CONDALMO.

The Canvas

Tue, 29 May 2012 19:14:19 -0400

Received this book in today’s mail

"To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries..."

Mon, 28 May 2012 18:43:01 -0400

““To acquire the habit of reading is to construct for yourself a refuge from almost all the miseries of life.””

- W. Somerset Maugham, Books and You (via 4mbivalent)

King apparently disliked Kubrick’s film adaptation, which...

Sun, 27 May 2012 16:24:34 -0400

King apparently disliked Kubrick’s film adaptation, which resulted in the godawful made-for-tv adaptation that you wouldn’t even remember if I hadn’t just typed about it. Kubrick FTW.

the-overlook-hotel:

Stanley Kubrick’s personal copy of Stephen King’s novel, The Shining. This well-worn book, normally housed in the Stanley Kubrick Archive in London but currently on tour in a traveling exhibition, is filled with Kubrick’s notes and comments. Many passages are highlighted, and Kubrick has filled the margins with hand-written notes that run the gamut from notating passages that inspired him, to crossing out sections he found silly.

(click images to enlarge)

For people of a certain age, who grew up with a certain frame of...

Sun, 27 May 2012 14:51:29 -0400

For people of a certain age, who grew up with a certain frame of reference, this is solid gold.

Some review books received this week (Taken with instagram)

Sat, 26 May 2012 10:00:50 -0400

Some review books received this week (Taken with instagram)

Succeed! In college!

Tue, 22 May 2012 11:04:00 -0400

My review of “How to Succeed in College” is in today’s Shelf Awareness. Excerpt:

Some of Jon B. Gould’s advice in How to Succeed in College (While Really Trying) is, well, depressing. Why are students being accepted into higher education if they lack knowledge about how to edit, how to revise and the difference between the two? Shouldn’t they already have a good sense of what it means to plagiarize and why it’s a bad idea? Does anyone, anywhere, think “grammar check” software will save their bacon?…

"I have come gradually to understand that the liberal arts cliché about teaching you how to think is..."

Fri, 18 May 2012 21:44:00 -0400

“I have come gradually to understand that the liberal arts cliché about teaching you how to think is actually shorthand for a much deeper, more serious idea: learning how to think really means learning how to exercise some control over how and what you think. It means being conscious and aware enough to choose what you pay attention to and to choose how you construct meaning from experience.”

- David Foster Wallace’s legendary This Is Water 2005 commencement address. (via explore-blog)

… hear part of it.

Review: "Such a Life" by Lee Martin

Thu, 17 May 2012 21:23:29 -0400

My review of Lee Martin’s “Such a Life” is in the Star Tribune this week.

“Such a Life” strikes these father-son themes throughout the collection, with some essays branching out to other topics — the difficulty of eating vegan meals in the South, or the complications of having a neighbor with deeply different political convictions — but always circling back to the relationship between fathers and sons.

"He shared some fascinating insights into his role in Tom Tykwer and Lana and Andy Wachowski’s..."

Thu, 17 May 2012 19:31:16 -0400

“He shared some fascinating insights into his role in Tom Tykwer and Lana and Andy Wachowski’s Russian doll of a movie. Or should that be roles? “I have six cameo parts in this strange, ambitious film,” Grant explained. “I do a lot of killing and raping. I wear an awful lot of prosthetic make up, too. You probably won’t know that I am in the film! But it was a laugh. I thought before I read it that I’d turn it down, which I normally do, but I was interested in meeting the Wachowskis because I have always admired them enormously. And they are so charming and fascinating.””

-
Exclusive: Hugh Grant Talks Cloud Atlas | Movie News | Empire

No words.

(via wordbrooklyn)

I’ve got some words. Fuck that fucking bullshit, get your goddamn mitts off of goddamn mother fucking Cloud Fucking Atlas, you fucking romcom fuck

Get over it, homophobes.

Wed, 16 May 2012 15:42:13 -0400

Get over it, homophobes.

"‘May I’ I asked with diffidence, ‘take a moment to acquaint myself with, and taste the fine..."

Wed, 16 May 2012 15:35:40 -0400

“‘May I’ I asked with diffidence, ‘take a moment to acquaint myself with, and taste the fine qualities of, the most sterling and serious, and therefore of course the most read and most quickly acknowledged and purchased, reading matter? You would pledge me to unusual gratitude were you to be so kind as to lay before me that book which, as certainly nobody can know so precisely as you, has found the highest place in the estimation of the reading public, as well as that of the dreaded and thence surely flatteringly circumvented critics, and which furthermore has made them merry.’”

- Robert Walser displays the correct way to approach your bookseller. From The Walk, out June 5th from New Directions in a newly mulled-over translation by Susan Bernofsky. (via mcnallyjackson)

largeheartedboy: How a book is born, via GalleyCat.

Wed, 16 May 2012 09:26:03 -0400

largeheartedboy:

How a book is born, via GalleyCat.

"I’m just old enough to remember the Great Depression. After the first few years, by the mid-1930s —..."

Tue, 15 May 2012 10:14:45 -0400

“

I’m just old enough to remember the Great Depression. After the first few years, by the mid-1930s — although the situation was objectively much harsher than it is today — nevertheless, the spirit was quite different. There was a sense that ‘we’re gonna get out of it,’ even among unemployed people, including a lot of my relatives, a sense that ‘it will get better.’

[…]

It’s quite different now. For many people in the United States, there’s a kind of pervasive sense of hopelessness, sometimes despair. I think it’s quite new in American history. And it has an objective basis.

”

- Noam Chomsky releases an Occupy pamphlet of analysis of the global movement and advice on how to protest intelligently (via explore-blog)

Take “Sherlock”, for example. Series two aired...

Tue, 15 May 2012 10:05:45 -0400

Take “Sherlock”, for example. Series two aired months ago. It’s just now making it to the U.S.

theatlantic:

Why Can’t Americans Watch British TV Shows as Soon as They Air?

56 Up, the latest installment in the extraordinary “Up Series” of documentaries, which has followed the lives of the same 14 Britons for close to 50 years, premieres tonight in England. Starting with 1964’s Seven Up, when the subjects were seven years old, the series has revisited these same 14 people (with the exception of one or two who have refused to participate at various intervals ) every seven years. This makes the series one of the most important and unique longitudinal sociological studies ever undertaken. It also makes for a riveting viewing experience. Each installment ends by default with a natural cliff-hanger. But, alas, unlike scripted television, we must wait for another seven years of real-time life to pass before we can find out what happens next. And so, like millions of other viewers from around the world, I have anxiously been anticipating 56 Up, knowing that it was due in 2012. And yet, to my surprise and dismay, 56 Up—insanely, anachronistically—is being aired exclusively in the UK this week. And that’s it. People in the US and elsewhere are unable to watch it on TV, DVD, or the web now and for the unknown near-future.

Why, in a global marketplace that has the technological capability for content to be available simultaneously around the world, aren’t people, regardless of where they live, able to enjoy content—be it 56 Up or a host of other films and shows—as soon as it’s released? Is it due to corporate contractual obligations? Is it part of global sales strategies? Or maybe just inertia of doing things the old way? The answer, I discovered, is a little bit of all three. This is bad news not only for viewers who are unable to view new content, but is often likely an economic mistake for producers as well.

Read more. [Image: The Up Series]

"The Difficulty Comes In Knowing What is Real and What is Not"

Tue, 15 May 2012 09:42:53 -0400

Andrew Ervin interviews Brian Evenson.

Exactly like this.

Sun, 13 May 2012 21:31:37 -0400

Exactly like this.

Teju Cole interview on Leonard Lopate show

Thu, 10 May 2012 09:47:00 -0400

Where the Wild Things Are

Tue, 08 May 2012 17:51:48 -0400

Where the Wild Things Are

nprfreshair: Audio is now up for our show-long Maurice Sendak...

Tue, 08 May 2012 17:20:14 -0400

nprfreshair:

Audio is now up for our show-long Maurice Sendak tribute. I cried. You might want to have tissues handy.

Chicago Tribune interview with Chard Harbach

Tue, 08 May 2012 13:52:32 -0400

Here’s your coverage of last night’s event at the Printers Row Live! conversation with Chad Harbach, author of The Art of Fielding. Representative excerpt:

What do YOU, Chard Harbach, think “Fielding” is about? The ways in which we put obstacles in fornt of ourselves and others close to us.

Well done, ChiTrib! Well done. This is fornt page journalism.