Author: Laura Collins Hughes

Touring Authors’ Secret Weapon: The Literary Escort

“Escorts immediately make you feel as if you had known them for decades. Their duties range from bypassing pileups on I-95 to purchasing double soy lattes to explaining why only one person showed up at your reading in Winnetka. … They are a vanishing feature of the landscape — even though most people are unaware of their existence — a testament to that amazing American ability to create niche careers where no such careers should exist.”

Hemingway Left His Moveable Feast The Way He Wanted It

Author A.E. Hotchner, who delivered Ernest Hemingway’s manuscript of “A Moveable Feast” to publisher Charles Scribner Jr., writes that Scribner’s new “bowdlerized version” of the book is the result of a “frivolous incursion,” as well as a false assertion, by a Hemingway grandson. Contrary to the grandson’s claim, at Hemingway’s death the manuscript was not in shards but ready for publication.

Who’ll Buy Live Nation’s Fleet Of UK Theatres?

“Live Nation has officially signalled its intention to offload its portfolio of UK theatres. That portfolio includes two major West End musical houses (the Lyceum and Apollo Victoria), a one-third stake in the Dominion, and some 14 regional houses, including major theatres in Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol, Edinburgh and Oxford.” Whoever buys them will buy — or, likely, expand — a power base as well.

Cultural Olympiad Gets £16M And A Boldface Board

“Tony Hall, chief executive of the Royal Opera House, was today confirmed as the chair of a new Cultural Olympiad board,” which “will comprise Arts Council chief executive Alan Davey, Royal Shakespeare Company director Vicky Heywood, Barbican managing director Sir Nicholas Kenyon, BBC director general Mark Thompson, Tate director Sir Nicholas Serota, the mayor’s adviser on arts and culture Munira Mirza, and Jude Kelly, the Southbank Centre artistic director who has been overseeing the project to date.”

Vatican Accepts Oscar Wilde Into The Fold

“In life, he was about as likely to get an audience with the Pope as Pontius Pilate. Now, more than a century after his death, Oscar Wilde,” who converted to Catholicism on his deathbed, “has been claimed by The Vatican as one of its own. … Moves to rehabilitate Wilde began two years ago when his aphorisms were included in a collection of maxims and witticisms for Christians published by Father Leonardo Sapienza, head of protocol at the Vatican.”

Are The Proms Living Up To Their Promise?

“[D]o the Proms actually matter – meaning, are they a truly live force in our culture? It’s a fair question, because there’s no doubt that the Proms were a truly live force when they were born in 1895. What founder Robert Newman promised was nothing less than a social and musical revolution. ‘I will run nightly concerts and train the public by easy stages,’ he declared, ‘Popular at first, gradually raising the standard.'”

Sears Tower Takes A New Name, And Its Identity Blurs

“How would New Yorkers feel if the owners of the Empire State or Chrysler Buildings sold off the naming rights to those buildings? How would Parisians react if the Eiffel Tower changed names? … Putting your name on the city’s–and the nation’s–tallest building is a privilege that should be earned, not simply coaxed out of owners in a real estate deal.”