Asides

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On the death of quicksand. http://www.slate.com/id/2264312/

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As with the iPad (or the Newton before it), who would want to buy a printed book, and why? (via @GrantaMag) http://bit.ly/d98loD

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Such falsehoods never damage Palin's credibility [...] because information and ideology are incidental to this relationship http://bit.ly/9m9wVj

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Ten of the best railway journeys in literature http://bit.ly/931Q1q (via @GuardianBooks). Greene and Maclean share the honors...

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Inside the Knockoff-Tennis-Shoe Factory http://nyti.ms/angDkA (via nytimes)

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'Fierce Reader' - A Kermode tribute by John Sutherland http://bit.ly/a2OzRo via GuardianBooks

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James Patterson now the world's highest earning author, $70m this year. And he doesn't even write his books. http://bit.ly/bDIp09

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Hitchens on Wodehouse, circa 2004. The Honorable Schoolboy. http://bit.ly/8Zu2gF

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20 point primary lead . Time to bring back the maverick. RT @nprpolitics: After A Turn To The Right, McCain Looks Ahead http://n.pr/9RbjJj

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Fake medical treatment can work amazingly well. (Link)

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8,000-page Philip K. Dick manuscript to be published and edited by Jonathan Lethem (via @ScottEsposito)

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The Guardian's roundup of the Best Children's Books ever. (via @nilanjanaroy )

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How the 500 euro note became the denomination of choice for criminal gangs (via @BBC_magazine )

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Great NYRB review of Sam Lipsyte's The Ask.

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Pico Iyer on Jan Morris and VS Naipaul.

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Why would man pursuing U.S. citizenship for 10 yrs suddenly decide to commit terrorism? Link. (via @ultrabrown)

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(Very Readable) Joseph Pulitzer profile. http://tabletmag.com/arts-and-culture/books/29662/no-prize/

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A A$20000 typo that called for "fresh ground black people" instead of "pepper." http://publishingperspectives.com/?p=14590 (via BookNinja)

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The men that make Obama funny.

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Dated, but funny. Yann Martel tries to get the Canadian PM to read.

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Notes on why the novel and the Internet are opposites.

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TEV : "Often, we can't recall the details of what we read, but we can summon back the tonal memory of the work."

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Does it matter when good writers turn out to be jerks in real life? Link.

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Ang Lee to direct Life of Pi. In 3D.

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Fascinating read. "Game theory and modeling human behavior"

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My love blasted you from my mind, Your skin too silken to be seen; via @mvatlarge a Clegg "poem" from when he was 17. http://bit.ly/9xeDZ3

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RT @MAOrthofer In The Hindu Seema Sanghi reports on translating Kafka into Tamil http://bit.ly/acNo38

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Great Gatsby among America's 40 worst books? Yeah, really. http://bit.ly/bAQ0zi

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Faulkner: Mailman, Kafka: Legal Secretary. Author Day Jobs from http://bit.ly/cvrWew (via http://bit.ly/cGeN2g)

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How the paperback novel changed American Literatue http://bit.ly/cvrWew (via @mathitak)

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While on Le Carre's inspirations, a blogger on how Le Carre altered his backstory ever so slightly. http://bit.ly/anWsky.

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John Le Carre's inspirations. Fascinating read from the Times. http://bit.ly/byqamf

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RT @mathitak: Arthur Phillips lists six fictional works set in places their authors never visited. http://bit.ly/9uQlEb

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Amitav Ghosh shares the $1M Dan David prize. http://bit.ly/ar6qh1 No coincidence that it happened after our handshake at the Miami Book fair

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Why are novels the length they are? http://bit.ly/ad3YeV

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Tracking a letter to the President. http://bit.ly/d4m1pr

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RT @BorowitzReport: Vatican sex scandal couldn't come at a worse time for the Pope, who was about to sign an endorsement deal with Nike.

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+1. RT @mvatlarge: Hitchens: Britain should arrest the pope. http://bit.ly/bC45Hx

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Tom Swick on travel writing in the Youtube age. http://bit.ly/dgFsDe (via http://aldaily.com)

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Hilary Mantel interview in the Telegraph. Very Cool. http://bit.ly/cQsznL

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The Lost Man Booker prize shortlist. http://bit.ly/aOuEiE

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David Foster Wallace marks up a student's paper. "Problematize is a bullshit academic word. Shun it. Fly it. Trust me." http://bit.ly/c6R9bU

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The Devil and Sherlock Holmes, a new book by David Grann, my favorite non-fiction writer not counting Gawande: http://bit.ly/9PopEg

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The mention of snipers always brings to mind this Ian Rankin pulp-that-is-more-than-just-pulp: http://bit.ly/biMWEA

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Snipers might have found the war that needs them the most. Langewiesche on Afghanistan. http://bit.ly/bn7qrf

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Why Marlowe's still the chief of detectives: http://bit.ly/7BTlCG (via aldaily)

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A possible Salinger book deal that almost happened: http://bit.ly/cfyrC8 (via BoingBoing)

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The Onion has some inside dope on how the iPad was designed ;) http://onion.com/d1F1wc

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The fight against the common cold: http://bit.ly/8YyQeq

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Michael Dirda on the "new" Nabokov: "Posthumous collection of rough drafts and authorial notes" Link.



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Are reviewers just jealous of Malcom Gladwell?



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Would Roald Dahl have liked Wes Anderson's Fantastic Mr. Fox? His widow thinks yes, James Parker disagrees...



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Video of a surprisingly long Philip Roth interview with Tina Brown of the Daily Beast.



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From the department of unlikely quotes, here's E.B White (Strunk & White): “I hate the guts of English grammar”  Link.



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Plagiarism Software Finds a New Shakespeare Play. Link



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Roth accompanies fans visiting the landmarks from his books. "Newark is my Stockholm and that plaque is my prize".  Link.



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He's 'cowardly, dysfunctional and immature'. Rushdie and Pia Glenn wash dirty linen. Link (via @SanSip)



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"Mad" bus rammed 20 cars and in the center of Perm. Link.



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William Deresiewicz's review of Atwoods latest.



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Life imitates Arrested Development: Prisoner escaped after swapping identity with twin brother.  Link.



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Do Beck and Limbaugh believe what they say? A David Frum thought experiment.



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Reactions to the original (New Yorker) story about Obama's increasing reliance on Drones in Afghanistan. Link.



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A Hilary Mantel interview from the Globe: http://bit.ly/40eS1x

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Great post on Jack Kerouac from The Reading Experience. http://bit.ly/42aoq5

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The former first lady as a literary device. http://bit.ly/4tRyWt

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And from the Guardian book blog, the Wong Fook Hing bookstore. http://bit.ly/3dG0f2

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Flashback from the LA Times. A '69 review of Slaughterhouse Five.... http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacketcopy/2009/10/vonnegut.html

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Fascinating read. RT @manish_vij: ('96) India de facto banned 'The Moor's Last Sigh' by stopping imports (fixed review date) http://3.ly/cWo

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Price war over books worries industry. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/17/books/17price.html

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Junot Diaz talks about his struggles, and the things that made him a writer. http://bit.ly/pcNqJ (Via The Afterword)

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And here's Philip Roth on (among other things) Obama, again from the Times. http://bit.ly/4v0c2Y (Both links via @mathitak)

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John Irving interview in the Times UK.  Link.

“I am not at all at peace, or even comfortable, living in the United States,” he writes. “Both as an artist and as a liberal, I would not choose to live in the United States, but I am from here, and I have ties here.

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Wal-Mart vs Amazon. $9 bestsellers! Link.

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The cover of the uncensored, unauthorized Simpsons bio. Very cool. Link.  (via )

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'Look at the Birdie'. Previously unpublished Vonnegut story.

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The inescapable W.B. Yeats. http://bostonreview.net/BR34.5/huddleston.php

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Freewheeling Amartya Sen interview from Outlook.

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The Great Balloon Boy Hoax. More evidence that The Simpsons  have said everything there is to say about everything.

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Fascinating look behind the scenes at The Simpsons. (and how Fox tried to keep it under wraps) Daily Beast Link.  (via @bookninja)

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Libraries wade into digital lending, and publishers naturally want them to unwade. Link.

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Barnes and Noble e-reader looks like a Kindle crossed with an iPhone Link.  (via @npbooks, @mashable)

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The Guardian on the Disneyfication of Fairy Tales.

[...]the picture painted by the Grimms was of a vast, dark, world-encompassing forest in which still darker deeds were committed – and went unpunished.

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Barnes and Noble might debut its own e-book reader soon. Link. (via @bookninja)

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Report: Majority Of Newspapers Now Purchased By Kidnappers To Prove Date.  From, who else, The Onion.

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The Lost Pleasure of Browsing (for books and brides). Link.

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The National Book Awards shortlist is out. Eggers and Vidal to get special awards. Link. (via @npbooks)

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Banksy does to Pooh what Hirst did for sharks: Link.  ; Time offers a brief history of Pooh.  (via @nilanjanaroy)

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The Lost Prestige of Nuclear Physics. (via aldaily.com)

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THE BBC magazine on how it feels to suddenly have no identity. Link.  (via @the_magazine)

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Norman Rush has nothing but praise for James Ellroy in the NYRB.

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The Guardian celebrates the Mantel and Mueller wins as the "celebration of high quality over high profile."  Link

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After the initial angst, people seem to be coming around to the view that Mueller isn't so bad after all: The Complete Review, and The Literary Kicks both have good words for her.

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Rush Limbaugh to judge Miss America contest.  Clearly, the best judge they could find. (via @ScottEsposito)

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Jonathan Freedland: "Obama's Nobel: It Makes Sense in Norway" http://blogs.nybooks.com

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Nice piece on US reactions to Herta Mueller.  (via @MAOrthofer)

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Gladwell asks if dogfighting and football are really that different.

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"Complicity." A Julian Barnes short story in the New Yorker this week.

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The Secret Sentry: The Untold History of the National Security Agency, from the NYRB

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What happens when a Facebook addict deletes herself?

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Jennifer Schuessler writes - The Children's book's "ambition slows even its most absorbing storylines to a stutter."