“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.”
Tag: 04.15.10
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.”
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.”
WSJ Readers, Renee Fleming Says She’s Available
“At one point during the interview Ms. Fleming said she wanted to perform at private concerts–for corporations, say –but started to explain that they are difficult to slot into a schedule booked so far in advance. ‘Oh, wait,’ she said, stopping. ‘This is for The Wall Street Journal, right? I would love to do more private concerts.'”
A Winning, Hidden Property Of Printed Books
“I love the typefaces and the bindings and the feel of well-made paper. But what I really love is their inertness. No matter how I shake ‘Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland,’ mushrooms don’t tumble out of the upper margin, unlike the ‘Alice’ for the iPad.”
The Arts People, Hats In Hand, On Capitol Hill
“The sessions on Tuesday and Wednesday were serious yet chummy” as “a parade of cultural agency administrators … appeared this week before the House Appropriations subcommittee that controls the purse strings of the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Gallery of Art, the Kennedy Center and others.”