Snippets

'Story' versus 'literature'

Philip Pullman argues that 'literature' is what a film director must leave out when translating a 'story' into a movie. The plot and the events are the story part and can be made into a play or a film. What is left behind is 'literature'.

Pullman was talking about the movie version of his book(s). Have you ever looked at it that way? How about the total distortions, like in The English Patient, for example. How do you classify that? When nothing remains of the book except the title?

The Guardian

007 will be reborn in 2008

2008 will the year of the first 007 book by Sebastian Faulks. James Bond will be reborn. To celebrate the centenary of Ian Fleming's birth, Sebastian Faulks has been commissioned to write up more tales of the suave secret agent. Devil May Care, the first in the reincarnated series (one thinks it will be a series of books, not just one) will be published by Penguin in May. Who will he be pit against, now that the cold war enemies are no more? In the absence of the boy wizard will he be the new ... whatever?

The Guardian

Sukarno's books

The Jakarta Post says that Sukarno's private collection of thousands of books now belongs to Johan Budi Sava, the owner of the Toga Mas bookstore on Jl. Dieng in Malang. Thousands of old books are now on the second floor of the bookstore, and one day will serve as a small museum for anyone to use for their research. But many are old and fragile, like the 1825 map of Yogyakarta in the collection, and cannot be handled.

A year ago, when he was in Bogor to look for a place for a new bookstore, Johan Budi Sava was introduced to a businessman said to be Sukarno's friend, who said he had been asked to take care of the book collection. As he could not do it any more, he asked Johan to take care of them. And Johan jumped at it.

Wahhh!!!

The Jakarta Post

How not to write a novel

In a story How to write a novel, Tim Dowling talks about the pitfalls. He says: 'Writing a novel must be one of the easiest things to avoid doing in the world -- chances are no one has asked you to do it, and no one will care if you don't. As soon as you start, almost every other activity in the world seems preferable. Distractions come in every shape ...'

For him, some of the biggest distractions are:

Food: He suggests an arrangement where '... there are several flights of stairs between you and anything remotely worth eating.'

The Internet: '... the biggest distraction faced by the modern novelist.'

And the Terrifying Enormity Of What You Are Trying To Do: 'Writing a novel is ... a bit like swimming across a huge, dark lake. Starting off is easy and finishing is both a relief ... but there's a long stretch in the middle where you can't see either shore and you're not even sure you're heading the right way.'

Tim Dowling writes for The Guardian. His first novel, The Giles Wareing Haters' Club (Picador) is out now.

The Media Circus

Literary quotes of the year 2007

Here is a sample:

Doris Lessing, on being told she had won the Nobel prize for literature
"Oh, Christ. You can't go on getting excited every year about this. I've won all the prizes in Europe, every bloody one."

Anne Enright, on her Man Booker-winning The Gathering -- or how not to promote your book
"When people pick up a book they may want something happy that will cheer them up. In that case they shouldn’t really pick up my book. It’s the intellectual equivalent of a Hollywood weepie."

Martin Amis, defending his comments on Islam on the grounds that he didn't 'write' them.
"To paraphrase and slightly adapt Vladimir Nabokov: I think like a genius, I write like a distinguished man of letters, I talk like an idiot."

Norman Mailer to Philip Roth, in queue for the loo -- too much information.
Mailer: "Phil, sometimes I have to go into a telephone kiosk to pee. You just can't wait at my age."
Roth: "I know, it's the same with me."

Plenty more here if you are interested.

Times Online

Paper shortage in China, or Bad news for pirates

The report says that the latest Harry Potter and Dan Brown are not so affordable anymore. Nothing to cry over. But it also says the same of classic Chinese fiction -- now that is sad.

Price of paper in China is reported to be up by 10% due to 'voracious demand' and 'a crackdown on small, polluting paper mills’ to clean up the environment. So far only China appears to be affected. But the problem is, many publishers in the United States and Europe having their books printed in China to reduce printing costs. Penguin UK is said to spend about 60 per cent of its manufacturing budget in China. Not much longer, from the looks of it.

China is the United States' biggest offshore supplier of print products, mainly books, and, according to government statistics, exports of paper products from China rose by 76% between 2005 and 2006.

In a quiz show, the correct answer to the question, 'Who invented paper?' would be China. China is said to have invent paper around the 2nd century, before it was spread to the Arab world and Europe via the Silk Road. So thee country that started the revolution might also end it. Prices of books are bound to go up. It might make more sense to retail bestsellers like Harry Potter and Dan Brown as electronic downloads. (Thus, freeing the paper supply for the rest of us? Nothing wrong with wishful thinking, I guess! And it doesn't cost anything.)

International Herald Tribune

Alexander Graham Bell and Scottish Literature

Did Alexander Graham Bell invent the telephone?

As every schoolboy knows (or, at least when I went to school they did) Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, and that has been the correct answer in every quiz show -- that is, until now.

Now a new book, The Telephone Gambit: Chasing Alexander Graham Bell's Secret by Seth Shulman, argues that Bell stole some of the ideas from a rival, Elisha Gray. He argues that, "... Bell -- aided by aggressive lawyers and a corrupt patent examiner -- got an improper peek at patent documents Gray had filed ..." Interestingly, German inventor Philipp Reis, is reported to have beaten them both with an invention resembling the telephone in the1860s, but has never been never publicly credited.

How many more lies do we live on? Fiction will outlive facts all the time.

Associated Press


Scottish Literature is not English

We knew that. Just try reading Trainspotting by Irving Welsh. But seriously. Scottish literary are appalled at a decision by the US Library of Congress to reclassify their work as a subsection of English literature. This means Scottish literature will no longer have its own section in the world's biggest library.

Culture Minister Linda Fabiani has promised to raise the matter with the US Congress, and a spokesman for the library said it would be reconsidering the controversial decision, the report says.

Did you know that John Buchan, who wrote The Thirty-Nine Steps, was Scottish when you read it as a teenager? I didn't, and it didn't matter. How about Robert Louis Stevenson? I knew he was Scottish but that didn't matter either.

I wonder what they have done to books by Canadian authors? Like Rohinton Mistry, for instance. Oh dear, did I say that? I hope I didn't start a small war somewhere. (BTW, did you know Alexander Graham Bell was a Scot?)

BBC

PG Wodehouse and the Hobbit

Russians love PG Wodehouse

If you believe Bertie Wooster, aunts are amongst the most dislikeable and
dangerous creatures on the planet, and seeking their approval is a most arduous task. We have felt for Bertie through our teenage years, though we are not sure why. Now it appears the Russians can't get enough of upper class English twits stealing policemen’s helmets either.

PG Wodehouse was outlawed in the previous Soviet Republic by Stalin in 1929. But the ban was lifted in 1990 and the Russians can't get enough of Pyelem G Vudhaus, as he is known there. There are Wodehouse clubs and a Russian Wodehouse Society with over 3,000 members. Says Natalya Trauberg, translator and founder member of the club, "Russians need freedom and laughter very much ... They had none for so long."

The Telegraph


Jackson agrees to produce Hobbit films

If your cow gives good milk, why not milk it good? This cannot be truer of any industry than Hollywood. The name of the cow is JRR Tolkien, and the flavour of the milk is called The Hobbit.

Having had a certain affinity with old JRR for several decades, I cannot help feeling a little irritated by the over-enthusiasm of all these "Johnny come latelies." (Like when Bobby McFerrin released that infernally commercial Don't Worry, Be Happy. How dare he?!) Still, it could be worse. It could have been someone other than Peter Jackson doing it. Two films are being planned. (Why make one when you can make more money with two?)

The Guardian