Booker Shortlist Announced
What a shock. Salman Rushdie and John Berger did not make the final cut!
Nor did Tom Rob Smith's Child 44, which was a surprise in itself, just by being held up as a possible nominee. Also left aside were Netherland by Joseph O'Neill and books by Gaynor Arnold, Michelle de Kretser, and Mohammed Hanif.
Finalists are:
Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger (Atlantic)
Sebastian Barry, The Secret Scripture (Faber and Faber)
Amitav Ghosh, Sea of Poppies (John Murray)
Linda Grant, The Clothes on Their Backs (Virago)
Philip Hensher, The Northern Clemency (Fourth Estate)
Steve Toltz, A Fraction of the Whole (Hamish Hamilton)
http://www.themanbookerprize.com/news/stories/1134
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Monday, September 8, 2008
International conference on the book
SIXTH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON THE BOOK
The Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C., USA
25-27 October 2008
http://www.Book-Conference.com
This conference serves as a forum for examining the past, current and future role of the book. Recognizing that although the book is an old medium of expression, it embodies thousands of years' experience of recording knowledge, the Book Conference also examines other key aspects, including publishing, libraries, literacy, and education.
The Book Conference welcomes a wide range of participants from the world of books - authors, publishers, printers, librarians, IT specialists, bookretailers, editors, literacy educators, academic researchers, and scholars from all disciplinary traditions.
Deadline for papers is 11 September 2008. See the website for details.
The Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C., USA
25-27 October 2008
http://www.Book-Conference.com
This conference serves as a forum for examining the past, current and future role of the book. Recognizing that although the book is an old medium of expression, it embodies thousands of years' experience of recording knowledge, the Book Conference also examines other key aspects, including publishing, libraries, literacy, and education.
The Book Conference welcomes a wide range of participants from the world of books - authors, publishers, printers, librarians, IT specialists, bookretailers, editors, literacy educators, academic researchers, and scholars from all disciplinary traditions.
Deadline for papers is 11 September 2008. See the website for details.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
A new way to share or find your love
The majority of classic romantic novels end with either marriage or heartbreak. Now, book lovers around the world will have the chance to plot and develop their own real-life romantic stories as a major publisher launches the first online dating site aimed purely at literary enthusiasts. PenguinDating.com was developed in conjunction with the established online dating provider Match.com after the publisher's online team came up with the initial idea as a way to extend the brand and pique the interest of readers. While sites such as GoodReads provide a virtual community for avid book readers, the Penguin site focuses primarily on lonely hearts. The service – which went live last week – has already attracted more than 500 subscribers in its first three days, and will be promoted at the end of more than two million paperback novels.
Journalists arrested at Republican convention
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) condemned the arrest of at least seven journalists covering protests out side the US Republican Party convention and is calling for the release of three journalists still being held and for all charges against them to be dropped.
The seven journalists were arrested last Monday in the city of St. Paul, where the Republicans were officially nominating their Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates. Other independent journalists have been pepper-sprayed and even held at gunpoint during "pre-emptive" raids aimed at disrupting protesters, said US media reform group Free Press.
Amy Goodman, host of the Democracy Now! television and radio show, was arrested after trying to get information about two producers from her show, Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Nicole Salazar, who were arrested while filming protestors. A photographer for the Associated Press, Matt Rourke, was also arrested at about the same time. The Democracy Now! journalists and Rourke were released hours after being arrested. Goodman was officially charged with "obstruction of a legal process and interference with a peace officer."
Student journalists Edward Matthews and Britney McIntosh from the University of Kentucky and university newspaper advisor James Winn were also arrested. All three had press credentials with them. They are still awaiting formal charges and may be released soon, according to reports.
The Newspaper Guild-CWA, a US affiliate of the IFJ, said it is joining with Free Press and other organizations in demanding that all charges be dropped against the journalists arrested while covering the Republican Convention and related protests, in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Click here to sign the Free Press online petition calling for charges to be dropped against the journalists: petition
The seven journalists were arrested last Monday in the city of St. Paul, where the Republicans were officially nominating their Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates. Other independent journalists have been pepper-sprayed and even held at gunpoint during "pre-emptive" raids aimed at disrupting protesters, said US media reform group Free Press.
Amy Goodman, host of the Democracy Now! television and radio show, was arrested after trying to get information about two producers from her show, Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Nicole Salazar, who were arrested while filming protestors. A photographer for the Associated Press, Matt Rourke, was also arrested at about the same time. The Democracy Now! journalists and Rourke were released hours after being arrested. Goodman was officially charged with "obstruction of a legal process and interference with a peace officer."
Student journalists Edward Matthews and Britney McIntosh from the University of Kentucky and university newspaper advisor James Winn were also arrested. All three had press credentials with them. They are still awaiting formal charges and may be released soon, according to reports.
The Newspaper Guild-CWA, a US affiliate of the IFJ, said it is joining with Free Press and other organizations in demanding that all charges be dropped against the journalists arrested while covering the Republican Convention and related protests, in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Click here to sign the Free Press online petition calling for charges to be dropped against the journalists: petition
Saturday, September 6, 2008
NYC inspires the most atrocious opening sentence
So the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest for the worst opening sentence for a novel (inspired by that deathless phrase, "A Dark and Stormy Night") went ahead, despite the most strenuous efforts of a Bulwer-Lytton descendant. (See older post.)In a story in the New York Times, Clyde Haberman muses that "New York, warts and all, has long inspired great writing." But an awful opening sentence?
Indeed. And here it is. A chorus of trumpets, if you will.
“Theirs was a New York love, a checkered taxi ride burning rubber, and like the city their passion was open 24/7, steam rising from their bodies like slick streets exhaling warm, moist, white breath through manhole covers stamped ‘Forged by DeLaney Bros., Piscataway, N.J.’ ”
This gem was composed by a Mr. Spik (pronounced "speak"), 41, who lives in Washington, where he is the communications director for a diamond-importing company. But he has visited New York often enough to know the billows of steam that rise from the subway that snakes beneath the streets. As for the manhole covers, when interviewed by Haberman over the phone, he said, “I just thought DeLaney Brothers had a funny ring to it. There’s no hidden meaning, no Salman Rushdie kind of stuff. And Piscataway just sounds funny.”
As Haberman comments, "You just try coming up with something so dizzyingly atrocious."
“It’s challenging to write something that’s intentionally bad,” Spik agreed. “You have to know the mechanics of English to be able to throw a monkey wrench into it.”
Ain’t that the truth, said Scott Rice, an English professor at San Jose State University who has presided over the Bulwer-Lytton competition since its inception in 1982. “Somebody said years ago that the contest calls for something like the equivalent of imitating a drunk on roller skates." It’s certainly not for the untalented or the faint-hearted.
The appeal of Mr. Spik’s submission was “the way it slides downhill,” Professor Rice said. “It starts out a little bit dramatically, with this somewhat unusual metaphor of a checkered taxi ride of a love affair, and it goes right downhill and ends up in a sewer.”
The prize for the major winner in this surprisingly popular contest is in the three figures -- Mr. Spik received a check for $250.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/02/nyregion/02nyc.html?ref=books
Fixing the English language
In the UK, Tesco is changing its checkout signs after coming under criticism from linguists for using "less" rather than "fewer". As in the sign over the express checkout that reads "LESS THAN TEN ITEMS."
It may seem a minor grammatical point, but language watchdog The Plain English Campaign thinks it's important -- so much so that they helped Tesco come up with an alternative, "UP TO TEN ITEMS," saying it is easy to understand and avoids any debate.
(Though whoops, they still haven't got it quite right.)
Both words are used as comparatives - fewer meaning "a smaller number of" and less meaning "a smaller amount or quantity of" according to A&C Black's Good Word Guide.
Confused? There is plenty of precedent for using less for fewer, argues the Plain English Campaign. It goes back more than 1,000 years, to the time of King Alfred the Great (9th Century), and substituting for fewer is still common in informal speech, especially in the US (and NZ).
THE ANSWER (In case you want to know.)
'Less' means not as much
'Fewer' means 'not as many'
'Fewer' when items can be counted individually
'Fewer' means 'not as many'
'Fewer' when items can be counted individually
The Plain English Campaign has a simple rule of thumb to help everyone: less means "not as much," whereas fewer means "not as many". Fewer should be used when you are talking about items that can be counted individually, for example, "fewer than 10 apples". Less is correct when quantities cannot be individually counted in that case, e.g. "I would like less water".
But it can be tricky when referring to quantities, says Marie Clair from the Plain English Campaign. For example, we say less than six weeks, not fewer than six weeks, because we are not referring to six individual weeks, but to a single period of time lasting six weeks. Some people get "really roused up" about the misuse of less or fewer, she says, and words that describe quantity, degree or amount seem to perplex people.
Phrases like "10 items or less" or "up to 50% discount" are retail speak and it would be much better to use language "from people on the streets," she adds.
Indeed, Tesco is not alone in committing this grammatical faux pas in public -- the Good Word Guide notes that a Post Office advertisement in the Guardian stated: "Please remember, on Tuesdays and Thursdays there are less queues in the afternoon."
The BBC Magazine, which ran this story, asks readers to send in examples of the grammatical rules or blunders they find most irritating. It would be rather fun if you sent me some, too.
Friday, September 5, 2008
Did Palin attempt to have books banned?
There has been huge interest in the assertion made by several people, and publicized in TIME Magazine, that Republican Vice-Presidential nominee Sarah Palin attempted to have certain books banned from the Wasilla City Library. So, is the claim true?
According to the New York Times for September 2, 2008, it is. Ann Kilkenny, citizen of Wasilla, told a journalist that Palin brought up the idea of banning some books at a meeting. "They were somehow morally or socially objectionable to her," she said.
The librarian, Mary Ellen Emmons, pledged to resist all efforts at censorship. Forthwith, Palin fired her, but changed course after residents strongly objected. Emmons left both her job and Wasilla a couple of years later. (She has since married, which accounts for the difference in her name in the TIME Magazine article.)
The full story, straight from the horse's mouth at the Anchorage Daily News, has just been posted on the internet site of the Boston Herald:
http://news.bostonherald.com/news/national/politics/2008/view.bg?&articleid=1117009&format=&page=1&listingType=2008campnews#articleFull
"Back in 1996, when she first became mayor," the story begins, "Sarah Palin asked the city librarian if she would be all right with censoring books."
The commentary from the public, which follows the story, and which has appeared so rapidly that it is yet another testament to the timeliness and interest of the topic, makes very interesting reading.For still more on the controversy, including a very interesting dissection of her career by one of the comment-writers, see:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com:80/jacketcopy/2008/09/sarah-palin-ban.html
The Obama campaign has reported that in the hours following Palin's speech they received over eight million dollars in internet donations.
That list of banned books
There have been many questions about the source of the list of books that Republican Vice-President nominee Sarah Palin tried to have banned from the Wasilla Public Library, and which I published in part on this blog.
The complete list was posted by a commentator, Andrew Aucoin, on the blog http://www.librarian.net/ It turns out that the questions were justified, because his list is lifted from the site http://www.adlerbooks.com/banned.html It is a summary of books that have been banned at one time or another in the United States, and not the books named by Palin -- though who knows which of them might have been included in her kill list.
While one must admire Aucoin's cut-and-pasting skill, this was nothing less than mischievous, because it distracts from the very real issue of censorship, and whether Palin supports it. As Adler & Robin Books, the originator of the list, comments in their preamble, banning books is far too common in the United States, which is a sad and frightening fact.
"Who bans books?" they ask, replying, "Libraries, schools, entire towns, and sometimes, in the past, the United States government."
It happens nearly every week. Luckily, most of the time concerned citizens rise up and protest, and the book is reinstated, but occasionally it goes unnoticed, "and the banned book stays lost to a school or a country."
"Censorship in the United States is an old pastime and new hobby of the feebleminded," the writer vigorously adds. James Joyce's Ulysses was banned by the government, and copies seized by the U.S. Postal Service, as were Voltaire's Candide, Aristophanes's Lysistrata, Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Confessions, and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. School districts have banned Shakespeare's Twelfth Night and The Merchant of Venice, and Little Red Riding Hood has met the same fate. And of course we all know the history of the banning of Darwin's Origin of the Species.
It is a shameful record, particularly for a country that holds such fine ideals of the sanctity of free speech. It is very encouraging indeed that the possibility that someone who believes in censorship of books should hold the second-highest office in the land has met with such an open outcry.
The complete list was posted by a commentator, Andrew Aucoin, on the blog http://www.librarian.net/ It turns out that the questions were justified, because his list is lifted from the site http://www.adlerbooks.com/banned.html It is a summary of books that have been banned at one time or another in the United States, and not the books named by Palin -- though who knows which of them might have been included in her kill list.
While one must admire Aucoin's cut-and-pasting skill, this was nothing less than mischievous, because it distracts from the very real issue of censorship, and whether Palin supports it. As Adler & Robin Books, the originator of the list, comments in their preamble, banning books is far too common in the United States, which is a sad and frightening fact.
"Who bans books?" they ask, replying, "Libraries, schools, entire towns, and sometimes, in the past, the United States government."
It happens nearly every week. Luckily, most of the time concerned citizens rise up and protest, and the book is reinstated, but occasionally it goes unnoticed, "and the banned book stays lost to a school or a country."
"Censorship in the United States is an old pastime and new hobby of the feebleminded," the writer vigorously adds. James Joyce's Ulysses was banned by the government, and copies seized by the U.S. Postal Service, as were Voltaire's Candide, Aristophanes's Lysistrata, Jean-Jacques Rousseau's Confessions, and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. School districts have banned Shakespeare's Twelfth Night and The Merchant of Venice, and Little Red Riding Hood has met the same fate. And of course we all know the history of the banning of Darwin's Origin of the Species.
It is a shameful record, particularly for a country that holds such fine ideals of the sanctity of free speech. It is very encouraging indeed that the possibility that someone who believes in censorship of books should hold the second-highest office in the land has met with such an open outcry.
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Palin's attempt to ban books
TIME magazine is running an article on Vice-Presidential nominee Sarah Palin, describing how she tried to fire librarian Mary Ellen Baker for not removing a list of "questionable books" from the shelves of the Wasilla library.
Apparently, Palin went to the library and made inquiries about the procedure for banning certain books, claiming that some voters thought they had "inappropriate language" in them.
"The librarian was aghast," claims the article. The librarian, Mary Ellen Baker, couldn't be reached for comment, but news reports from the time show that Palin had threatened to fire Baker for not giving "full support" to the mayor.
A contributor to http://www.librarian.net/ (scan the comments following the announcement of the TIME story) names the books Palin tried to ban from the library. The list includes:
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess
As I Lay Dying, by William Faulkner
The Canterbury Tales, by Geoffrey Chaucer
Confession, by Jean Jacques Rousseau
Death of a Salesman, by Arthur Miller
Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keyes
Lady Chatterley's Lover, by D.H. Lawrence
Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman
Little Red Riding Hood, by the Grimm Brothers
Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
Lysistrata, by Aristophanes
Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck
To Kill a Mocking Bird, by Harper Lee
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, by Ken Kesey
The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier
Pigman, by Paul Zindel
Plus:
Anything by Stephen King, everything by J.K. Rowling, just about everything by Roald Dahl, both of Mark Twain's major works, most of Judy Blume, most of William Shakespeare, and (this is truly mind-boggling) Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary by the Merriam-Webster Editorial Staff
GalleyCat@ http://www.mediabistro.com/ slyly comments, "Maybe if she didn't want to ban Our Bodies, Ourselves by Boston Women's Health Collective her daughter Bristol wouldn't be having a shotgun wedding." Yes, that book is one of those she wanted to ban.
Mary Ellen Baker resigned from her library director's job in 1999.
Apparently, Palin went to the library and made inquiries about the procedure for banning certain books, claiming that some voters thought they had "inappropriate language" in them.
"The librarian was aghast," claims the article. The librarian, Mary Ellen Baker, couldn't be reached for comment, but news reports from the time show that Palin had threatened to fire Baker for not giving "full support" to the mayor.
A contributor to http://www.librarian.net/ (scan the comments following the announcement of the TIME story) names the books Palin tried to ban from the library. The list includes:
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess
As I Lay Dying, by William Faulkner
The Canterbury Tales, by Geoffrey Chaucer
Confession, by Jean Jacques Rousseau
Death of a Salesman, by Arthur Miller
Flowers for Algernon, by Daniel Keyes
Lady Chatterley's Lover, by D.H. Lawrence
Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman
Little Red Riding Hood, by the Grimm Brothers
Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
Lysistrata, by Aristophanes
Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck
To Kill a Mocking Bird, by Harper Lee
One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, by Ken Kesey
The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier
Pigman, by Paul Zindel
Plus:
Anything by Stephen King, everything by J.K. Rowling, just about everything by Roald Dahl, both of Mark Twain's major works, most of Judy Blume, most of William Shakespeare, and (this is truly mind-boggling) Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary by the Merriam-Webster Editorial Staff
GalleyCat@ http://www.mediabistro.com/ slyly comments, "Maybe if she didn't want to ban Our Bodies, Ourselves by Boston Women's Health Collective her daughter Bristol wouldn't be having a shotgun wedding." Yes, that book is one of those she wanted to ban.
Mary Ellen Baker resigned from her library director's job in 1999.
Monday, September 1, 2008
Fun and games during NZ Book Month
September Treasure Hunt
A quirky competition has been launched to support NZ Book Month.
Louise Wrightson, and her company New Zealand Books Abroad, is promoting a book lovers’ treasure hunt as her contribution to the event.
“ On 1 September we are planting five fictitious titles among the genuine NZ published books on our webshop,” said Wrightson.
“All people have to do is spot the phoneys and email them to us with their name. All the correct entries will go in a draw to win all 25 finalists in this year’s Montana Book Awards. This fine library of the best in contemporary publishing is worth more than $1300.”
Wrightson said she is a passionate supporter of NZ publishing and that she is delighted with the quality and the range of NZ books on offer.
“Selling NZ books at home and abroad is a serious business. The competition we are running in support of NZ Book Month gives us a chance to have lots of fun on the side.”
And you can buy books (including Island of the Lost and the Wiki Coffin novels) from their site:
www.nzbooksabroad.com
And even compare the prices with those charged in the US!
A quirky competition has been launched to support NZ Book Month.
Louise Wrightson, and her company New Zealand Books Abroad, is promoting a book lovers’ treasure hunt as her contribution to the event.
“ On 1 September we are planting five fictitious titles among the genuine NZ published books on our webshop,” said Wrightson.
“All people have to do is spot the phoneys and email them to us with their name. All the correct entries will go in a draw to win all 25 finalists in this year’s Montana Book Awards. This fine library of the best in contemporary publishing is worth more than $1300.”
Wrightson said she is a passionate supporter of NZ publishing and that she is delighted with the quality and the range of NZ books on offer.
“Selling NZ books at home and abroad is a serious business. The competition we are running in support of NZ Book Month gives us a chance to have lots of fun on the side.”
And you can buy books (including Island of the Lost and the Wiki Coffin novels) from their site:
www.nzbooksabroad.com
And even compare the prices with those charged in the US!
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