Altick, the late professor of Victorian literature at Ohio State University, traces the public fascination with writers’ homes at least as far back as the eighteen-forties, when there was a vogue for books describing the houses and landscapes of famous authors, complete with engravings and, later, photographs.” On the strangeness of literary celebrity.
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Batuman in Conversation
For Angelenos: Elif Batuman will be reading from The Possessed tonight at 7:00 at the LAPL Central Library. A conversation with LA Times Books Editor David Ulin follows the reading. More information and reservations here (tickets are free).
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Books, Charity, and Africa
The Hipster Book Club is doing a literary-themed charity drive for the famine in the Horn of Africa.
“Murakami, who is nothing if not ambitious, has created a kind of alternative world, a mirror of ours, reversed.”
Though coverage of Haruki Murakami‘s 1Q84 has been ubiquitous this month (appearing on this site as well), it is always worthwhile to read the inimitable New York Review of Books‘ take on such things.
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In Defense of Anti-Writing
Over at the handsomely redesigned Open Letters Monthly, yours truly weighs in on William T. Vollmann.
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Ethnoburb, For One Hundred
Prepare to lose a few hours on the glorified Wikipedia wormhole that is Daily Idioms, Annotated, then read this brief interview with the blog’s creator, material scientist Debbie Chachra.
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“Does it help writers to drink?”
Writing for The Guardian, Blake Morrison ponders the eternal question: “does it help writers to drink? Do they drink any more heavily than any other social group – doctors, lawyers, shop assistants or … advertising executives?”
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Emily St. John Mandel Sees Other People
Our own Emily St. John Mandel, whose novel The Lola Quartet not only released this month but also made Maud Newton’s travel list (so you know it’s good!), sits down with Brad Listi for an Other People Podcast.
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