This and that

iTunes university

iTunes now offers free knowledge from top universities in the US -- including MIT, Sanford, Berkeley -- and it is all free. (I listened to one lecture on d-i-y typography design. I noticed that there is also something on creative writing in there.) The site, which was launched with 16 institutions earlier this year has had video and audio content from it downloaded more than 4 million times.

An iTunes report says: 'Already, more than half of the nation's top 500 schools use it to distribute their digital content to students -- or to the world.'

Check it out now. (iTunes is a free download for both Macs and PCs.)

http://www.apple.com/education/itunesu/


No more wait for paperback?

It is not uncommon for readers in this country to 'wait for the paperback' given the outrageous prices (given our weak currency). Of course, there is the so-called trade-back or C-format (hardback size with a soft cover) released for us poor cousins but while it is easy to read it still costs in the region of RM70.00 -- steep for most readers.

This news from Picador to launch new fiction in both hardback and paperback is most welcome. It is apparently being done to combat the ailing market for hardback literary fiction. (Read about the sales figures for this year’s Man Booker shortlist.) But do not hold your breath yet -- book distributors in this country are not the brightest in the world. (They don’t read.) Remember how long it took The Harmony Silk Factory to hit our shores, and that too in that grotty A-format? Pan Macmillan says they will release high-end hardback and B-format paperback editions simultaneously from next year.


Webster's Word of the Year

For 2007, Webster's New World College Dictionary has chosen "grass station" as its Word of the Year. It is play on the word 'gas station' (Americans call petrol, gas remember). So this is a grass station -- one that dispenses ethanol and biomass fuels, some of which are distilled from actual grass.

Apparently this term is 'so sizzlin' hot it has already appeared ... (in) The New York Times.'

The report also says this 'doesn't mean grass station will show up in Webster's anytime soon.' It will probably appear in Oxford first. In 2006, Webster's Word of the Year was 'crackberry'.


Library books 126 years late

A Guardian Unlimited report says that 'Chile has returned 3,778 books that its military had taken from Peru's national library -- more than 126 years overdue'. According to the report these were books pillaged by Chilean soldiers in 1881 after the capture of Lima during the 1870-1883 War of the Pacific. 'Chile shipped the books, most in excellent condition, to Peru this week via DHL, where they'll be returned to Lima's national library.'

Wahhh!!! Educated soldiers! Others sack and loot. Chilean soldiers borrow books and return them. (Never mind about being late, let's not get picky).


Author's murder conviction upheld

The Supreme Court has upheld the murder conviction of novelist Michael Peterson, who is serving life in prison for killing his wife, Kathleen, whose body was found at the bottom of a staircase in the couple's home in 2001.

Peterson had argued in his appeal that evidence was improperly obtained from his computer, and also that the judge had made a mistake by admitting evidence about the 1985 death of a Peterson family friend in Germany.

Peterson's novels include the 1990 novel about the Vietnam War, A Time of War, and a 1995 sequel, A Bitter Peace.


First Man Asian literary prize goes to Chinese writer

Chinese author Jiang Rong has won first the US$10,000 Man Asian Literary Prize for his novel Wolf Totem.

According to the judges, 'Jiang's book, set on the desolate grasslands of inner Mongolia, tells the tale of nomads and settlers and their (relationship) with wolves during China's tumultuous Cultural Revolution, exploring man's place in nature.' Jiang says he spent 30 years thinking, and 6 years writing Wolf Totem.

Funny though, that one. Wasn't Mongolia one of the countries excluded from the first Man Asia Literary Prize?


Norman Mailer dies

I have to confess that I avoided reading Norman Mailer probably because I read The Naked and the Dead when I was still in school, and was probably put off by its density. (I guess one should never read some novels when one is too young for it, like Dostoeyvsky for example) I did read a couple more after that though, The Fight being one and another was an anti feminist rant. I thought he took himself too seriously. I infinitely preferred the filppant charm of Gore Vidal.

Anyway, Norman Mailer, the author of 30 books -- including The Castle in the Forest published this year -- died of renal failure at the age of 84 on the 10th of November 2007.

Norman Kingsley -- or Nachem Malek in Hebrew -- was born in New Jersey on January 31, 1923. His father, Isaac Barnett, was a South African emigre but the dominant figure in the family was said to be his mother, Fanny Schneider, who came from Long Branch, where her father was the town's unofficial rabbi.