Ira Glass Gets Wrong

“Or: How to Make a career in other people screwing up” Why is there such a big payoff for the listener in stories about wrongness? What makes it so pleasurable? Well, if the story works, you become the character, right? You agree with their early point of view, and then when it gets shattered, you are shattered with it. So in the storytelling, you want to manipulate the evidence and the feelings so that the audience is right there agreeing […]

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All Tonight’s Parties

There are some nights were you look at the schedule of things going on and think to yourself “oh yeh, this is why I live in New York”, and tonight is definitely one of those nights. 1.  The Rumpus turns a years old, asks HTMLGiant to help them celebrate.  Tao Lin, Rivka Galchen, Justin Taylor, Deb Olin Unferth, and Stephen Elliott at Broadway East, where Chinatown meets the Lower East Side. 171 East Broadway. 2. Jami Attenberg reads from her […]

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Bites: Gentrification Lit, Adam Langer, Dustin Hoffman Loves Libraries, Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin host the Oscars, and more

N+1 discuss “gentrification novels”. Discussed are Jonathan Lethem, Prospect Park West, etc.  As a Park Slope resident, I feel a little bit shitty right now. Lit. Rare books for the “cultured traveler” Adam Langer, one of the great Chicago writers, tells us some music he likes. HTML Giant tells us about Warm Milk Press. The American zeitgeist implodes upon itself as James Franco, following his quirky stint on daytime television, is slated to guest star on 30 Rock. Dustin Hoffman: […]

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Weekend Bites: Dave Eggers is like John Wayne but with a pen, Raymond Carver, Jon Ronson, Bjork and Barney kaput?, Hornby hearts LHB, and more.

Three Guys One Book: “Where have all the cowboys gone? Has literature isolated itself from a bigger cultural context?”  Dave Eggers, Zadie Smith, Dennis Johnson, Gary Shteyngart, and the New York Times bestsellers of 1943 all make cameos. Jacket Copy asks: “How much of (Raymond) Carver’s “minimalist” style was a byproduct of (Gordon) Lish’s editing?”  This 1997 New Yorker article provided as reference, and this review of the Library of America release of “Raymond Carter: Collected Stories” might shed sufficient […]

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Weekend Bites: Dave Eggers is like John Wayne with a pen, Raymond Carver, Jon Ronson, Bjork and Barney kaput?, Hornby hearts LHB, and more.

Three Guys One Book: “Where have all the cowboys gone? Has literature isolated itself from a bigger cultural context?”  Dave Eggers, Zadie Smith, Dennis Johnson, Gary Shteyngart, and the New York Times bestsellers of 1943 all make cameos. Jacket Copy asks: “How much of (Raymond) Carver’s “minimalist” style was a byproduct of (Gordon) Lish’s editing?”  This 1997 New Yorker article provided as reference, and this review of the Library of America release of “Raymond Carter: Collected Stories” might shed sufficient […]

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Bites: Taschen, Dave Eggers is busy, Egon Spangler, Antony)

Got a thousand bucks to blow? Taschen is putting out their most expensive book in five years, and it’s none other than Norman Mailer’s first posthumous work Norman Mailer, MoonFire: The Epic Journey of Apollo 11. If you want a more creative way to blow a grand, I have this really interesting business project called Vol. 1 Brooklyn that could use some funds. Paper Cuts asks if “Dave Eggers is the busiest man in literature?” We would like to answer […]

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