Maya Angelou. Credit: Astrid Stawiarz / Getty Images.
It's been quite an interesting news week in the literary and publishing world. Here's the lit news round up for the week of March 1 - 6 2009:
James Franco is publishing a short story collection under Scribner.
Random House, the world's largest publisher, acquires Berkeley's independent Ten Speed Press. I muse on the reasons why.
Maya Angelou reveals she does not tweet. Then who's behind the @mayaangelo Twitter account with 2,495 followers? A 20-year-old artist named Lee.
In other Twitter news, SF-ers Dom Sagolla and Adam Jackson of 140 Characters are writing a style guide for Twitter. It will be released as an iPhone app and a book.
Stacey's Bookstore on Market St hosts its final author reading before its close.
San Francisco's own Laura Albert, the writer behind the JT Leroy hoax, has published a short story under her own name. Her lawyer Donald David (if he is who he says he is) chastises me in the comments.
Critics love or hate Jonathan Littell's fictional Holocaust memoir The Kindly Ones.
Barnes & Noble announces the winners of their Discover Great New Writers Awards.
The NY Times introduces best sellers lists for comic works.
The University of Virgina holds an exhibition for the anniversary of Edgar Allen Poe's birthday. Among the artifacts on display? A 1842 letter in which Poe apologizes to his publisher for drinking too much.
Comments
To answer your question, I am who I "say I am." I even provided you with my email address. And, if you believe that I am "chastising" you by suggesting that you be accurate and factual in what you write, which presumably is not fiction, I believe that is half the problem. That is not personal, it is just a suggestion that you might want to provide your readers with the accurate story.
Hi Donald. By all means, I invite you to correct me whenever you see something amiss, as I do with all my readers. It's never too late to correct an entry. In this case however, I am still not clear exactly what I've written that is "fictional". My March 4 post on Albert writing fiction under her own name was reported in Galleycat and the New Yorker blog. I wrote, "This time, she's writing fiction under her own name" — a sentence you seemed to take issue with. Please clarify instead of making vague accusations. P.S. Your e-mail address, along with the statement that you're being Albert's lawyer, is very readily available online, and any hoaxster could be "you."
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