Profiles in Food:
Neat profile of Ruth Reichel, former food critic of the New York Times, whose name I’ve seen around but never knew much about.
Sunday Morning Shards #26:
On my mind and in the reading queue this week: The “Post-U2” Edition:
*Had by first official conversation (with my friend Amy) about my second book which will be about the marketing of the arts.
*The Bodeans are a fantastic live band. Catch them in Seattle, Aspen or Boulder over the next two weeks.
*Jason Kottke updates his readers on his fundraising attempt to do his blog full time.
*Dailysonic is a simply awesome podcast. Picture Morning Edition for our generation (via Large Hearted Boy).
*Still trying out Audio Hijack Pro. Results are spotty thus far.
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*Can hip-hop be feminist? (via blackfeminism.org).
*Prepping like mad for my speech this week in Toronto. Still feeling insecure.
Rockin’ Interview w/ Eric Idle:
Please download and listen to this interview KRCW’s "The Treatment" did with Eric Idle, an original member of Monty Python. It’s a mesmorizing discussion of British v. American humor and the history of 20th century comedy. Idle’s genius comes across as effortless.
Chaotic Fun:
This American Life this week features a New York City-based group called Improv Everywhere which creates scenes of ranndomness in public places. Its not Flash Mobbing per se because everyone knows each other and the events last longer than a few minutes.
Some of these “missions” are genius. Creating a luxurious restroom in a McDonalds. Positioning dancers in the windows of a skyscraper.
What great ideas. I might have to do something like this for my book. Although listen to the story on TAL. Some of the ideas go terribly wrong.
Info Geek Enabler: PubSub
Ah PubSub, where have you been my whole life? I think I found out you through Micropersuasion and now belong to a scret club of my own sinister and pathetic question.
Question to the gallery: Are you the kind of person who gets angry when you discover your favorite had an Op-Ed in the paper two weeks ago and you missed? Of course you aren’t. You have a life to lead.
PubSub lets you create a "Subscription list" of phrases (in my case, names like Susan Orlean, Nelson George and Sarah Vowell) then sends you, via RSS, whenever their names are mentioned in a blogosphere. It’s a fabulous tool for writers who leave very few trace elements online or who don’t have their own websites. Which is most of them.
I’m going to be using it for my name when my book comes out.
Continuing living. Nothing but Info-Geekery here.
R.I.P. Saul Bellow:
In case you hadn’t heard, Saul Bellow, one of the giants of American literature, has died. He was 89. He leaves behind more than a dozen novels, a Nobel Prize, three National Book Awards and several generations of students.
I read Bellow’s novella Seize the Day in high school and found it thick and dull. But as I spent time as a journalist in publishing, as I interviewed other Jewish writers like Michael Chabon, Ethan Canin and others, again and again they pointed to Bellow as their inspiration. They claimed Bellow and novels like Henderson the Rain King and The Adventures of Augie March gave Jewish authors the permission to be more than chroniclers of the shtetl and the Lower East Side. Augie March’s first line "I am an American, Chicago born" gave two generations of Jewish authors the right to identify themselves as Americans as well as Jews. And while that assimilationist tendancy has fallen out of fashion (now, thankfully, it’s hip to be Jewish and proud of it), Jewish-American authors and American Jews at large first had to feel as though they too belonged in their adopted homeland, not as guests or interlopers, but as participating artists, workers, voters and citizens. Saul Bellow and his immense literary output stood at the head of this change and pushed forward hard.
Lit Blog Co-op:
My friend Mark Sarvas, proprietor of the excellent book blog The Elegant Variation has launched (with 19 friends) a super-cool idea:. What if 20 literary bloggers picked 4 books each year that have been overlooked by the mainstream press? Behold the Lit Blog Co-op. On May 15th, they make their first Read This! selection.
Congratulations Mark and everyone. How cool is this?
Books I’m Excited About #2: Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell
Title: Assassination Vacation
Author: Sarah Vowell
Relationship: Saw it at my neighborhood bookstore and bought it immediately, as I have done with each of Sarah Vowell’s books.
Synopsis: Sarah Vowell takes a cross country roadtrip visiting sites of America’s most infamous political murders.
Acquired: See above.
Excitement: I’ve been a Vowell since 1997 when I first heard her pieces on "This American Life". I’ve since read all of her books as soon as I could get my hands on them. And since now she’s voiced a character in The Incredibles, is repped by the Steven Barclary Agency and thanks just about every young media demnigod you can think of in her acknowledgements (Eggers, Hornby and Ira Glass to name but three), I declare her to be officially leading the world’s greatest life. I sit somewhere between quiet awe, smoldering jealousy and the lingering hope that we’ll be friends someday.
Early Verdict: Next to the toilet. 10 pages in already.
More Bookmark Now Tour Stops:
I’ve updated the Bookmark Now Tour Schedule to reflect newly confirmed stops in Los Angeles and Seattle. If you live in a city I’m coming to, please let me know if you’d be willing to ride along and help out with a little-book related summer madness. If you don’t live near a city on this list, and are associated with a library, bookstore, university or community organizatio that would benefit from the wisdom of Bookmark Now (namely that literature is alive and well), please let me know.
Kevin Reviews Books…In Print:
I don’t do it a whole lot but my latest book review for the San Francisco Chronicle was published last Sunday. You can find it here.