Author Photos
A post over at The Rumpus led me to a post over at The Millions led me to Marion Ettlinger’s online gallery. OK, so there’s my paper trail.
Anyway. I’m something of a naughty reader, I suppose, because except for the few authors I’ve met or really, really adore, I just don’t know what writers look like. I think I could pick Hemingway out of a crowd (James Patterson for sure!), but could I point to David Mitchell? Or Annie Proulx? Or, jeez, Alice Munro? Nope. In the highly unlikely event I ever walked by somebody on the street, I’d miss my chance to grovel for an autograph!
(I’m like this with singers, too. I think it’s because I don’t care about the band/artist/writer as a “person” so much as a producer of that art I like. Who cares what the singer looks like as long as the song is good, right? Or is that terrible?)
Imagine my surprise, then, to go flipping through Ettlinger’s gallery and stumble across photos of authors I’ve widely read…and find that they look exactly like I’d subconsciously assumed they would, based on their writing.
Cormac McCarthy, for example. I mean, what else could he look like? Am I right? Or am I right?
See also: Charles Frazier; Raymond Carver; Joyce Carol Oates; Alice Munro (actually, I just love the mischievous twinkle in her eye). And basically everyone else there, except Jhumpa Lahiri and Truman Capote.
OED lite…
This may be the coolest thing I’ve ever seen on the interwebs: Online Etymology Dictionary.
Which word would you sponsor?
This will blow your mind, but…
…I didn’t actually finish Thesis over the weekend. In fact, I didn’t do any writing at all. Instead I did a lot of being hungover and hanging out with the boyfriend and going to the Ren Fest and eating food, but I didn’t do any Thesis. Why? Because I’m an asshole. Also, because I think a big part of me is actually scared to finish this beast.
This weekend, thanks to the G-20 and city-wide hysteria, I have four whole days to work. So this weekend is Thesis Weekend. (Plus some other stuff so I don’t lose my mind.) Monday AM it goes – second draft finished – to my advisor.
That’s the plan. That’s the timeline. Let’s do this thing!
The light, the tunnel…?
I don’t want to get ahead of myself here, but I think…I mean, I hope…that is, I’ve made it my goal…um…well. I think this may be the weekend during which I actually finish* my Thesis. I think it’s time. Past time, really. Like a baby that refuses to be born…
So this is the weekend when I force the little sucker out!!
*By “finish” I mean, of course, “complete the second draft of my manuscript and take it one tiny step closer to something I feel comfortable showing my board if not, actually, something I would really consider to be done.”
MY PRAYERS HAVE BEEN ANSWERED.
My favorite writer who doesn’t really write rides again: Patterson Signs 17-Book Deal with Hachette (via PW).
Here’s a quote:
…the prolific author has just inked a new 17-book deal that will keep him with publisher Hachette through 2012. The deal includes 11 adult titles, to be published in hardcover by Little, Brown and Company and in paperback by Grand Central Publishing, and six titles for young readers, to be published by Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.
That’s 17 books IN TWO YEARS. TWO. YEARS.
Also:
In a statement, Patterson said ,”I love writing stories. I have more to tell and I’m thrilled that the wonderful Hachette Book Group will continue to be my partner in exciting readers with these stories that I love.”
I noticed an error in that so I’m correcting below…
In a statement, Patterson cackled, “I love reading stories that have been written by other people. I have more to tell other writers to write about and I’m thrilled that the wonderfully confused Hachette Book Group will continue to be my partner in glorifying my own name without putting in the work and thereby exciting readers with these stories that I love to make other people write for me.”
Love ya, Jimmy. If you need another lit slave, give me a shout! I’d love to be a cog in your empire.
Book-learnin’? Who needs it!
There’s been a bit of a kerfluffle lately (around the blogs I read, anyway) about how kids are taught about books in school (the originator, and some responses). It seems there’s a hefty population that received less-than-stellar English education, taking classes in high school and earlier that sucked all the fun out of books and reading.
I’ve always loved to read and grew up in a family where that was prized and encouraged, so there was never an issue in that regard. I read for class and I read outside of class. I stumbled and floundered and cursed my way through Dickens and Joyce, and then I went home and read what I liked to read. Oh, sure, more than once I was that asshole kid saying, “but how you KNOW that they MEANT to do this?” but it didn’t ruin reading for me. Far from it. For example, I wouldn’t have discovered Evelyn Waugh in high school if I hadn’t had to do a huge project on The Loved One – which still remains one of my favorite books, probably in part because I spent so much time with it, picking it apart and making sense of it for myself. That’s why teachers encourage their students to look between the lines – if you can argue your point, it doesn’t matter what the author “meant” to do. (We all know by now that any teacher who says his or her way is the only way is a moron…and if the blog comments are any indication, there are a lot of morons teaching high school English!)
Having that experience in picking literature apart can only help me as a writer. Now when I read, I read for enjoyment but also to see how other writers put their stories together. What do I like and why? Could I use that? Would I avoid it? What’s being said that isn’t being said? It’s important. I do rebel against it (constantly), but the thought is always there at the back of my mind. It doesn’t make reading less fun.
That said, I think the hyper-regimented, cut-throat competition of the reading classes many mention in the above blogs is silly and unnecessary. It’s one thing to have a demanding reading list, it’s quite another to make reading a contest for glory. How much of that can a young reader really retain? Are they savoring the experience or rushing ahead to get to the next pointless achievement? What about readers who are slow? Readers who struggle? It’s not “inspiring” for a kid to watch her classmates zooming ahead and being rewarded, it’s embarrassing. Why slap that connotation on books right away? At least let the kids make it to Dickens before they start to hate reading.
Karen Bender says it best:
I think children should fall into books, like a puddle of mud. They should be able to sit and muck around in a book, reading it for the passages they enjoy, for the messages they take from it—which can be very individual messages. I think they need to fall in love with books their own way. As parents, I think we should just have them around, sit and read with them. And stop worrying about when they’ll get to Harry Potter.
Amen, sister!
News! Of the good variety!
Last night I breached the 100-page second-draft-Thesis mark, having now completed 107 pages of Thesisy goodness. Of course it’s all crap and needs a third-draft overhaul, but whatever. It’s progress!
The Literary Diet
Found this today – an interesting way to quantify what we read:
Now, the fun part–assigning literary genres to correspond to the pyramid levels. This is just for fun so please don’t get your knickers in a twist at my genre placement.
- Bread and Grains = classic literature, poetry, drama, contemporary prose
- Veggies = nonfiction, non-celebrity bios and memoirs
- Fruits = Sci-Fi, Fantasy, graphic novels, et al
- Meat = historical fiction, detective fiction, women’s fiction
- Dairy = chick-lit, YA, romance
- Sweets = celebrity bios/tell-alls, trashy novels
I am a Bread and Grains kind of girl, with a little Meat and Dairy tossed in for flavor. Fruits, Veggies and Sweets almost never if you can believe it!
