Hotel room discards
It's time for the annual Travelodge (UK) report on what books are most often left behind in their hotel rooms; no tally at the official site yet, but The Telegraph has the top twenty, in Fifty...
View ArticleWriting in ... Estonia
In Helsingin Sanomat Sirpa Pääkkönen gives an overview of the literary situation in Estonia, in Estonian literature needs Sofi Oksanen. (Note that this is a Finnish publication, so it's maybe...
View ArticleMan Booker Prize shortlist
They've announced the shortlist for the 2012 Man Booker Prize; only one of the titles is under review at the complete review (the only one of the titles I've seen, too ...), The Garden of...
View ArticleBarley Patch review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Gerald Murnane's Barley Patch. I'm a sucker for books about writing (and reading) anyway, but Murnane's near-perfect...
View ArticleTranslations/originals
In the New Statesman Ollie Brock asks: 'where do you draw the line between original and translation ?' in Translators shouldn't be slaves to the holy "original". There is of course no...
View ArticleChina and the Nobel Prize
Ah, yes, as Nobel season approaches it's time for concerns like these: at People's Daily Online they wonder When can Chinese shed 'Nobel Prize complex' ? -- asking: Why does China, a country...
View ArticleGerman Book Prize shortlist
Hot on the heels of the Man Booker Prize shortlist announcement, the German Book Prize -- structured as a German Man Booker (complete with ridiculous publisher-submission-limitations (only two...
View ArticleHet aapje dat geluk pakt review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Arnon Grunberg's not yet translated Het aapje dat geluk pakt. (Note that his Tirza is coming out from Open Letter in a few...
View ArticleArkadii Dragomoshchenko (1946-2012)
Arkadii Dragomoshchenko (Аркадий Трофимович Драгомощенко) has passed away; see, for example Jacob Edmon's rememberance at Jacket2. I still have those Sun & Moon Press volumes, but...
View ArticleGamal al-Ghitani Q & A
At ahramonline Sayed Mahmoud, Mary Mourad, and Mohamed Saad have a Q & A with Gamal El-Ghitani: Politics dominate literature in post-revolution Egypt (with video, and lots of pictures)....
View ArticlePrize proliferation
At the BBC Sarah Dunant offers yet another commentary on the proliferation literary prizes, in A Point Of View: And prizes for all. She notes that in the UK: At last count there are...
View ArticleWriting in ... China
Via Paper Republic I learn about Lara Farrar's piece at CNN on China's weird and wildly popular world of workplace novels. Unanswered: the question why no 职场小说 has been published in...
View ArticleThe Satanic Verses retrospective
With Salman Rushdie's memoir, Joseph Anton, due out shortly (pre-order your copy at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk), The Guardian have a nice documentary piece where: 'Writers, broadcasters,...
View ArticleThe Poet Assassinated review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Guillaume Apollinaire's peculiar 1916 classic, The Poet Assassinated.
View ArticleHerman Koch (and straatrumoer)
At the PEN Atlas site Tasja Dorkofikis wonders about Entertainment for the Middle Classes ? - The success of Herman Koch, which includes a short Q & A with the author of the enormously...
View Article'Philip Roth and Wikipedia'
I complained about Philip Roth in legacy-controlling mode last week after The New Yorker weblog published An Open Letter to Wikipedia from him, but a proper response is now up at Non-Commercial...
View ArticleIranian literary attitudes
In the Wall Street Journal Matthias Küntzel is disturbed to find that 'Frankfurt welcomes the regime's censors as a gesture of 'convergence via a sustained dialogue'', in Tehran at the Book...
View ArticleLiterary tourism in the Philippines ?
In his column in The Philippine Star F.Sionil Jose makes the case for Literature for tourism, arguing that the literary connection is an underdeveloped side of Filipino tourism (domestic and...
View ArticleJeet Thayil Q & As
In India they're apparently pretty excited about Narcopolis-author Jeet Thayil getting his book shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize, so now one finds a number of articles and interviews with...
View ArticleThe Story of my Assassins review
The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Tarun J. Tejpal's The Story of my Assassins. This came out to much notice and considerable acclaim in India in 2009, but...
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