Roundup with Textbooks

The problem with textbook prices is more complex than either side (students/faculty versus textbook publishers) would lead you to believe. But exorbitant prices are being fought by a wave of open-source textbooks (yes that means free. And online).

As difficult and time-consuming as it is, one of the best exercises for writers is to copy by hand the prose of those they admire: in this case, a short story.

I’m firmly on Rushdie’s side about the cowardice of Random House in pulling a book about Muhammad’s child-bride.

Yes, library fines are necessary.

Book Signing just takes way, way, way too much work.

This is how books get made (or not) into movies.

This LA Times piece on Howard Junker and ZYZZYVA includes the information that Junker will be stepping down after twenty-five years (25!) as editor/publisher/all-other-roles-required-to-make-a-literary-journal. It will be difficult to replace such an iconic figure of the lit journal West coast world, and I’m worried whether ZYZZYVA will be able to continue.

Dan Green on Steven Millhauser:

Steven Millhauser could not really be called a neglected order drugs online in canada writer. He has won a National Book Award, his books are reviewed relatively widely and usually respectfully, and he has his share of admiring readers. But I don’t think he has been sufficiently recognized as the important and accomplished writer he really is. Since the early 1970s, he has produced a series of novels and short fiction collections that easily rival the fiction of any of his contemporaries in their imaginative depth, stylistic vigor, and formal ingenuity.

I’ve also been thinking about the connections between writers and the Olympics. The Olympics always inspire me — both the glowing successes and stumbling failures. Books — and art — aren’t exactly a competition, although the number of prizes and the cogs and wheels of the publishing industry always push us to think otherwise. Still, though, I want to write well, and push hard, and seeing the sweat and joy of athletes always pushes me back to the writing desk.