Publishing is still innovating, says Jane Friedman, so even if one type of book becomes permanently out of print, other types will live on. Printed books won’t go out of print any time soon, but other types me dominate the future market. Remember the first cell phones? What if today’s Kindles and Nooks looked like that in 10-20 years compared to what they will become?
Category Archives: Authors
Klavan on Steyn
I got through my first day at work with a cast (I guess it’s technically a splint) all right. The big nuisance is shifting my car.
Andrew Klavan (you probably weren’t aware, but I’m a fan of his) writes a tribute to Mark Steyn today at Pajamas Media:
But perhaps I wasn’t made to be a doomsayer. The dying of things—of art forms and civilizations as well as people—seems to me the inevitable and steady state of the world: a point of view that leaves me prone more to melancholy than to panic. What I really care about now is the immortal parts of mortal enterprise. I want to get at the spirit of human business: the wisdom and vitality of a culture’s Great Moment preserved in the artifacts it leaves behind. The irrelevant—the stuff that doesn’t matter but is simply beautiful—the music, the poetry, the pictures and storytelling—the arts—that’s where all the joy is, and it’s the joy that seems more urgent to me as the years pass.
A Whole Bunch of Writing Tips
Steve Silberman is writing a book on “autism, the variety of human cognitive styles, and the rise of the neurodiversity movement.” He’s written articles in the past, but with the opportunity to put together 100k on a subject he is passionate about, he began to get nervous. He writes:
I’ve chosen to deal with my anxiety by tapping into the wisdom of the hive mind. I recently sent email to the authors in my social network and asked them, “What do you wish you’d known about the process of writing a book that you didn’t know before you did it?”
Several authors replied. Here’s one from Cory Doctorow that I wrestle with: “Write even when the world is chaotic. You don’t need a cigarette, silence, music, a comfortable chair, or inner peace to write. You just need ten minutes and a writing implement.” (via Books, Inq.)
Interview with a Superagent
The man behind the Wylie Agency speaks to the Wall Street Journal Magazine about his aggressive deals and some of the needs in the publishing industry. “I think most of the best-sellers list is the literary equivalent of daytime television. This is a world in which Danielle Steel is mysteriously more valuable than Shakespeare,” Wylie states.
Hans Christian Andersen, in person
Tomorrow I head south to Story City, Iowa for their annual Scandinavian festival, and on Sunday I’ll be at Danish Day at the Danish American Center in Minneapolis. So I won’t be posting tomorrow. I’m sure Phil will have wonderful things to share, which will ease your keen sense of loss.
Speaking of Denmark, I thought it would be nice to share a few excerpts from J. R. Browne’s report on his meeting with Hans Christian Andersen (I spelled it wrong last time), in his book The Land of Thor, which I reviewed yesterday.
Presently I heard a rapid step and the door was thrown open. Before me stood a tall, thin, shambling, raw-boned figure of a man a little beyond the prime of life, but not yet old, with a pair of dancing gray eyes and a hatchet-face, all alive with twists, and wrinkles, and muscles; a long, lean face, upon which stood out prominently a great nose, diverted by a freak of nature a little to one side, and flanked by a tremendous pair of cheek-bones, with great hollows underneath. Innumerable ridges and furrows swept semicircularly downward around the corners of a great mouth—a broad, deep, rugged fissure across the face, that might have been mistaken for the dreadful child-trap of an ogre but for the sunny beams of benevolence that lurked around the lips, and the genial humanity that glimmered from every nook and turn… a long, bony pair of arms, with long hands on them, a long, lank body, with a long black coat on it; a long, loose pair of legs, with long boots on the feet, all in motion at the same time—all shining, and wriggling and working with an indescribable vitality, a voice bubbling up from the vast depths below with cheery, spasmodic, and unintelligible words of welcome—this was the wonderful man that stood before me…. I would have picked him out from among a thousand men at first glance as a candidate for Congress, or the proprietor of a tavern, if I had met him any where in the United States….
“Come in! come in!” he said, in a gush of broken English; “come in and sit down. You are very welcome. Thank you—thank you very much. I am very glad to see you. It is a rare thing to meet a traveler all the way from California—quite a surprise. Sit down! Thank you!” Continue reading Hans Christian Andersen, in person
Klavan Reviews Mamet's Secret Knowledge
Andrew Klavan reviews playwright David Mamet’s new book The Secret Knowledge: On the Dismantling of American Culture
In fact, “The Secret Knowledge,” written in Mr. Mamet’s tough and funny style, is entertainingly informative. But the book only really becomes indispensable when it is personal and specific to Mr. Mamet’s experience.
The Search and The Snare
Walker Percy: “The search is what anyone would undertake if he were not sunk in the everydayness of his own life.”
John Flavel: “It may keep one more humble and watchful in prosperity, to consider that among Christians many have been much the worse for it.”
Click the links for more from each author.
Francis Chan on Erasing Hell
A moving presentation by Pastor Francis Chan on understanding the mind and motives of God related to justice and mercy.
The Secret to Writing in the Internet Age
Author Joseph Finder talks about what he does to keep distraction at bay. He’s got a new book coming too, so the YouTube page has a soft sell on that, but it’s not in this video.
Breitbart Explains the American Political Landscape
Andrew Breitbart has written a book about his political transformation from simple liberal to crusading conservative. It’s Righteous Indignation: Excuse Me While I Save the World! Host Armstrong Williams interviews him for BookTV and praises his book highly. Watch the video. It’s dynamite. He talks about the poverty of major media outlets. He describes how the Tea Party crowd was slandered when protesting Obamacare, and he explains how he created The Huffington Post.