“Neither for the first nor last time in his life, Orwell was the brilliant loner who saw what others around him failed to notice.” Adam Hochschild writes on Orwell’s Homage to Catalonia and his unique perspective on fighting in the Spanish Civil War. Vishwas Gaitonde takes us to Orwell’s first home in India.
A Brilliant Loner
‘I’m going to begin by telling you about Miss Frost.’
Simon & Schuster has posted an excerpt of John Irving’s forthcoming novel In One Person.
The Platonic Library
The Guardian has an excerpt of My Ideal Bookshelf, with pieces by Judd Apatow, David Sedaris and Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie, available for viewing on its website. Take a guess which one said Raymond Carver makes writing fiction look easy.
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On Representation
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What Makes the Pages Turn?
Recommended Reading: Do we read books for the plot or the characters?
Late American Novel Roundup
Coverage of The Late American Novel: Writers on the Future of Books (do you have your copy yet?) has been coming in at a steady clip: NYC publication CityArts takes a look; yours truly interviewed on The Marketplace of Ideas; Edward Champion offers a hasty response; the my co-editor sits down with his hometown paper.
Fear and Loathing in Ketchum, Idaho
Don’t worry, everybody — Anita Thompson, widow of gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson, has finally returned the prized pair of antlers that Thompson stole from the Idaho home of Ernest Hemingway, himself. The antlers, which he stole while in Idaho on assignment reporting on Hemingway’s suicide, had hung in Thompson’s garage for the past fifty-four years.
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