MetaFilter posts tagged with author

How To Write Badly Well

filthy light thief — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 12:27:56 -0800

You have a great idea for a novel and it's almost November, so you think now is the time to get cracking. You've decided that hiring a ghostwriter is too easy, but you don't have 100 days to write your novel and the snowflake method seems too frilly. Snowflakes, those delicate little monsters that papered your car when you were stranded on the road in Minnesota. A single snowflake is beautiful, but millions make an avalanche. You were cold, so cold, yet you survived. You're not sure if you have time to read a book on what not to do (UK edition), and the search results are daunting. Forget all that, because you already know how to write, right? Embrace your awesome, magnificent, spellbinding abilities, go forward but never back, ever spinning, shake the rain off your bedspread, and now that you have brewed a delicious pot of steamy, hot, life-giving coffee, you can learn how to write badly well. [via mefi projects] NaNoWriMo, previously: 2001 (and a follow-up, plus updated East Bay Express link), 2002, 2006, 2007 (twice), 2008 No budding author was harmed in the extraction of samples. The examples are written up by MeFi's own him.

Dominick Dunne 1925-2009

reenum — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 10:00:06 -0800

Dominick Dunne died yesterday at the age of 83. was well known for his chronicling of the follies and crimes of the rich. You can read some of his pieces from Vanity Fair here.

Two baguettes, lettuce, teeny tiny man...

markkraft — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 09:40:41 -0800

Christopher Moore has been to Paris lately, and has decided to share some of his vacation snaps, and, most amusingly, teach us a bit of French.

Gone too soon.

blaneyphoto — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 16:41:17 -0800

Author and educator Frank McCourt, dead at 78.

...ink by the barrel...

zarq — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 12:04:30 -0800

Negative reviews prompt author meltdowns: Ali ce Hoff man. Lee Oi-soo. Alain de Botton. Ayelet Waldman. Previously on MeFi. They should all probably take a deep breath, then read one of these articles. Ayelet Waldman's outraged comments on Twitter were made over Jill Lepore's negative review of her book "Bad Mother." This hilariously contradictory and ironic tweet (language, NSFW) was quickly deleted from her feed.

Djuna Barnes

Joe Beese — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 11:43:02 -0800

Djuna Barnes (12 June, 1892 – 18 June, 1982) was an American writer who played an important part in the development of 20th century English language modernist writing and was one of the key figures in 1920s and 30s bohemian Paris after filling a similar role in the Greenwich Village of the teens. Her novel Nightwood became a cult work of modern fiction, helped by an introduction by T. S. Eliot. It stands out today for its portrayal of lesbian themes and its distinctive writing style. - Wikipedia Her early works include The Book of Repulsive Women and Ladies Almanack. She spent the last 40 years of her life in seclusion in Greenwich Village's Patchin Place.

The Sinister End-of-the-World Homerun

Miko — Thu, 21 May 2009 15:50:03 -0800

"The only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved" .... and mad enough to play fantasy baseball. In the new book Kerouac at Bat: Fantasy Sports and the King of the Beats, a NY Public Library archivist considers documents revealing the author's detailed obsession with the imaginary exploits of players like Pictorial Review Jackson and teams like the "Pontiacs, Nashes, and cellar-dwelling LaSalles" in his finely grained, fictional Summer League.

"Greetings from Idiot America"

zarq — Tue, 12 May 2009 09:20:20 -0800

Charles Pierce, author of the 2005 essay "Greetings from Idiot America" decrying the rise of faith-based anti-intellectualism, has expanded his rant into a full length book: Idiot America: How Stupidity Became a Virtue in the Land of the Free. (via) Previously on MeFi. (link on that post is defunct) Anti-intellectualism has been around for ages, and has not been restricted to the US. But the American cultural divide was thrust further into the national spotlight during the last election cycle. Further reading: Susan Jacoby's book: The Age of American Unreason (interview on left-wing blog Alternet here,) and 1964's Anti-intellectualism in American Life by Richard Hofstadter. Pierce appears regularly on NPR's Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me!, and is a feature writer for Esquire, Slate, The American Prospect and the Boston Globe Sunday Magazine, usually on sports. He's also the author of several books, including Hard to Forget: An Alzheimer's Story.

Marilyn French has died.

Morrigan — Tue, 05 May 2009 16:32:17 -0800

Marilyn French, author of The Women's Room, among other works, has died.

What are you reading, charming writer?

mattbucher — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 08:13:48 -0800

What are writers reading? An eclectic mix of authors answer the perennial question. A sampling of responses: George Packer Anne Fadiman Cass Sunstein Jane Smiley Lydia Millet Steven Zipperstein Abraham Verghese John Dunning Stephen Burt Tim Harford

John Updike has died.

OmieWise — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 10:34:40 -0800

John Updike has died.

"Essentially, it is all about money and power."

Toekneesan — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 09:48:59 -0800

"It would be naïve to identify the Internet with the Enlightenment. It has the potential to diffuse knowledge beyond anything imagined by Jefferson; but while it was being constructed, link by hyperlink, commercial interests did not sit idly on the sidelines. They want to control the game, to take it over, to own it. They compete among themselves, of course, but so ferociously that they kill each other off. Their struggle for survival is leading toward an oligopoly; and whoever may win, the victory could mean a defeat for the public good. ...We could have created a National Digital Library—the twenty-first-century equivalent of the Library of Alexandria. It is too late now. Not only have we failed to realize that possibility, but, even worse, we are allowing a question of public policy—the control of access to information—to be determined by private lawsuit."—Robert Darnton on what the proposed Google Book Settlement could mean for the pursuit of knowledge—Google and the Future of Books

RIP Studs Terkel

me3dia — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 14:31:22 -0800

Studs Terkel has passed. Author, actor, oral historian, storyteller.

Someone is peeling Kundera's onion for him.

lucia__is__dada — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 04:02:07 -0800

The czech magazine Respekt, known for its investigative reporting, has published a story claiming prize winning author and anti-communist dissident Milan Kundera denounced a young exile who was back in Prague to the communist secret police. “Today at around 1600 hours a student, Milan Kundera, born 1.4.1929 in Brno, resident at the student hall of residence on George VI Avenue in Prague VII, presented himself at this department and reported that a student, Iva Militká, resident at that residence, had told a student by the name of Dlask, also of that residence, that she had met a certain acquaintance of hers, Miroslav Dvořáček, at Klárov in Prague the same day. The said Dvořáček apparently left 1 case in her care, saying he would come to fetch it in the afternoon. (…) Dvořáček had apparently deserted from military service and since the spring of the previous year had possibly been in Germany, where he had gone illegally” a police report says. Dvořáček was "given a sentence of 22 years’ hard labour, a fine of 10,000 crown, forfeiture of all his property and loss of civic rights for ten years". He spent 14 years in labor camps and lives now in Sweden. Milan Kundera denies and is talking about the assassination of an author.

H.H. Cool J

cashman — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 16:47:50 -0800

Helen (Hunt) Jackson was an author and an activist. Her mom died when Helen was 14, her dad 3 years later. Helen's first child died at 11 months, her second at 10 years old. In 1879 she was inspired after hearing Chief Standing Bear describe how the U.S. government took Native Americans' land. She began to publish in support of Native American rights. 1881 brought her book A Century of Dishonor [pdf], branded with the words "Look upon your hands! They are stained with the blood of your relations". In 1883, she published her most famous work, Ramona, a novel about racial discrimination set in California. If that's too much to take in, and now you need some kitties, she's still got you covered. Letters from a Cat (1879) is being featured at Archive.org today. Her husband, Edward Bissell Hunt, died in 1863. He held various positions in the United States army, producing a pamphlet urging the "energetic deportation" of Black people so that land could be "reclaimed for the sole use of the white man". Parenthesis around "Hunt" in Helen's name because apparently she went either by Helen Hunt or by Helen Jackson.

Unusual Public Offering

thatbrunette — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 20:50:53 -0800

When a young company is in need of some dough, they often will issue an IPO. But what if, instead of a company, an author decides to sell shares of his book royalties? Tao Lin is doing exactly that. Currently he is selling 6 shares (equal to 60% of his royalties) for $2,000 per share. (A steep price, given that the First National Bank of Alaska is trading around the same.)

"The fact that I was a girl never damaged my ambitions to be a pope or an emperor..."

dersins — Thu, 22 May 2008 11:23:45 -0800

The Willa Cather Archive is an incredible resource provided by the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, including biographies, letters, photos, and even full (often annotated) text of much of her writing, including scholarly editions of two of her greatest (and most famous) works, My Antonia and O Pioneers. About the archive.

Rapid Offensive Unit Xenophobe will no doubt be pleased

Artw — Sun, 23 Mar 2008 23:00:35 -0800

Edinburgh author Iain M. Banks, creator of the post capitalist space faring society The Culture and it's oddly named ships, has long been the UKs top science fiction writer, but has never had more than a toehold in the US (in part through lack of availability, in part due to lack of promotion and in part due to some pretty awful covers. That could change: Matter, his latest, has been heavily promoted in the US and sports a cover nearly identical to the UK edition. This week Orbit are releasing US editions of the two earliest Culture novels, with the third following in July, which could mean a complete release of all the novels in the US in order. More Banks: Slashdot review of Matter Guardian Books author profile Interview in The Australian The odd story behind a Banks interview in The Sun Iain Banks and Ken MacCleod (audio/video) The Banksoniain fanzine National secular society: Honorary Associate: Iain Banks Iain M. Banks' "Culture" references in Bungie's Halo Why I write - Iain Banks Iain Banks on clean, green living Iain M. Banks’s Consider Phlebas and T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land

Alain Robbe-Grillet, 1922 - 2008.

goodnewsfortheinsane — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 11:16:53 -0800

Alain Robbe-Grillet, French author, member of the Académie française and subject of this recent Mefi post, has passed away at age 85.

Coelho gives out pirate copies of books... reaps benefits

dobbs — Fri, 25 Jan 2008 11:16:01 -0800

Author Paulo Coelho talks about how creating The Pirate Coelho, a site with links to torrents of his own books, leads to a massive increase in sales.

Sterling's World 2008

digaman — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 08:39:25 -0800

Bruce Sterling's State of the World: an interactive discussion on the Well with the noted sci-fi author and futurist. "The political and economic landscape in 2008 is full of spinning, tottering Chinese plates poised on tall pool-cues." [An MP3 of his State of the World 2006 from SXSW was previously linked here.]

Norman Mailer, Dead at 84

muddylemon — Sat, 10 Nov 2007 04:43:17 -0800

Norman Mailer Dies at 84

“Please do the necessary things to stop production of the book.”

sock it to me monkey — Wed, 17 Oct 2007 08:51:18 -0800

"“If the book were to be published as it is in its present edited form, I may never write another story, that’s how closely, God Forbid, some of those stories are to my sense of regaining my health and mental well-being.” The New York Times reported today that Raymond Carver's widow, Tess Gallagher, is pushing to republish the stories in Carver's acclaimed 1981 breakout collection, "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love," in their original, unedited form. Carver's editor at the time, Gordon Lish, is acknowledged to have aggressively edited many stories this collection almost to the point of "a wholesale rewrite." The two examples provided of endings before and after the Lish edits [pdf; see pgs 5-7] raise unsettling questions.

The nastiest divorce/custody/dead baby stories you're ever likely to run across

thanotopsis — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 07:15:29 -0800

Here's the background of one of the nastiest divorce/custody/dead baby stories you're ever likely to run across. Alan Rodgers is a horror writer. This is his wikipedia entry, and this is his blog/forum at sff.net. He was originally married to Amy Stout, and together they had three children, two girls and a boy. After he tried to kill Amy Stout, she left him and married -- Me, Dan Moran. I'm the handsome dude in the eyepatch, if you click through to my profile. Together Alan and Amy #2 had a baby: Anthony Rodgers. Who died under interesting circumstances. A tragedy, I believe Alan Rodgers has called it, and by "tragedy" I suspect he means, "Thank God I wasn't prosecuted for negligent homicide." Or worse.

"I have finished my life work."

OrangeDrink — Sat, 19 May 2007 13:43:13 -0800

NewsFilter: Lloyd Alexander (2) has died two weeks after his wife. Don't take his children's fantasy books seriously? Does it help that the American author introduced thousands of kids to Welsh mythology through The Chronicles of Prydain (Including The Black Cauldron [movie]), wrote over 40 novels (many of which are not fantasy nor children's books, such as his first book, "Let the Credit Go"), joined the army in WWII to become a better writer, and translated Nausea? His last book, The Golden Dream of Carlo Chuchio, will be released in August.