Category: literary life
The lovely and talented Suheir Hammad has written two poems about Hurricane Katrina, which she performed at a fundraiser for survivors. You can now read one of them, “A Prayer Band,” in its entirety here. Here’s a taste:
a new orleans man pleads
we have to steal from each other to eat
another gun in hand says we will protect what we have
what belongs to us
i have known of fleeing desperate
with children on hips in arms on backs
of house keys strung on necks
of water weighed shoes
disintegrated official papers
leases certificates births deaths taxes
i have known of high ways which lead nowhere
of aches in teeth in heads in hands tied
i have known of women raped by strangers by neighbors
of a hunger in human
i have known of promises to return
to where you come from
but first any bus going any where
tonight the tigris and the mississippi moan
for each other as sisters
full of unnatural things
flooded with predators and prayers
all language bankrupt
Go here for the rest.
Zadie Smith’s much-anticipated third novel is released in the United States today. Described as a ‘campus novel,’ On Beauty is about two academic families with opposing views on everything. The Kippses are British and conservative Christians while the Belseys are American and unabashed liberals. It doesn’t help matters that the patriarchs also have distinctly opposing views about art in general, and Rembrandt’s work in particular. The story is set in motion by an affair, break-ups and make-ups, coincidences and incidents. In her acknowledgments, Smith, a longtime Forster fan, says that all her fiction is indebted to him and that she “wanted to repay the debt with homage.” The novel bears some similarities with Howards End (borrowing from it, for instance, an opening line.)
A controversy ignited last week over comments Smith supposedly made to New York magazine (among them, that England is “a disgusting place.”) Smith strikes me as someone who is much too grounded (not to mention too smart) to make such statements (statements that were obviously edited down). As is typical these days, the report was picked by the Times, the Telegraph, the BBC and elsewhere. Among the blogs, the Lit Saloon provided a stern response, while Maud Newton reported hearing from Smith herself that she was objecting to the reports. Maud also provided a link to a BBC4 interview, in which Smith said that the article had made her “weepy” and that she “never said that.” I just hate how the media love to build people up only to tear them down.
Reviews of On Beauty so far have been fairly good. Publishers’ Weekly and Kirkus both gave it starred reviews. Over at the NY Times, the redoubtable Michiko Kakutani appears to like it:
Like Forster, Ms. Smith possesses a captivating authorial voice – at once authoritative and nonchalant, and capacious enough to accommodate high moral seriousness, laid-back humor and virtually everything in between – and in these pages, she uses that voice to enormous effect, giving us that rare thing: a novel that is as affecting as it is entertaining, as provocative as it is humane.
But the Boston Globe‘s Gail Caldwell is more guarded in her praise:
Smith has the gift of writing crackerjack dialogue: Her ear is fine and mutable, and she can do street jive and breakfast banter as easily as she does the interminable faculty meeting. But ”On Beauty” is too long-winded. Its actions, external and interior, don’t always warrant its pages and pages of speech or description, which can start to feel superfluous and tangential after a while. Still, this is a rollicking and heartfelt story with endurance at its center.
I’m nearly done reading the book and will have a proper review up here (or somewhere else, shhh) in a couple of weeks.
Bengali poet Sunil Gangopadhyay will be tried in India on charges of “defiling a Hindu goddess.”
In an article in Bengal’s biggest newspaper this year, Mr Gangopadhyay was quoted as saying he was “sexually aroused” by an idol of Saraswati. Retired policeman Bhibhuti Bhusan Nandy filed a lawsuit saying the comments had hurt his religious sentiments.
Additional chief judicial magistrate in Calcutta’s Alipore court, Manjit Singh, ordered Mr Gangopadhyay to appear in court on 3 December. The court also ordered legal proceedings against three others – Aveek Kumar Sarkar, editor of the Anandabazar Patrika newspaper, its publisher Bijit Kumar Basu, and chief executive Subir Mitra.
What fresh hell is this? Someone’s religious feelings are “hurt” and this is considered a crime?! And, of course, they get the journalists while they’re at it. Disgusting.
Dan Wickett, of the Emerging Writers’ Network, alerts us that his new e-panel is up at his blog. This one is about people who have been writing for a long time and are now going to make their publishing debut.
Mark Sarvas delivers on his long awaited interview of John Banville, whose novel The Sea was recently shortlisted for the Booker Prize. Part 1 of the interview is up today, with other portions to be delivered in upcoming weeks leading to the award.
If you’re a book nerd like me, you might like to check out the SF Chronicle‘s a review of Donna Seaman’s Writers on the Air, a collection of interviews with some of America’s best writers. Seaman is a reviewer for Booklist, the host of a radio show in Chicago, and a board member of the NBCC.