The Facebook Book

My new book, For My Next Illusion I Will Use Wings, will be published in print in Hebrew in a couple of months. But at the beginning of January 2012 I decided to try something new, and published a free digital copy of it on… Facebook.

The idea of publishing an entire new collection of very short stories on Facebook was, in part, an experiment to see how literature can become more social. The digital format has enormous advantages for the reader; but most of the time digital formats still try to imitate the experience of reading a book in print (paging, bookmarks, virtual bookshelf, etc). I wanted to see if it could be different: how literature could evolve if the reader can see who of his friends likes the same stories, who is sharing the stories he shared with others, how does the book endure with readers’ comments on every page, visible to all.

Poets at the Superbowl

“It’s halftime in America,” Clint Eastwood said on Super Bowl Sunday. It was during an ad that caused all the conversations at the party I was at to stop (mostly so everyone could say, “Is that Clint Eastwood?”).

But now that the bacon explosion has settled and I’ve given the ad a second look, it’s about as motivating and moving as an ad can hope to be. And Carolyn Kellogg seems to have figured out why. At Jacket Copy, Kellogg revealed that one of the ad’s copywriters is poet and Tin House editor Matthew Dickman.

Faulkner, Steinbeck, and Fitzgerald all wrote for the movies, and maybe advertising is this generation’s meal ticket and the Super Bowl its Hollywood. The ad is visually striking, and the message rather more important than which light beer to drink. The ad calls for us to come together and persevere, to rally around, well, the American auto-industry (it was an ad for the Chrysler, after all).

In spite of a bit of a mixed metaphor about punching cars (“This country can’t be knocked out with one punch. We get right back up again, and when we do the world is going to hear the roar of our engines.”), I wonder whether it was the prose that made the ad so profound or if it was just the unifying power of Clint Eastwood.

“Kafka would have had a Twitter feed!”

Jonathan Franzen hates eBooks. If that statement fails to shock, maybe it’s because it’s old news (appearing as headlines here and here), or maybe it’s because, well, who cares?

The response to Franzen’s anti-ebook statements at his recent—and first ever—press conference was very much divided (comments at the Huffington Post offer a good sampling of both sides). Franzen claimed, among other things, that the lack of permanence in eBooks (their infinite editability) was damaging to society, and many readers purred in agreement—while, I imagine, pawing at their heavy hardcovers of Freedom. Others, however, accused the writer of intellectual snobbery: “Where does he get off telling me how to read? What does this acclaimed, prize-winning writer know about anything anyway?”

At the end of the day, Franzen is just a man with opinions and reading preferences (and a Pulitzer and a National Book Award). His personal reservations about eBooks really aren’t anything new, and they’re probably shared by some of your neighbors. (I wonder if Franzen and those who share his views on eBooks have actually tried reading them—admittedly, I despised eBooks until I read one).

CRITICAL HIT AWARDS: February 2012

Welcome back to the Critical Hit Awards for book reviews. This is a round-up, a recommended reading list, and—why not?—a terribly prestigious and coveted prize. Nominate your favorite review of the month by tweeting it at @electriclit with the hashtag #criticalhit or cast your vote in the comments section below.

 

Hard to believe, but in a month when Luc Sante dropped some knowledge about Patti Smith, Ben Marcus got everyone talking about The Flame Alphabet, and our beloved readers came through with some great nominations, none of those book reviews actually won. I know, I know. You’re aghast. Well, the competition for Critical Hit Awards is brutal. Here are this month’s winners.

(Thanks to @CalJoPo, @t_nesbit, @TradePaperbacks, @benasam, @msnowe, and @thelazyw for nominating book reviews this month!)

BEYOND BOOKS: The 12th Annual Edwardian Ball

Beyond Books is based on the premise that “leading a literary life” is not only about reading and writing and editing and solitude; it’s about complete cultural immersion and exploring the language of every lived experience.

San Francisco freaks and geeks who like to play dress-up and waltz beyond the midnight hour celebrated the macabre cartoon fantasies of Edward Gorey this past weekend at the 12th Annual Edwardian Ball. This year’s spectacular multidisciplinary tribute — featuring music, dance, theater, video, painting, sculpture, fashion, installation art, aerial acrobatics and absinthe-rootbeer cocktails(!!!) — was inspired by the cult author-illustrator’s The Iron Tonic (Or, A Winter Afternoon in Lonely Valley). What follows is a parody of the Gorey text with photos from the show.

 

The Eternal Balm
(Or, A Winter Night in San Francisco)

The tinies at the Gorey Ball
Danced brightly till they hit the wall.

Those who could not twirl stood upright,
Leather corsets binding most tight.

World Book Night Wants You

If you’re reading this, chances are you won’t be receiving one of the 1,000,000 books World Book Night is giving away. But you still can (and should) take part.

Everyone has a friend who doesn’t read (or doesn’t read enough), and those are the people World Book Night is targeting. On April 23, WBN will be working with thousands of volunteers, libraries, and bookstores to distribute books by hand to “light or non-readers” After last year’s successful launch in the UK, WBN is coming to the states.

Here’s the story from Carl Lennertz, the Executive Director and sole employee of World Book Night, U.S.

World Book Night is printing hundreds of thousands of special free paperback editions, and they are looking for thousands of volunteers to go out on one day and give books out across America. … You pick the place: hospital or diner, school or … well, lots of possibilities. Be creative. … yes, there are some rules and regulations. But no cost, except for your time, love of books, and caring for your community.

LITERARY ARTIFACTS: the quixotic search for Cervantes’s bones

Cervantes: Lost in La Mancha, Found in Madrid. (Maybe. Probably. We Think.)

Each month in the Literary Artifacts space, writer Kristopher Jansma writes about his encounters with rare books, writerly memorabilia, and other treasures in New York City and around the world, hoping to discover how the internet age is changing the face of literature as we know it.

 

Somewhere deep inside the Convento de las Trinitarias Descalzas in Madrid, historian Fernando Prado is searching amidst the holy books and cloistered nuns for the man who wrote the first modern novel, published 407 years ago today: Miguel de Cervantes— or whatever’s left of him.

The plaque on the exterior of the convent memorializes the author of the great Don Quixote, who is buried inside.  Probably.  They’re pretty sure he’s in there somewhere.  Just no one’s quite sure where.  Cervantes’s bones may have been moved to another convent nearby during a 17th century renovation.  Although it’s thought they were moved back again, and that they weren’t disturbed at all when, in the 20th century, part of the convent was converted into a courthouse.  However, what’s certain is that he was buried there initially—at least it said in his will that he wanted to be.  Though Cervantes himself was not a member of the “Barefoot Trinitarian” sect that runs the convent to this day, they once helped ransom him out of slavery, and one of his daughters belonged to the convent (they think).  All we really know for sure is that the great author died nearby, in his home, of dropsy (only it may have been cirrhosis of the liver, or possibly diabetes) on April 23rd, 1616, just ten days before William Shakespeare.  Except that Spain was using the Gregorian calendar and England the Julian… so really they died on the same day.

OK, fine.  Really all we actually know is that he’s dead.

The 2011 Story Prize Finalists

Faulkner once said that every novelist is a failed short story writer, and every short story writer is a failed poet. I’ve paraphrased (Faulkner said it with more eloquence and more words), but his point is counter to the common wisdom.

Novels typically reside at the top of the publishing and literary hierarchy, while short story collections receive fewer awards, reviews, or sales (if they’re published at all). And, of course, no one reads poetry.

Enter The Story Prize.

WINNERS: Holiday Restraint Contest

Electric Literature is pleased to announce the winners of its Holiday Restraint contest. Below are the winning entries and a few words from the contest judge Mike Edison.

I reckon I was asked to judge this beast as much for my firm grip on the English language as for my reputation for excess (not to mention that I learned to judge battles inside of a steel cage), and without getting too puffed up about it, I was, as Keith Richards might say, positively gob-smacked about the invite.

For those of you coming in naked, the contest rules were deceptively simple: write a short story of 30 to 300 words that used each word only once.

Over 130 entries ran the gamut from failed word jazz, fractured Haikus, stoned prose poems, the worst of William Burroughs’ cut-and-paste experiments, and the stream-of-consciousness ramblings of failed beatniks and first-year English as a Second Language students, to genuine moments of insight rife with rhythm, humor, and what I like to call “zork,” although I am not sure that term has been adopted by the literary world at large.