“If you ask around, I’m sure you’ll be able to find a really bad novel easily enough. I mean a novel by someone who has spent isolated years writing a book they are convinced is a great work of literature. And when you’re reading it you’ll know it’s bad, and you’ll know what bad truly is.” What makes bad writing so bad? Toby Litt at The Guardian investigates.
Let’s Trade Manuscripts
Comics on the Big-Screen
It takes decades to build up a great superhero, but only one bad movie to tear him down. Den of Geek explores the downside of comic book adaptations.
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Tin Man
Sergeant Ed Drew's tintypes of the war in Afghanistan are the first tintypes made in a combat zone since The Civil War. Drew made them for his son. "I wanted him to know his father in the event that I was killed in action and it became less important that my work was done in tintype than that I could show the humanity of war in the eyes of airmen I fly combat missions with," he said.
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Miles to Go before I Sleep
Our own Nick Ripatrazone writes for The Atlantic about the tradition of writers who love to run, from Haruki Murakami to Joyce Carol Oates. Pair with Ripatrazone’s Millions essay on writing as training.
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The New Kid
As of last night, the UK has a brand new literary prize, the Folio, which its founders describe as “a Booker without the bow ties.” The Independent chronicles the short history of the prize, which owes its existence to a controversy among Man Booker judges two years ago.
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Poets and Tomatoes
“We are hermits, that is true. We live in tiny rooms, and we stay in those rooms hours upon hours every day, every month, every year. But we also like to walk around and throw ourselves into big crates of tomatoes, and roll around in them, and then get up all tomato-stained.” Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera talks about living life as a poet (which apparently includes a lot of tomatoes) in an interview with the Guardian.
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Table 4 Today
When restauranteur Elaine Kaufman was alive, she gave writers a refuge at her favorite spot, Table 4. Even though the restaurant and Kaufman are long gone, her memory and devotion to writers live on with the Table 4 Writers Foundation. The foundation gives out $2,500 grants to writers at a gala at the New York Athletic Club on March 27. The 2013 winners include, "Bound" by Karen Yin, "Gotham Mexico" by Danny Thiemann, "Kim of Noho" by Kurt Pitzer, "Parkside" by Jennie Yabroff, and "Rent Control" by Matthew Perron. Additionally, several of Elaine's regulars will be honored, including Mary Higgins Clark, Carol Higgins Clark, Stuart Woods, Chazz Palminteri, and Richard Dreyfuss.
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The New Yorker on The Late American Novel
The folks at The New Yorker's Book Bench offer their take at The Late American Novel: Writers on the Future of Books. (Spoiler Alert: Katherine Hepburn gets a shoutout.)