Applauding Sarah Kaufman’s Pulitzer Prize, John Rockwell notes that “there are two anomalies to her well-deserved win. First, she’s one of the last of a dying breed. Apart from her and Alastair Macaulay, my successor at the NY Times, who else is a full-time staff dance critic in American journalism anymore?”
Author: Laura Collins Hughes
Thanks To Ash Cloud, A Strangely Quiet London Book Fair
Monday, the start of the London Book Fair, “was described as a ‘surreal’ first day, with LBF organisers now actively assessing a ‘missed appointments’ day on Thursday…. Andrew Franklin, managing director of Profile, said: ‘It’s looking really forlorn. It’s been very hard to conduct business because there is no [one] here to conduct it with.'”
Where Literature And Rock Music Intersect
“The literary game is a dangerous one. Art schools have long been considered breeding grounds for bands — the Rolling Stones, Wire, Roxy Music — but there are surprisingly few graduates in English on the scene. While a casual allusion is often a safe bet for reflected cool, more sustained homage runs the risk of pretension.”
At Cannes, Art And Money Vie For Prominence
The art-house directors whose movies will compete at next month’s Cannes Film Festival “have their adoring hardcore cineaste fans but most could stroll unmolested through any multiplex in the English speaking world.” Not so the Hollywood behemoths who will be in attendance as well.
Terry Gilliam To Direct At English National Opera
“The Oscar-nominated screenwriter will direct a new production of Berlioz’s The Damnation of Faust. … Gilliam, who made his name with the British comedy series Monty Python, has also directed several Hollywood films, including the recent The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.”
Sylvia And Ted Chat About Their Romance
From the British Library comes “an audio CD of Plath recordings, including a rare recording of Plath and Hughes talking about their relationship. The poet, who committed suicide in 1963 aged 30, is heard speaking cheerily about life in England, and about her meeting and marriage to Hughes.”
Philadelphia, Hotbed Of Novel-Writing
“The difference between Philly and Flatbush is that our region’s emerging novelists did not move here in search of a scene. They were already here – raising children or working in unrelated careers.” And most of them are women.
National Gallery Of Canada Bars Minors From Part Of Show
“Because of sexually explicit content” in the exhibition “Pop Life,” from the Tate Modern, “visitors who wish to enter two of the exhibit halls will be asked to show identification to prove that they are over 18. The gallery has restricted parts of exhibits in the past but officials who were questioned Wednesday could not remember entire rooms being blocked off.”
Seiji Ozawa, Too, Will Miss Tanglewood This Year
The Boston Symphony Orchestra announced “that its former musical director says he needed to cancel more engagements than originally planned so that he could fully concentrate on continuing treatment” for esophageal cancer. “Ozawa was scheduled to lead BSO in [Lenox], Mass. on July 24 and 25.”
Word Of Mouth Drove Small-Press Tinkers To Pulitzer
“The author’s unlikely success story is rooted in a series of personal interactions between publishers, booksellers, and reviewers that launched a book the old-fashioned way. … [T]he success of ‘Tinkers’ can be linked to a handful of people who were so moved by the richly lyrical story of an old man facing his final days that they had to tell others about it.”