Poet awarded 100K

Reward for a lifetime's output

From the BBC

 

Pulitzer Prize-winner Philip Levine has received a $100,000 ($63,000) lifetime achievement prize from the American Academy of Poets.

 

The 85-year-old former US poet laureate was awarded the Wallace Stevens Award for "outstanding and proven mastery in the art of poetry".

Levine is best known for his detailed portraits of working class Detroit.
His poetry collections include Not This Pig, What Work Is and News of the World.

Medieval maritime words

Bud Warren, on the inimitable maritime discussion list, marhst-l, posted intriguingly about a new word he had found

WRANGNAIL

As it turned out, it is a very old word indeed.

It can be roughly translated as "trunnel" or "treenail," a wooden pin or pen, a "wooden nail" used for securing ship's timbers together

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 But in fact it really means a wooden peg used to secure the planking of the floor, or decking.

The definition was found in a remarkable book, Sources of London English: Medieval Thames Vocabulary, by Laura Wright.

Hit the link and have fun hunting down other strange words that were uttered by watermen and shipwrights on the Thames many, many generations ago.

Upcoming Hop

It may be Friday the Thirteenth, but we have an exciting week ahead -- the NAUTICAL BLOG HOP.

I have five different posts scheduled for each day of the Hop, all about women on whalers.  The first is about Mary Brewster, the pioneering whaling wife, and the rest are about Viola Cook's many strange sojourns in the Arctic, Sarah Gray and the cask with her husband's remains, Martha Brown, who was marooned by her husband and wreaked a very strange revenge, and "George Wheldon," the cross-dressed whaler.

V.E. Ulett, fellow author with Old Salt Press, and publisher of Captain Blackwell's Prize, says, "My post is on naval families and the best bit of research I'll never use."

Linda Collison, author of the wonderful Barbados Bound  (aka Star-Crossed ) will be writing about women disguised as men aboard ships in the age of sail -- how did they pull it off?

And the contribution by S.J. Turney is on the war galley from ancient times to the 16th century.

Prue Batten will be writing about 12th century nefs - which, she says, is the vessel of her choice (after research) for The Gisborne Saga.

Much more to come, and a great deal more to look forward to...

Captain wanted for whaleship

From the Associated Press

Only experienced mariners need apply.

Mystic Seaport is looking for the first captain in more than 90 years for the historic whaling ship, the Charles W. Morgan. The Connecticut maritime museum has been restoring the 172-year-old wooden ship, preparing it to sail across New England next summer.

The Day of New London reports  that seaport officials said job candidates must be experienced mariners and also be comfortable with the public because of the media attention and crowds the ship will attract during its three-month trip.

"They have to be absolutely qualified to manage this artifact, which has national and international importance," said Dana Hewson, the museum's vice president for Watercraft Preservation and Programs. "They also have to embrace the role of the public nature of this endeavor."

Applicants must have a 500-ton Near Coastal Master license and 10 years of command experience on traditional sailing vessels with extensive knowledge in square-rig sailing. The job could require the captain to work with the media, passengers and governors of the states the ship is visiting.
Qualifications limit the size of the pool of candidates, Hewson said.

"It's a relatively small world, so it's certainly been known in the field that we'd be doing this," he said.

The Morgan's last voyage ended in 1921 and is the world's only surviving wooden whaling ship.

The ship, which was launched by Mystic Seaport in July, will visit ports in Boston, New Bedford, New London, Newport and Provincetown next year. Organizers and scientists say one of its most important destinations will be Stellwagen Bank off Boston, which had been a hunting ground for whales and is now a refuge.

The Morgan will sail with a mission to raise public awareness of the importance of protecting the oceans and its species and of whale watching as a sustainable business.

Hewson said the museum hopes to announce the new captain in the next two or three months. The captain will be involved in the fitting out of the ship next spring and the job will end once the voyage is completed in August 2014.

Mystic Seaport would not disclose the salary.

With thanks to Scott Baxter for pointing this out. Painting by Ron Druett.

Man Booker shortlist revealed

From the Bookseller

Shortlisted are: NoViolet Bulawayo's We Need New Names (Chatto), Eleanor Catton's The Luminaries (Granta), Jim Crace's Harvest (Picador), Jhumpa Lahiri's The Lowland (Bloomsbury), Ruth Ozeki's A Tale for the Time Being (Canongate) and Colm Toibin's The Testament of Mary (Viking).

Read reviews for all six shortlisted novels on We Love This Book.

Two writers have previously been shortlisted: Jim Crace in 1997 for Quarantine, and Colm Tóibín for The Blackwater Lightship in 1999 and in 2004 with The Master. Catton, who will be 28 by the date of the winner announcement, is the youngest on the shortlist.

Chair of judges Robert Macfarlane told this morning's press conference: "We looked for books that sought to extend the power and possibility of the form. THis is in keeping with the history of the novel. We wanted novel novels." He added: "The judging process has been more UN than Dodge City. Our tools were evidence, advocacy and debate."

Van Gogh painting identified

A report from the BBC reveals that a new Van Gogh painting has been logged and catalogued.

Sunset at Montmajour - which depicts trees, bushes and sky - had spent years in a Norwegian private collector's attic after he had been told the work was not by the Dutch master.

But now the experts at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam have changed their minds.

The museum said the painting was authenticated by letters, style and the physical materials used.

It is the first full-size canvas by Van Gogh discovered since 1928.

Museum director Axel Rueger called the discovery a "once-in-a-lifetime experience'' at an unveiling ceremony.

He said the institution had previously rejected the painting's authenticity in the 1990s partly because it was not signed.

However thanks to new research techniques and a two-year investigation, it concluded the artwork was by the artist.

It also has provenance.  The piece can be dated to the exact day it was painted because the artist described it in a letter to his brother, Theo, saying he had painted it the previous day - on 4 July 1888.

Wonderful.  Now one can only speculate about what kind of money the painting is worth...

Dining solo

One of the most difficult parts of a book promotion tour can be restaurant meals on your own.  In fact, when I saw the amusing cartoon to the left, it crossed my mind that in a formal restaurant in a strange city, you would almost welcome the bogeyman for company...

So I was interested to see a magazine article in this past Saturday's New Zealand Herald, describing ways and means of beating the dining solo blues.

The first challenge is the staff.  Did you know that some waiters mark the order sheet "LG" for "Lonely girl" or 'Lonely guy?" And that the occasional maître d' will seat a solo as far from the window as possible, preferably next to the toilets? 

They should be absolutely ashamed of themselves, and restaurants that encourage that sort of behaviour should be avoided by everyone, not just the solos.

Years ago, in Rarotonga, I saw an American man come into one of the local restaurants by himself.  He was in late middle age, and obviously on a business trip.  The two waitresses, both lovely Cook Island Maori girls, set out to make him feel at home.  They took turns to chat, to recommend dishes, ask simple things about how long he would be on the island, tell him about local sights, and ask him about his kids and grandkids at home.  It was all very innocent, and he was having a wonderful time, simply because they had taken pains to make him feel comfortable.

There certainly should be no stigma in dining alone, and it seems from the article that the restaurant trade might have grown up and taken this little fact on board, there being so many solo business diners out there. But still tips for writers and editors who are on solo book-related trips are welcome, and the story provides those, too.

Carrying a book or a newspaper is an old ploy, but a good one.  (My thought is that an even better idea is to carry your just-published book, and hold it up as you read it, so that the whole restaurant can admire the jacket.)  According to the story, carrying an iPad is also a good idea. Dining at the bar is preferable to a table, as one can strike up a conversation with the barman, if the people on the other stools aren't amicable. 

But, in my experience, the best thing to do is remember my story about the businessman in Raro, and get into conversation with the waiters.  If you have lots of giveaways, like bookmarks and postcards to promote your book, they will love you.

Gandalf to play Sherlock Holmes

We have seen a range of Sherlocks lately, ranging from Robert Downey Jr. to the wonderful Benedict Cumberbatch to that fellow whose name I can't remember, and whose name I don't want to know -- that bloke in the American show called "Elementary" who apparently doesn't know how to shave but does know how to be unbelievably objectionable, and who has a rather fetching -- and very long-suffering -- side-kick, "Joan" Watson, aka Lucy Liu. 

So, who will play the iconic detective next? 

Surprise, surprise, it is Gandalf, aka Sir Ian McKellan -- or so the BBC has announced.

Sir Ian McKellen is to play a retired Sherlock Holmes in a new film by Oscar-winning director Bill Condon.

The film, A Slight Trick Of The Mind, will be adapted from Mitch Cullin's novel of the same name.

Set in 1947, Sir Ian will play an elderly Sherlock, who is still trying to crack an unsolved, 50-year-old case.

Amazon bundles print and digital

KDP authors have been offered a new marketing device

Amazon has announced plans to offer buyers of printed books a copy of the text in digital form for free or at a discounted price.

Its Matchbook scheme will apply retroactively to any title bought from the store since it opened in 1995.

At present the offer is only being publicised on the firm's US website.


Amazon said the programme would launch in October and would include more than 10,000 titles. Publishers involved include Harper Collins and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

The retailer said it was now urging other authors and publishers to enrol.

The only problem that I see with it is that checking the box that gives Amazon permission to bundle your  print and digital books is that the robots see this as a different file, and so the book is taken off the market for the same time that it takes to republish an updated version.  But no doubt this will be sorted out in due course.

Inspirational SF writer and editor dies

I was saddened to read that Frederik Pohl has passed away

Not only was a great science fiction writer, but he was a fine editor, too, one who encouraged new talent.  When I was in my late teens, he did me the honor of accepting a short story of mine -- and paid me $50 US for it, which was a munificent sum, at the time.

Frederik Pohl, born 1919 in New York City, was one of the earliest SF fans, attending the first SF conference in Philadelphia in 1936, and was one of the founders of the Futurians and the Hydra Club. He served in the Italian theaters of World War II and afterward became a literary agent, representing many of America's top SF writers. In the '50s he went back to writing and editing, producing his first novels in collaboration with C.M. Kornbluth, beginning with classic The Space Merchants (1953) and continuing with Search the Sky (1954), Gladiator-at-Law (1955), and Wolfbane (1959). He also collaborated with Jack Williamson and Lester del Rey.

Pohl's solo novels include Slave Ship (1957); Drunkard's Walk (1960); A Plague of Pythons (1965); The Age of the Pussyfoot (1969); Nebula winner Man Plus (1976); and Hugo, Nebula, and Campbell Memorial award winner Gateway (1977), which began his Heechee series and was followed by Beyond the Blue Event Horizon (1980), Heechee Rendezvous (1984), Annals of the Heechee (1987), The Gateway Trip (1990), and The Boy Who Would Live Forever (2004).

An influential editor, Pohl edited Ballantine's original anthology series Star Science Fiction in the ’50s. In the ’60s, he edited SF magazines Galaxy and If, and in the ’70s he was executive editor at Ace, then SF editor at Bantam. He won Hugo awards for editing in 1966, '67, and '68 and a Retro Hugo for best professional editor of 1953 in 2004. 

Read a full literary biography HERE