 |
| David Lynch, 'Good Day Today' |
 |
| Joy Division, 'She's Lost Control'/'Atmosphere' single. Art direction: Peter Saville. |
 |
| Photograph: Friedhelm Rathjen |
 |
| Saul Bellow, Letters, edited by Benjamin Taylor |
 |
| Joy Division (Closer re-issue booklet). Photograph: Anton Corbijn. |
 |
| Joy Division, Unknown Pleasures. Design: Peter Saville. |
 |
| Joy Division, Closer. Design: Peter Saville. |
 |
| Joy Division, Still. Design: Peter Saville. |
 |
| Joy Division, Singles +-. Design: Peter Saville. |
 |
| Terrence Malick, Days of Heaven (1978) |
 |
| Robert Darnton, The Case for Books: Past, Present, and Future |
[...] the collection of linked essays begins with an interrogative piece focused on the Google Books digitization initiative and its potential impact for scholars and readers worldwide in the rapidly changing world of new media. The book continues with essays that focus on the opportunities supplied through the emergent world of digital economies over the last fifteen years. The final section offers some interesting insights into the politics of textual conservation (and how they may have failed dismally in the post-war era), as well as the value of book history and bibliography in sounding the depths of textual uncertainty, effortlessly bringing Shakespeare, commonplace books and Voltaire into his ruminations. [Read more]Darnton remains cautious of the electronic format as a publishing medium, and raises concerns about the corporate administration of digital libraries and archival resources. One might weigh the removal, replacement or destruction of original hard copies against greater electronic accessibility. But is this necessarily the case? Darnton questions the legitimacy of the claim, and wonders whether corporate ownership might in fact limit public access to important literary and historical texts. Could a greater reliance on digitization become a barrier to future scholars?
 |
| Angela Morgan Cutler, The Letter |
 |
| Design: Rhys Tranter |
 |
| Woody Allen |
 |
| The Letters of Samuel Beckett (Volume II), 1941-1956 |
This second volume of The Letters of Samuel Beckett opens with the war years, when it was often impossible or too dangerous to correspond. The surge of letters beginning in 1945, and their variety, are matched by the outpouring and the range of Beckett's published work. Primarily written in French and later translated by the author, the work includes stories, a series of novels (Molloy, Malone meurt and L'Innommable), essays and plays – most notably En attendant Godot. The letters chronicle a passionately committed but little known writer evolving into a figure of international reputation, and his response to such fame. The volume provides detailed introductions which discuss Beckett's situation during the war and his crucial move into the French language, as well as translations of the letters, explanatory notes, year-by-year chronologies, profiles of correspondents and other contextual information. [Read more]Publisher's Website: The Letters of Samuel Beckett: Volume 2, 1941 - 1956, eds. Martha Dow Fehsenfeld, Lois More Overbeck, Dan Gunn & George Craig, Cambridge University Press
 |
| Margaret Atwood is interviewed on BBC's Woman's Hour |
 |
| Photograph: Johnny Savage |
 |
| Joyce Carol Oates, Sourland |
 |
| J. G. Ballard, The Complete Short Stories (Paperback) |
 |
| Michael Lawrence in Krapp, 39. Photograph: Dixie Sheridan © 2009 |
Michael Lawrence: Krapp, 39 really started out as a lark. An actor’s stunt. I’ve always loved Beckett’s Krapp’s Last Tape. For me it is a seminal solo show, and a masterpiece of minimalism and modernism. And it’s one of those roles, like Lear, I suppose, that lies in wait for you at the end of your acting career like a mountain summit, if you’re lucky enough to make it that far. Years ago I saw a beautiful production by my friend Jason Bauer in a basement theater in the East Village, NYC. Jason was in his early thirties at the time, but with a fearlessness that was typical of him, he took on the role of old man Krapp and was transcendent. Jason tragically died of alcoholism a few years later at the age of 39. Which is very spooky in a way, because that is the age of Krapp’s recorded 'younger self' that 69-year-old Krapp listens to in the play. Anyway, walking home in the snow that night after seeing his production, I got it in my head that when I turned 39, I would record the 39-year-old Krapp’s monologue so that I could use it in the year 2038 when I’m 69 and ready to play the role. Like I said, an actor’s stunt, but it made me smile.The production runs from 22nd November - 22nd December, excluding Sundays.
Fast-forward to 2008, and I was about to turn 39, and the themes of Beckett’s play were burning inside me: end of youth, artistic failure, loss of romantic love. (And the death of a parent - my own mother had passed away from cancer not so long ago - another tragic, early death.)
 |
| Waiting for Godot in New Orleans, 2007. Photograph: Donn Young |
Over the six decades since its first performance, Godot has been staged on countless occasions and in radically contrasting circumstances, whether by convicts in California's San Quentin Prison in 1957, or in war-torn Sarajevo in 1993, or by survivors of Hurricane Katrina in an open-air production in New Orleans in 2007. It may justifiably be claimed that the play's central figure - albeit absent, and possibly non-existent - has by now assumed his own existence, independent of both play and author. Godot is a 'pop culture ghost' [a phrase of Kim Newman's], materialising in a huge variety of cultural and commercial contexts. There is a rich Godot cartoon tradition, and job advertisements or car insurance dealers routinely enjoin readers not to carry on 'waiting for Godot' but to apply immediately. Despite his non-appearance, Godot has passed into idiom.Also at A Piece of Monologue:
Pozzo's stutter of uncertainty - 'I myself in your situation, if I had an appointment with a Godin ... Godet ... Godot ... anyhow, you see who I mean, I'd wait till it was black night before I gave up' - is striking in that it combines a threatened sense of Godot's importance with an airy vagueness about his name, succeeding only on the third attempt. All the names have an identical first syllable, 'God', and some commentators have argued either that the play is a modern morality tale, a dramatisation of mankind's need - however unspoken - for a 'God'; or alternatively a post-theistic play, illustrating His/Her factitiousness, or His/Her aloofness from the travails of the created order.
Waiting is certainly a well-established concept within a number of faiths, including Christianity, but normally involves a good measure of willed anticipation and optimism. The deferred gratification represented by Godot, by contrast, is no more secure, no more imminent, by the end of the play than it is at the beginning. The only surety is the renewability of waiting. Moreover, En attendant Godot was written originally in French, a language in which god-, far from having theological associations, prefixes a range of words denoting material objects, such as godemiché [dildo], or slang usages (godiche [ninny]). The second of Pozzo's tryouts - 'Godet' - means a goblet or pot, and is used colloquially in prendre un godet [to have a jar]. These earthy, homely words are just as consonant with Vladimir and Estragon's physical extension as any spiritual referent intended to endorse their occasional glances towards the metaphysical.
Mary Bryden, 'Preface'in Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot (Faber and Faber, 2010)
 |
| Paul Auster at his home in Brooklyn, New York |
Goodreads: Now for a few questions from our community. Goodreads member Kirstie Shanley would like to hear your favorite story about another author.Also at A Piece of Monologue:
Paul Auster: I do have a beloved story about another author that I believe is true, and I hope is true, because of how I feel about that author. I used the story in my novel Brooklyn Follies. It is, I believe, a true story: Kafka and his last lover, Dora, were walking in a Berlin park together and came upon a little girl crying because she had lost her doll. Kafka told her that he knew for a fact that the doll was fine, because he had had a letter from her. When the girl asked to see it, he told her he had not brought it with him but would return the next day with the letter. Thus began a series of elaborate letters from the doll posted from various locations. It's a wonderful story, not least because it shows such compassion on Kafka's part.
Goodreads: Goodreads member Anton Roe wonders how much you are influenced by your wife, the novelist Siri Hustvedt (and in turn, how you influence her). How much do you share during the writing process?
Paul Auster: Siri and I have been together for 30 years and have shared our work with each other from the very beginning. As I write my books I'm reading them out loud, carrying pages home, eagerly awaiting her comments. She's brilliant. I don't think there's a comment she's made that I haven't taken to heart over those years. Conversely, I read everything she writes, in her finished draft.
I think in order to do this kind of thing, number one you have to have total faith in the other person—believe in that person's project, and be completely honest. You can't just pat the other on the back. We do our thing separately but we share it.
Goodreads: Describe a typical day spent writing. Do you have any unusual writing habits? Goodreads member Susan recalls that you've said you always write in notebooks. She asks, "Can you talk a little more about your writing process and your notebook collection?"
Paul Auster: There was a Monty Python sketch that showed Thomas Hardy writing in front of a live audience, and when he'd finish a sentence, they'd all cheer. Then he'd cross out a sentence, and they'd all boo or sigh. That's about as exciting a life as it is for a writer: You write sentences, and you cross out sentences.
My day begins as all days begin for every human being. You wake up—if you're alive, you wake up—pot of tea, read the paper, then walk to the little apartment three blocks away where I have my separate writing spot. It's very Spartan here, nothing to do but work. I spend as much time as I can writing each day, which usually means from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.—basically a 9-5 schedule. Some days one has more stamina, you're more on fire, it's a marathon so you have to pace yourself.
I do have a few unusual writing habits—I'm a dinosaur now. I write everything by hand and type it up on an old manual typewriter, an Olympia 1961. The one time any serious damage was done to it was when my now-33-year-old son was two, and he snapped off the return arm. I had to take it to a shop that was very much like the Hospital of Broken Objects in Sunset Park.
I can say this, I've never been able to compose on a keyboard. I need a pen or a pencil in my hand, feel that it's a very physical activity. When I write, words are literally coming out of my body.
I'm very particular about my notebooks, and 95 percent of the time they are the same kind of notebook: They're made in France and are very tall—Clairefontaine brand, 24 x 32 centimeters. They're filled with pages of graph paper, which I like, as my handwriting is rather small.
I tend to buy notebooks whenever I travel. I have Norwegian notebooks, Japanese notebooks, Australian notebooks. I write with a fountain pen, and over the years I've experimented with many different kinds of fountain pens, but for the past decade or so I've been using an Italian brand called Aurora. I do write with pencils, too, and those are always Pentel mechanical pencils with 0.5 leads. I told you I have small handwriting! [Read more]
 |
| Don DeLillo, End Zone |
 |
| Kraftwerk: Music Non-Stop |
 |
| Don DeLillo, Cosmopolis. (March 2011) |
 |
| Don DeLillo, Endzone. (March 2011) |
 |
| Don DeLillo, Falling Man. (March 2011) |
 |
| Don DeLillo, Great Jones Street. (March 2011) |
 |
| Don DeLillo, Running Dog. (March 2011) |
 |
| Don DeLillo, The Body Artist. (March 2011) |
 |
| Don DeLillo, White Noise. (March 2011) |
 |
| J. G. Ballard |
 |
| Jacques Derrida. Photograph: Richard Melloul/Sygma/Corbis |
In addressing a philosopher of the importance of Jacques Derrida, whose massive output – about 60 volumes not including his as yet unpublished seminars – has been translated and debated the world over, Benoît Peeters has quite rightly chosen not the origins or content of the work itself, but the life of the man behind it. In short, he has written an excellent biography entirely in keeping with Anglo-Saxon traditions. He is the first to have gained access to the writer's records at France's Institute of Contemporary Publishing Archives and the Langson Library at the University of California, Irvine. He also interviewed around 100 essential figures.Also at A Piece of Monologue:
He has reconstructed the events that prompted a young, non-practising Jew, born in 1930 in Algeria and banned from his lycée in 1942 by the Vichy government, to move to Paris in 1949 to study at the Lycée Louis le Grand, subsequently graduating to the Ecole Normale Supérieure.
In 1966, after acquainting himself with the work of the phenomenologist Edmund Husserl, Derrida took part in the celebrated symposium on structuralism organised by Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore that brought together Roland Barthes, Jean-Pierre Vernant, Jean Hyppolite, René Girard and Jacques Lacan, among others. A year later he met Paul de Man, a theorist of modernist literary criticism, who introduced him to several US universities. He was soon rewarded with considerable success, particularly after the publication of De la Grammatologie (Of Grammatology) and L'Ecriture et la Différence (Writing and Difference). Over the next 10 years he found his place between two generations of brilliant thinkers, engaging in constant dialogue with Emmanuel Lévinas, Maurice Blanchot, Jean Genet, Michel Foucault, Pierre Bourdieu and Louis Althusser.
Meanwhile, he worked hard on research, teaching and publication. In 1983, with several fellows, he founded the International College of Philosophy, then took up a post at the Graduate School of Social Sciences. His fame spread and his virulent critique of Marxism, structuralism and a certain ideal of overturning the established order – mistakenly seen as "1968" thinking – percolated down through French public opinion. From 1986 he increasingly came under attack. The tide of hatred grew so strong as to dash any hopes of election to the Collège de France.
In fact, Derrida remained a social democrat opposed to colonialism and capital punishment, a feminist, a true Enlightenment scholar, attached to republican values, and an admirer of De Gaulle and Mandela. But from around 1987, as Peeters points out, he was successively depicted as an anti-democratic nihilist and an adept of two Nazi theorists – Carl Schmitt and Martin Heidegger – whose work he had investigated, then as an extreme leftwinger, on account of Spectres de Marx (Spectres of Marx), a major work on the concept of revolution. Finally he was accused of being a Nazi, after making a clumsy attempt to defend his friend De Man, whose murky past working on an antisemitic Belgian newspaper had emerged after his death.
Peeters sheds light on all this nonsense while revealing the many facets of a passionate thinker who travelled widely and invented a new language of philosophy. This explains his interest in a wide range of subjects (literature, law), social situations (exclusion, homosexuality) and struggles against suffering and discrimination (racism, antisemitism). [Read more]
