tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-17160758988625239582023-11-16T11:47:37.204+00:00THE ROVING EDITOR{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.comBlogger42125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-28807538296056777762010-09-16T15:48:00.028+01:002010-09-16T18:03:28.603+01:00PATRICIA ENGEL'S 'VIDA'<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://kevinfromcanada.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/engel2.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 199px; height: 299px;" src="http://kevinfromcanada.files.wordpress.com/2010/07/engel2.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>You could have read it <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/04/meet-patricia-engel.html">here </a>first, but I'm delighted to see that with <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/07/books/07book.html">Michiko Kakutani's glowing review</a> in the <span style="font-style: italic;">New York Times</span>, Patricia Engel has well and truly arrived as an important new literary voice.<br /><br />The occasion, of course, is the publication of Patricia's debut, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Vida-Patricia-Engel/dp/0802170781"><span style="font-style: italic;">Vida</span></a>, a book which has more than lived up to my high expectations, and the promise of early pieces such as <a href="http://bostonreview.net/BR32.4/article_engel.php">'Lucho'</a>, <a href="http://www.guernicamag.com/fiction/958/da/">'Dia'</a> and <a href="http://bostonreview.net/BR33.3/engel.php">'Desaliento'</a>. All of these stories feature the same main protagonist, the Colombian-American Sabina; in <span style="font-style: italic;">Vida </span>they are woven into a sequence of linked episodes in her life spanning two decades. The result is a highly satisfying hybrid of novel and short story collection that is particularly successful in portraying a multi-dimensional central character.<br /><br />Patricia has a way with arresting opening lines, and a seemingly effortless, conversational style of narration that is brilliantly sustained. This creates a rare sense of immediacy and intimacy that is the mark of a gifted storyteller. Take the beginning of the title story:<br /><br />'She told me her real name was Davida . . . She said she couldn't remember who started calling her Vida but that it happened here in Miami. In Colombia she was never called anything but her given name, but over here Vida stuck, which she said was okay with her because that plane ride over the Caribbean broke her life in two.'<br /><br />There are a number of interesting pieces on Patricia and her work available to read online (including a mention this week in the New York <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=X&q=http://www.nydailynews.com/latino/2010/09/15/2010-09-15_untitled__junot15v.html%3Fr%3Dentertainment&ct=ga&cad=:s7:f2:v0:d1:i0:lt:e0:p0:t1284571805:&cd=HOwkPsjLWm0&usg=AFQjCNGzqijSHS7vrkn7fcwUw51cYaTKKw"><span style="font-style: italic;">Daily News</span></a>!) but the best place to start is <a href="http://www.patriciaengel.com/">her website</a>. I also recommend you take a look at the <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/04/author-q-patricia-engel.html">Q&A</a> she did for The Roving Editor back in April last year.<br /><br />I don't have as much time as I'd like for literary talent-spotting these days, as <a href="http://seanjcostello.posterous.com/">my regular job as an editor</a> tends to get in the way. However I'm always interested to hear from and about promising new writers, so do get in touch via the blog or look me up on <a href="https://twitter.com/seanjcostello">Twitter</a>. In the meantime, get your hands on <span style="font-style: italic;">Vida </span><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Vida-Patricia-Engel/dp/0802170781">here</a>. I'm not sure if there are plans to publish the book on this side of the water, but I'm glad to see the Grove/Atlantic edition is available on <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Vida-Patricia-Engel/dp/0802170781">UK Amazon</a> also.<br /><br />When we spoke last spring Patricia told me, <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/04/author-q-patricia-engel.html">'I write stories for the pure thrill of it.'</a> It's a thrill that will be shared by her many readers, I'm sure.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-64190031387558922182010-06-11T13:45:00.010+01:002010-06-11T16:57:26.408+01:00'WHY I WRITE' by Donald Ray Pollock<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3324/3568082466_36dc9776ef.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 500px; height: 333px;" src="http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3324/3568082466_36dc9776ef.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size:100%;"><em></em></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size:100%;">‘I found myself, at the age of forty-five, feeling trapped and dissatisfied with a factory job that I’d held for twenty-seven years (I ended up staying thirty-two years). Don’t get me wrong, it was a good job, but I wanted to do something else with the rest of my life.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size:100%;"><br /><br />‘Since I didn’t really know how to do anything except factory work, and maybe because I loved to read, I decided to try to learn how to write, figuring that at least it wouldn’t cost anything other than time and a few reams of paper and a typewriter. Also, being a person who feels somewhat-to-very uncomfortable around groups of people and most “social” situations, writing appealed to me because of its solitary nature.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size:100%;"><br /><br />‘I would like to add that I was extremely naïve when I started. I thought that writing must be fairly easy and that you made a lot of money. Fortunately, by the time those two illusions were smashed, I’d already started to love sitting at the keyboard staring at the wall for hours at a time.’<br /><br /></span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" >Donald Ray Pollock is the author of </span><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Knockemstiff-Donald-Ray-Pollock/dp/0099520974/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1"><span style="font-size:100%;">Knockemstiff</span></a><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" >. A graduate of the </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-US" >MFA program at Ohio State University, </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" >he was the winner of the PEN/Robert Bingham Award in 2009. He was recently awarded a grant </span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-US" >from the Ohio Arts Council. His work has appeared in publications including the </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size:100%;">New York Times</span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-US" >, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size:100%;">Berkeley Fiction Review,</span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" lang="EN-US" > </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size:100%;"><em></em></span><span style="font-size:100%;">PEN/America</span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" >, </span><span style="font-size:100%;">Washington Square</span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" > </span><span style="font-size:100%;">Review</span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" >, and </span><span style="font-size:100%;">Epoch</span><span style="font-style: italic;font-size:100%;" >. Visit his website <a href="http://www.donaldraypollock.com/">here</a>.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size:100%;"><em><br /><br />* More about <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2010/06/good-for-nothing-else.html">'Why I Write'</a>.<br /></em></span>{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-51410198013815036682010-06-11T09:30:00.014+01:002010-06-11T13:34:01.244+01:00'GOOD FOR NOTHING ELSE'?<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgh0YdhyphenhyphenbYUwzn0WANQuiqhFw-PRsn-Fx4Yv91lwvLdHV04mywuNp7PBPySADnRBBw1gBKkmoT9ahddP-G6oL8-nPOw-p5wbcTbbOnC4_h0bBW0gqNi8a4T0cLggllsqmAUBd-Yif1KSJE/s1600/pourquoi+ecrivez-vous+%28cropped%29.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 181px; height: 227px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgh0YdhyphenhyphenbYUwzn0WANQuiqhFw-PRsn-Fx4Yv91lwvLdHV04mywuNp7PBPySADnRBBw1gBKkmoT9ahddP-G6oL8-nPOw-p5wbcTbbOnC4_h0bBW0gqNi8a4T0cLggllsqmAUBd-Yif1KSJE/s400/pourquoi+ecrivez-vous+%28cropped%29.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5481451009703205794" border="0" /></a><span style="font-size:100%;">Of all the questions regularly put to authors by journalists and readers, it seems to me that the most important one is why they bother in the first place.<br /><br />A number of years ago the French newspaper </span><span style="font-style: italic;">Libération </span><span style="font-size:100%;"><span style="font-style: italic;"> </span>published a special supplement in which they asked some of the great writers of the day to express themselves on the subject 'Pourquoi ecrivez-vous?' I remember Samuel Beckett's contribution was by far the most concise, reading in its entirety: 'Bon qu'a ca.', which could be translated as 'Good for nothing else.'<br /><br />I thought it might be enlightening to ask some of the Roving Editor’s favourite writers to address this question under the heading ‘Why I Write’, after <a href="http://www.orwell.ru/library/essays/wiw/english/e_wiw">George Orwell’s famous essay</a> on the subject, published in 1946. Orwell’s is an honest, revealing attempt at an answer, but ultimately he admits: ‘All writers are vain, selfish, and lazy, and at the very bottom of their motives there lies a mystery. Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand.’<br /><br />In dusting off this question and putting it in front of a new set of writers I am not expecting responses as terse or as self-deprecating as those of Orwell and Beckett. However I’d be surprised not to detect some echoes at least of how they felt. So, in what I hope will be the first in occasional series on the blog, I am delighted that Donald Ray Pollock has agreed to tell us ‘Why I Write’. Watch this space.</span>{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-84372627793644318662010-06-03T09:49:00.008+01:002010-06-04T10:08:34.596+01:00DISCOVERING TEA OBREHT<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.teaobreht.com/images/bio_image.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 126px; height: 200px;" src="http://www.teaobreht.com/images/bio_image.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>The announcement of the <span style="font-style: italic;">New Yorker</span>'s <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/03/books/03under.html">'20 under 40'</a> list of fiction writers worth watching has prompted a huge spike in traffic to the Roving Editor. Virtually all of the visitors are searching for one name: <a href="http://www.teaobreht.com/teaobreht.com/teaobreht.com.html">Téa Obreht</a>, whose first published work was praised <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/06/tea-obrehts-fearful-symmetry.html">here</a> almost a year ago. I'm delighted for Téa, whose debut novel, <a href="http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780385343831"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Tiger's Wife</span></a>, is due in March 2011.<br /><br />In addition to <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/06/tea-obrehts-fearful-symmetry.html">the original post</a>, I recommend you sample Téa's story <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/08/the-laugh/7531/">'The Laugh'</a> and this <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2009/07/i-dreamed-of-africa/7593/">interview</a>, both published in the <span style="font-style: italic;">Atlantic </span>magazine's 2009 fiction issue.<br /><br />Congratulations also to three other writers on the <span style="font-style: italic;">New Yorker</span>'s list whose work has been featured in the Roving Editor: <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/03/read-wells-tower.html">Wells Tower</a>, <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/08/late-to-party.html">Joshua Ferris</a> and <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/08/chinese-whispers.html">Yiyun Li</a>.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-83691777813218989282010-05-06T09:48:00.025+01:002010-05-06T12:52:51.098+01:00ASK FOR SAM LIPSYTE<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjERipuqvkscnK39Ldg0nxLGyT1J4Rz7CnTuqHnpZpLhCrCXgBpvla1Vrx_7qA-NKn-UNLwsvDOc1NKGHEPYPujOrNa2Oj0gYUj-HtbgnL9774dwXaePDFf8sx8ymVkrR4tqhpXZKCtz58/s1600/The+Ask+by+Sam+Lipsyte+%28rev%29.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 211px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjERipuqvkscnK39Ldg0nxLGyT1J4Rz7CnTuqHnpZpLhCrCXgBpvla1Vrx_7qA-NKn-UNLwsvDOc1NKGHEPYPujOrNa2Oj0gYUj-HtbgnL9774dwXaePDFf8sx8ymVkrR4tqhpXZKCtz58/s320/The+Ask+by+Sam+Lipsyte+%28rev%29.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5468113286603467314" border="0" /></a>It was Donald Ray Pollock who first drew my attention to <a href="http://poetsandwriters.coverleaf.com/poetsandwriters/20100304?pg=55&search_term=bures&search_term=bures#pg55">Sam Lipsyte</a>'s work in a <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/10/james-joyce-once-claimed-that-if-dublin_06.html">Q&A</a> he did for the Roving Editor back in 2008. Don praised Lipsyte's 'great and quirky' collection <span style="font-style: italic;"><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Venus-Drive-Sam-Lipsyte/dp/0007133677/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1223363043&sr=1-1">Venus Drive</a>.</span> I sought out his work online and discovered the stories <a href="http://www.opencity.org/cremains.html">'Cremains'</a> and <a href="http://www.failbetter.com/03/Lipsyte.htm">'Flashback, or Why Nobody Won the Fight Between Our Fathers in Walt Wilmer's Toolshed'</a>. Their pitch-black humour and terse, self-incriminating narrative voices reminded me strongly of early Beckett fictions (in particular <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/First-Novellas-Penguin-Modern-Classics/dp/0141180153"><span style="font-style: italic;">First Love and Other Novellas</span></a>) mixed with the earthiness of Bukowski.<br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Lipsyte">Lipsyte</a> has produced three novels since <span style="font-style: italic;">Venus Drive</span>. His latest, <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ask-Sam-Lipsyte/dp/1906964408/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpi_1"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Ask</span></a>, will appear in the UK next month, thanks to independent publisher <a href="http://www.oldstreetpublishing.co.uk/">Old Street</a>. (Full disclosure: I occasionally do some work for Old Street in my capacity as a freelance editor.) The <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/may/02/sam-lipsyte-the-ask-review">Observer</a> has already flagged up what amounts to a major coup for a small UK publisher, given the widespread critical acclaim <span style="font-style: italic;">The Ask</span> has enjoyed in the States, not to mention its respectable showing on the <span style="font-style: italic;">New York Times</span> bestseller list.<br /><br />On the evidence of <a href="http://www.gq.com/entertainment/books/201001/sam-lipsyte-the-ask">what I have read so far</a>, <span style="font-style: italic;">The Ask</span> is that rarest of literary beasts, a comic novel that manages to be both funny and profound. Its beleaguered protagonist Milo Burke has echoes of Ignatius J. Reilly in <span style="font-style: italic;">A Confederacy of Dunces</span>, while the world of work is depicted with the same merciless eye for detail that made <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/08/late-to-party.html"><span style="font-style: italic;">Then We Came to the End</span></a> so bracing and true. Milo is a fund-raiser for a university in New York he knows is second-rate, but for which he is obliged to make 'the ask', a role that puts him in touch with a wealthy former college friend who has questionable motives for making 'the give'. I'm hoping the working out of the plot is as satisfying as this premise -- and the promise of the opening chapters -- suggests.<br /><br />If further persuasion is needed, take this endorsement of <span style="font-style: italic;">The Ask</span> from another fine writer who has been featured on these pages, <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/03/read-wells-tower.html">Wells Tower</a>: 'One of the most hilarious and perfectly executed books that I've read in recent years.'<br /><span style="line-height: 115%;font-family:";font-size:11pt;" ><span style=""></span></span>{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-27271318590743208742010-02-25T07:44:00.034+00:002010-02-26T10:20:17.437+00:00LITERARY ADAPTATIONS IN THE WORKS<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkFpwcI383DfriiO23KOdqOr60Aoq_se56PXornKPoAt_U4g46H-jBgnRa1e9fygXgeO_P_nKRG4VrikSlmTTRRbQddu42ZgM8-qKEajnXWEbg6uSR_8N9xmmxnpxyd8vLyZQEJyI6ZyA/s1600-h/White+Tiger+%28reduced%29.jpg"><img style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 185px; height: 283px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkFpwcI383DfriiO23KOdqOr60Aoq_se56PXornKPoAt_U4g46H-jBgnRa1e9fygXgeO_P_nKRG4VrikSlmTTRRbQddu42ZgM8-qKEajnXWEbg6uSR_8N9xmmxnpxyd8vLyZQEJyI6ZyA/s400/White+Tiger+%28reduced%29.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5442493773010934898" border="0" /></a>Aravind Adiga's debut novel, Man Booker Prize-winning <em><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/White-Tiger-Aravind-Adiga/dp/1843547228/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267174167&sr=1-1">The White Tiger</a>, </em>is one of a number of upcoming literary adaptations from British filmmakers. A long list of projects recently awarded funding was released by the <a href="http://www.ukfilmcouncil.org.uk/article/16489/Films-in-production-and-development-awarded-funding-from-the-UK-Film-Council">UK Film Council</a> this week.<br /><br />Adiga, whose work has been featured on the <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/10/aravind-has-arrived.html">Roving Editor</a>, will see <em>The White Tiger</em> brought to the screen by fellow novelist Hanif Kureishi. Kureishi recently <a href="http://www.vamban.com/fatwas-enormously-important-for-literary-world-hanif-kureishi/">commented</a>, not entirely seriously, one suspects: 'I needed the money for my children – to ensure that they have a better life. The lives of my children are much more insecure compared to mine. I need to make films like <span style="font-style: italic;">Slumdog Millionaire</span>.’ <a href="http://www.smugglerfilms.com/company_press.htm">Elsewhere</a> he said '<span style="font-style: italic;">The White Tiger</span> is a rags-to-riches murder story. It is Aravind's extraordinary characters that make this one stand out above all others.'<br /><br />Among other forthcoming attractions. . .<br /><br /><ul><li><strong style="font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conor_McPherson">Conor McPherson</a> is adapting </strong>Taichi Yamada's novel <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Strangers-Taichi-Yamada/dp/0571224377"><em>Strangers</em></a>, with James Marsh(<span style="font-style: italic;">Man on Wire</span>) <a href="http://www.slashfilm.com/2010/02/24/uk-film-council-funds-new-films-from-oliver-hirschbiegel-nick-hornby-andrea-arnold-and-man-on-wire-director-james-marsh/">set to direct</a>. (There has already been <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0125217/">a Japanese-language version</a>.)</li><li><strong style="font-weight: normal;"><a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0708903/">Lynne Ramsay</a>, who was unfortunately <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_Need_to_Talk_About_Kevin#Film_adaptation">bumped from the adaptation of <span style="font-style: italic;">The Lovely Bones</span></a> </strong>in favour of Peter Jackson, will write and direct <em><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Need-Talk-About-Kevin-Paperback/dp/1852424672/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267175764&sr=1-1">We Need To Talk About Kevin</a> </em>by Lionel Schriver. <a href="http://www.variety.com/article/VR1118015052.html?categoryId=13&cs=1">John C. Reilly and Tilda Swinton</a> will take leading roles.</li><li>Screenwriter <strong style="font-weight: normal;">Simon Beaufoy</strong>, (<em>Slumdog Millionaire, The Full Monty</em>)<em>, </em>is <a href="http://www.quietearth.us/articles/2008/11/11/Simon-Beaufoy-adapting-Steven-Halls-THE-RAW-SHARK-TEXTS">adapting <em>The Raw Shark Texts</em></a> from the novel by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Raw_Shark_Texts">Steven Hall</a>, and <a href="http://theplaylist.blogspot.com/2009/10/bill-condon-helming-salmon-fishing-in.html"><em>Salmon Fishing in the Yemen</em></a>, from <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Salmon-Fishing-Yemen-Paul-Torday/dp/0753821788/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267176508&sr=1-1">the novel by Paul Torday</a>. Beaufoy recently told the <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/celebritynews/4612235/Saturday-Interview-Simon-Beaufoy.html">Daily Telegraph</a>: 'I'm very lucky. I actually like screenwriting. I rarely feel a sense of doom going to my desk.'</li><li><strong style="font-weight: normal;">Sadie Jones</strong> is writing the screenplay for her debut novel <em><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Outcast-Sadie-Jones/dp/0099513420/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267170647&sr=1-2">The Outcast</a> </em>for <a href="http://www.screendaily.com/news/production/uk-ireland/john-madden-to-direct-adaptation-of-sadie-jones-the-outcast/5009667.article"><strong style="font-weight: normal;">John Madden</strong></a>(<em>Shakespeare in Love</em>) to direct.</li><li>And finally, yet another debut novel, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thirteenth_Tale_%28novel%29"><em>The Thirteenth Tale </em>by Diane Setterfield</a>, is currently being adapted; this one by the venerable <a href="http://www.ioncinema.com/movie/id/10128/the-thirteenth-tale">Christopher Hampton</a> (<em>Atonement, Dangerous Liaisons</em>).</li></ul>{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-3198058614942762942009-12-09T16:00:00.015+00:002009-12-09T17:22:33.223+00:00PETINA GAPPAH ON THE AGE OF INDEPENDENCE<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2112/3530297193_faca62fe20.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 333px; height: 500px;" src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2112/3530297193_faca62fe20.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>In what has been an exceptional year for the short story, the announcement of <a href="http://www.petinagappah.com/about.html">Petina Gappah</a> as winner of the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/dec/04/guardian-first-book-petina-gappah">Guardian first book award</a> is further cause for rejoicing. Her debut collection, <span style="font-style: italic;">An Elegy for Easterly</span>, is published by Faber.<br /><br />You can read a brand new story called 'Miss McConkey of Bridgewater Close' <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/dec/05/petina-gappah-awardwinner-short-story">here</a>. This is a quietly powerful piece about a child coming of age as Rhodesia transforms itself into Zimbabwe.<br /><br />In her <a href="http://www.petinagappah.com/">blog</a>, the author describes the background to the story as 'the time that I find most interesting to write about, the move from settler rule to majority rule and the early days of independence. I am interested in exploring how independence materially changed lives, especially for the blacks who made it to the suburbs and whose children found themselves in the alien territory of formerly whites-only schools.'<br /><br />Not only that: she also includes the video for the <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ov17bRbtCxU&feature=player_embedded">hit 80s record</a> (by David Scobie, 'one of Rhodesia/Zimbabwe's early rock stars') her parents dance to at the end of the story. It takes you right back. . .{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-43810455137137919542009-10-08T19:25:00.037+01:002009-10-12T09:16:21.309+01:00WILD ROVING<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://genderedi.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/189large5.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 280px;" src="http://genderedi.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/189large5.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>Despite appearances to the contrary, the Roving Editor has not been on an extended summer break. There may have been no blogging of late (apart from via <a href="http://twitter.com/seanjcostello">Twitter</a>) but there's been plenty of browsing -- all the fine publications that usually yield the exciting new work featured here have been regularly frequented.<br /><br />The trouble is, nothing has really grabbed me in the same way that <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/search/label/Eleanor%20Catton">Eleanor Catton</a> and <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/search/label/Patricia%20Engel">Patricia Engel </a>did earlier this year, or <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/search/label/Donald%20Ray%20Pollock">Donald Ray Pollock</a> and <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/search/label/Wells%20Tower">Wells Tower</a> did in 2008. Admittedly, it's asking a lot to hold out for talent of that calibre, but that's why I write the blog -- and also why I don't write it that often. It may be that I've been looking in the wrong places; if so, please feel free to point me in the right direction.<br /><br />In the meantime, to prove I've been a-roving, here are some pointers to work I've enjoyed in the last while but which hasn't quite fit the criterion of being by an emerging writer; while a couple of the names were new to me, all of the writers are established authors to some extent. . .<br /><br />The excellent Fifty-Two Stories site will run until the end of the year, and I would recommend recent contributions by Lydia Peelle (<a href="http://www.fiftytwostories.com/?p=548">'Phantom Pain'</a>) and the celebrated Egyptian author Alaa Al Aswany (<a href="http://www.fiftytwostories.com/?p=630">'The Kitchen Boy'</a>). I came upon the distinctive voice of <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/search/label/Glen%20Pourciau">Glen Pourciau</a> in the Paris Review last year; <a href="http://www.parisreview.com/viewmedia.php/prmMID/5930">'Nightblooming'</a> by Kenneth Calhoun is one of the most entertaining pieces I've read in 2009. Finally, <a href="http://fivedials.com/fivedials">Five Dials</a> is the most attractively presented online litmag out there; its latest issue has a Paris theme, and features fiction by Steve Tolz.<br /><br />Do watch this space, and <a href="http://twitter.com/seanjcostello">do get in touch</a> if you've got any hot tips to share.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-52920815939019002852009-06-26T07:40:00.015+01:002009-06-26T08:47:43.871+01:00PATRICIA ENGEL DEBUT COMING IN 2010<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.guernicamag.com/incl/img/upl/2009/04/engelpic.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 80px; height: 80px;" src="http://www.guernicamag.com/incl/img/upl/2009/04/engelpic.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>When she <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/04/author-q-patricia-engel.html">spoke to The Roving Editor</a> back in April, <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/04/meet-patricia-engel.html">Patricia Engel</a> promised to keep us posted about two book projects she had in the works. Now comes the excellent news that her debut short story collection is to be published in the US by <a href="http://www.groveatlantic.com/grove/default.htm">Grove/Atlantic</a> in autumn of next year.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.publishersmarketplace.com/">Publishers' Marketplace</a> reports that the book, entitled <span style="font-style: italic;">Vida</span>, 'follows a single narrator growing up in small town New Jersey and navigating her identity as a daughter of the Colombian diaspora'. It will doubtless include the stories <a href="http://bostonreview.net/BR32.4/article_engel.php">'Lucho'</a> and <a href="http://www.guernicamag.com/fiction/958/da/">'Dia'</a>. This is to be a two-book deal, and <span style="font-style: italic;">Vida </span>will be followed by a novel, as yet untitled.<br /><br />Here is how Patricia described what motivates her as a writer, and why she is drawn to short stories in particular: 'I love the vulnerability of the form and that there is nowhere for the author to hide. A short story requires swift seduction but can be as memorable and transformative as the drawn out affair of a novel. I write stories for the pure thrill of it. If it didn’t feel like a party when I sit down to write, I probably wouldn’t do it.' (Read the rest of her Q&A <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/04/author-q-patricia-engel.html">here</a>.)<br /><br />Congratulations, Patricia -- enjoy the party!{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-42175691599728169742009-06-17T07:33:00.023+01:002010-06-03T17:45:36.073+01:00TEA OBREHT'S FEARFUL SYMMETRY<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy1PToH6wxyPxIF7CwSFwIg3IbG0qzVOrMHBo3fqB3AKB74raPtAU1xiSiQuRXpclopccUWQle7eBfvV5y8ISAktaNU7JFnyHXaqzdGEJ10Kil1QRSHpd9OF54_TkPb2DSx18ffIufwMU/s320/tiger.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px; height: 258px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjy1PToH6wxyPxIF7CwSFwIg3IbG0qzVOrMHBo3fqB3AKB74raPtAU1xiSiQuRXpclopccUWQle7eBfvV5y8ISAktaNU7JFnyHXaqzdGEJ10Kil1QRSHpd9OF54_TkPb2DSx18ffIufwMU/s320/tiger.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><a href="http://www.teaobreht.com/teaobreht.com/teaobreht.com.html">Téa Obreht</a> wasn't born that long ago (1985), but she is a born storyteller. Her literary launch is an auspicious one, taking place as it does in the pages of the <span style="font-style: italic;">New Yorker</span>'s recent summer fiction issue, among such luminaries as Jonathan Franzen, <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/12/best-story-of-year.html">Aleksander Hemon</a> and <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/08/chinese-whispers.html">Yiyun Li</a>.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/features/2009/06/08/090608fi_fiction_obreht">'The Tiger's Wife'</a>, excerpted from Obreht's debut novel of the same name, has the elemental pull of a fable and the rootedness of a folk tale, but from the outset its concerns could not be more urgent and contemporary:<br /><br />'Having sifted through everything I have heard about the tiger and his wife, I can tell you that this much is fact: in April of 1941, without declaration or warning, the German bombs started falling over the city and did not stop for three days. The tiger did not know that they were bombs . . .'<br /><br />As we follow the traumatised tiger through the war-ravaged landscape and to the ridge above the village of Galina, he becomes the embodiment of the fears, superstitions and myths of the local people. And for one little boy, the narrator's grandfather, he is Shere Khan come to life from the pages of his beloved <span style="font-style: italic;">Jungle Book</span>.<br /><br />This is a rich mixture, but the material is beautifully handled by Obreht. The story never gets bogged down in allegory; its resonances ring true. It is the work of an author who is destined for great things.<br /><br />Obreht, who was born in Belgrade in former Yugoslavia and left in 1992 on the outbreak of war, has said in an <a href="http://cornellsun.com/section/arts/content/2009/03/25/student-artist-spotlight-tea-bajraktarevic">interview </a>that her novel is based on personal experiences: 'It’s a family saga that takes place in a fictionalized province of the Balkans. It’s about a female narrator and her relationship to her grandfather, who’s a doctor. It’s a saga about doctors and their relationships to death throughout all these wars in the Balkans.'<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">The Tiger's Wife</span> will be published <a href="http://www.randomhouse.com/author/results.pperl?authorid=99526">in the US</a> in and <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tigers-Wife-Tea-Obreht/dp/0297859013/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1245225867&sr=1-1">in the UK</a> in July next year.<br /><br />(In a departure from The Roving Editor's usual practice, the featured work is not freely available to read online. However I thought the story too exceptional to miss, so I would encourage you to sign up for the New Yorker's free preview of its digital edition <a href="http://archives.newyorker.com/skins/realview/tny/register.asp?pub=The%20New%20Yorker">here</a>.)<br /><br />UPDATE: More on Téa <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2010/06/discovering-tea-obreht.html">here</a>.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-10000259322876551532009-04-23T17:27:00.025+01:002009-04-23T19:05:22.274+01:00AUTHOR Q&A: PATRICIA ENGEL<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijJ1C9sfx5XSRAmkJgTzU6ZzqzMebN3JOjiXj97ftVwBc1Zcb8OswAMvOFqV4oWjaWluphz3pqudUw0_i49Ur7x1zjEsUoCgjo0vpAR6YiVkp_sZdi-JwuUO-gCT-MM7nVpt5WlUFxqQM/s1600-h/Patricia+Engel+crop+2.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 287px; height: 265px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijJ1C9sfx5XSRAmkJgTzU6ZzqzMebN3JOjiXj97ftVwBc1Zcb8OswAMvOFqV4oWjaWluphz3pqudUw0_i49Ur7x1zjEsUoCgjo0vpAR6YiVkp_sZdi-JwuUO-gCT-MM7nVpt5WlUFxqQM/s320/Patricia+Engel+crop+2.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5327938254719001778" border="0" /></a><span></span>If you haven't heard of Patricia Engel yet, you haven't been reading <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/04/meet-patricia-engel.html">The Roving Editor</a>. She is a gifted exponent of the short story, at a time when the form is at last gaining the recognition and audience it deserves. (Read <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Lasdun">James Lasdun</a> on this encouraging phenomenon <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/apr/04/short-story-debuts">here</a>.)<br /><br />So far Patricia has only published in literary journals, albeit in titles of the calibre of <a href="http://www.guernicamag.com/fiction/"><span>Guernica</span></a><span> </span><span>and the </span><a href="http://bostonreview.net/"><span>Boston Review</span></a><span>, where her talent was first noticed by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junot_D%C3%ADaz">Junot </a></span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Junot_D%C3%ADaz">Díaz</a><span>.<br /><br /></span>It can’t be long until her work appears between covers. Indeed Patricia tells me that she is currently working on two book projects, and has promised to keep us posted about their publication. In the meantime, it is my great pleasure to present this Q&A with a rising literary star.<br /><br /><i style="">Can you tell us a little bit about your background, and what led you to become a writer?<br /></i>My parents are Colombian and I grew up in New Jersey, among an extended family of musicians, painters, and a grandmother who was a writer. I sketched, painted, and read constantly, particularly biographies, books about mythology and the paranormal. Writing was a way to entertain myself, build a bridge to another life. I'd never let others read my work, though. My stories were only for me. Eventually the compulsion to write swallowed most of my other brewing dreams and I complied.<i style=""><br /><br />What attracts you to the medium of the short story?<br /></i>I love the vulnerability of the form and that there is nowhere for the author to hide. A short story requires swift seduction but can be as memorable and transformative as the drawn out affair of a novel. I write stories for the pure thrill of it. If it didn’t feel like a party when I sit down to write, I probably wouldn’t do it.<br /><br /><i style="">Which writers do you admire?</i><span style="font-style: italic;"><br /></span>I admire any writer that goes into the page raw-hearted, but the first heroes to blow my mind during adolescence were <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marguerite_Duras">Marguerite Duras</a>,<span style="font-style: italic;"> </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anais_Nin">Anaïs Nin</a><em></em>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Camus">Albert Camus</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryse_Cond%C3%A9">Maryse Condé</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_Garc%C3%ADa_M%C3%A1rquez">Gabriel García Márquez</a>, <a href="http://www.contemporarywriters.com/authors/?p=auth38">Esther Freud</a>, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/search-handle-url/ref=ntt_athr_dp_sr_1?_encoding=UTF8&search-type=ss&index=books&field-author=Alexandre%20Jardin">Alexandre Jardin</a> and <a href="http://www.biographybase.com/biography/Gary_Romain.html">Romain Gary</a>.<span style="font-style: italic;"><br /><br /></span><i style="">Where and when do you write?<br /></i>Usually at desk or table at home, starting early in the morning. I prefer silence, solitude, and natural light. I rarely write at night.<br /><br /><i style="">How did you first come to be published?<br /></i>In college, I majored in French and Art History, not Creative Writing, and had no sense of the publishing path for a very long time, which was a good thing because it allowed me to focus only on the writing. Then one day I sent <a href="http://bostonreview.net/BR32.4/article_engel.php">‘Lucho’</a> to <span style="">the<i> </i>Boston Review</span> and the fiction editor liked it.<br /><br /><i style="">How has being published affected you as a writer?<br /></i>Placing a story in a journal is like finding a home for a stray cat. Not exactly a miracle, but no small deed either. I'm extremely grateful every time it turns out well.<br /><br /><i style="">Your stories seem to feature recurring central protagonists (I’m thinking of Sabina, who narrates both ‘Lucho’ and <a href="http://www.guernicamag.com/fiction/958/da/">‘Día’</a>) and a large and colourful cast of more peripheral players. Can you say something about your approach to creating characters?<br /></i>The Sabina stories are part of a collection that follows her over two decades. In creating characters I try to give readers the friends they never knew they wanted or needed. I enjoy characters that are tender and cruel, confronting their humanity, who manage to form profound bonds despite personal chaos. My stories are built on the idea that we are the sum of the people we’ve allowed ourselves to care about. We test one another, and we make each other better.<br /><br /><i style="">Have you come across any new writers whose work you would recommend?<br /></i>I wouldn't say they're new, but the voices I've recently pushed on friends are <a href="http://www.sevenstories.com/author/index.cfm?fa=ShowAuthor&Person_ID=197">Jorge Franco</a>, <a href="http://www.complete-review.com/reviews/modfr/grimbert.htm">Philippe Grimbert</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fa%C3%AFza_Gu%C3%A8ne">Faïza Guène</a>, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Lila-Says-Novel-none-Chimo/dp/0684836033">Chimo</a>, and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Vallejo">Fernando Vallejo</a>.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-20283000557347725782009-04-15T16:49:00.025+01:002009-04-16T16:13:19.991+01:00MEET PATRICIA ENGEL<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.guernicamag.com/incl/img/upl/2009/04/engelpic.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 80px; height: 80px;" src="http://www.guernicamag.com/incl/img/upl/2009/04/engelpic.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>I first came across <a href="http://meakinarmstrong.blogspot.com/">Patricia Engel</a> last year when her story, <a href="http://bostonreview.net/BR33.3/engel.php">'Desaliento'</a>, won the <a href="http://bostonreview.net/"><span>Boston Review</span></a>'s annual prize for fiction. I enjoyed her unhurried storytelling and unfussy prose, and made a mental note to look out for more of her work.<br /><br />The opportunity came via the latest email bulletin from the always worthwhile <span><a href="http://www.guernicamag.com/">Guernica</a> </span>magazine. The current issue features <a href="http://www.guernicamag.com/fiction/968/da/">'Día'</a>, a beautifully observed vignette of an awkward encounter between two friends who could have been lovers but never were.<br /><br />Unconsummated relationships are something of a motif in Engel's work, at least on the evidence of the pieces she has published online. <a href="http://bostonreview.net/BR32.4/article_engel.php">'Lucho'</a>, her earliest published fiction, is narrated by the teenage Sabina, whose grown-up voice we hear in 'Día': 'He was 16 and I was 14, which meant we could be friends on our block but had to ignore each other at school. He had squishy lips and a small round nose, smooth shiny skin and greasy dark hair. All the girls checked him out. But Lucho was kind of dirty for a town like ours.' In this story, tragedy intervenes, and is all the more affecting for the suddenness with which it interrupts the leisurely unfolding of what could otherwise be an unremarkable tale of adolescent infatuation.<br /><br />Engel's knack of drawing the reader into the everyday world of her characters, then revealing in passing an incident that catches the reader unawares, is also evident in <a href="http://www.slicemagazine.org/story_engel.php">'Prison Letters'</a>, an excerpt from which appears in <a href="http://www.slicemagazine.org/index.php">Slice</a> magazine: 'Victor would go on benders, disappear for days, but always turned up on Sunday mornings and went to mass with my mom even when he was still with his first wife, a Jewish girl named Rebecca who died before I had a chance to meet her. They were on the rocks and she was pregnant. She went to see her parents after a big fight with Victor and an eighteen-wheeler smashed into her Datsun on the Long Island Expressway. Victor blamed himself and jumped off the roof of his house but didn't get so much as a scratch.'<br /><br />Is it fanciful to extrapolate from this a literary kinship between the Colombian-American Engel and Gabriel García Márquez? Perhaps. Engel is no magic realist, but she is a natural storyteller, and if I can risk invoking the name of another literary titan, she has something of Salinger's way with vernacular and feel for family relationships. Like both writers, she can also be very funny.<br /><br />Patricia Engel is an exceptional talent, but as far as I know she has yet to be signed up by a publisher. It is surely only a matter of time.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-50767734163621741832009-04-09T08:18:00.030+01:002009-04-09T11:12:58.523+01:00THE PERFORMANCE IS ABOUT TO BEGIN<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/516BF8Q2jdL._SL500_AA240_.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 240px;" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/516BF8Q2jdL._SL500_AA240_.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>I've written before in praise of <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/01/one-to-watch-in-2009.html">Eleanor Catton's short stories</a>. Now comes the welcome opportunity to sample her debut novel. This <span><a href="http://www.granta.com/rehearsal">extract</a> from </span><span style="font-style: italic;"><a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Rehearsal-Eleanor-Catton/dp/1847081169">The Rehearsal</a> </span><span>appears on the newly relaunched website of <a href="http://www.granta.com/Online-Only/The-new-Granta.com">Granta</a>, who will be publishing the book in the UK in July</span><span style="font-style: italic;">. </span><br /><br />It is a vivid, multi-layered creation, a performance in every sense of the word. By combining intense theatricality with the raw emotions and experiences of her teenage protagonists, Catton appears to be doing something truly extraordinary with the novel form. For me, the writing has more in common with the drama of Pirandello or Beckett than a work of prose fiction. I'm thinking in particular of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Six_Characters_in_Search_of_an_Author"><span style="font-style: italic;">Six Characters in Search of an Author</span></a><span style="font-style: italic;"></span>. But this is no mere exercise in style: the novel's ingenious framework is there to serve a purpose, not to be noticed or admired for its own sake.<br /><br />On this evidence <a href="http://www.granta.com/Contributors/Eleanor-Catton">Catton</a> has a compelling tale, or tales, to tell in <span style="font-style: italic;">The Rehearsal</span>, and I for one am impatient to read more.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-23073629077956978392009-03-23T10:35:00.033+00:002009-03-24T08:52:18.968+00:00READ WELLS TOWER<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www3.waterstones.com/wat/images/nbd/l/19/9781847080486.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 254px; height: 400px;" src="http://www3.waterstones.com/wat/images/nbd/l/19/9781847080486.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>Of all the writers featured on The Roving Editor, <a href="http://us.macmillan.com/everythingravagedeverythingburned">Wells Tower</a> is the name that attracts most visitors to the blog, thanks to <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/11/meet-well-tower.html">a brief post back in November</a>. This augurs well for the success of his debut collection, <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Everything-Ravaged-Burned-Wells-Tower/dp/1847080480/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1237810429&sr=1-1"><span style="font-style: italic;">Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned</span></a>, which is shortly to be published on both sides of the Atlantic.<br /><br />If I were asked to identify the qualities in Wells Tower's writing that make reading these stories such a rewarding experience, I would say that what impresses me most is the depth of his characterisation and the freshness of his language. The essence of good short story writing is economy, and in the same way that Picasso could conjure life from the simplest of lines, Tower has the gift of creating flesh and blood people out of a handful of words.<br /><br />And what well-chosen words they are. Take this pen-picture of the narrator's father, abandoned by his much younger lover, in 'Executors of Important Energies': 'My father felt astonished in his grief -- pushing fifty, the silver tufts bursting from his ears, to find his heart broken for the first time in his life. That was the one time he tried hard to be my friend. He had me over on weekends. He'd tell me love was like the chicken pox, a thing to be got through early because it could really kill you in your later years.'<br /><br />This quote also hints at a trait shared by many of Tower's protagonists: a sense of humour and self-knowledge in the face of adversity. In one of the best stories in the book, the carnival-set 'On the Show', there is a rare moment of tenderness between the new attendant on a ride called the Pirate Ship and one of his customers, a blind woman: 'The ride ends, and Jeff goes to her and helps her down the platform. She is warm against him, and cannot stop laughing. "Thank you, thanks very much," she says, and Jeff Park feels glad to have found work on the Pirate, a machine that draws joy out of people as simply as a derrick draws oil from dirt.'<br /><br />Indeed, there is a strong case to be made for Tower as a comic writer, for all the bleakness of the lives and landscapes he depicts. The comedy is there in the grotesque tableau of a man obliged to void his dog's bladder using a kind of Heimlich manoeuvre ('Retreat'); in the uneasy conversation between a violent man and his ex-wife's hippy lover, suddenly thrown together on a road-trip ('Down Through the Valley'); and, most flamboyantly of all, in the Pythonesque but ultimately poignant title story, an everyday tale of marauding Vikings who speak in modern American: 'A hydra flew in last night and ran off with Rolf Hierdal's sheep. We can't be putting up with this shit. It comes down to pride, is what it comes down to.'<br /><br />Uncomfortable encounters and strained relationships are something of a Tower speciality, as are sudden explosions of violence. All of these elements are present in 'On the Show', which for me is the key story in the collection. Its fairground setting seems a perfect metaphor for the desire for thrills and transcendence that drives the characters in the stories, a desire that the gaudy rides can only satisfy fleetingly before disappointment takes hold again. Jeff Park has an assignation with a girl with a fondness for phosphorescent candy whom he meets on the Pirate Ship. She doesn't show. Eventually he tracks her down: 'He goes to her quickly, puts his hand on her shoulder, and pulls her toward him, hard enough that her head jerks back. People turn. Her jaw hangs wide and pretty, but the light in her mouth has gone out.'<br /><br />I could go on, but the main point of this blog is to direct readers to the work itself. You can whet your appetite for the book by sampling two of the stories online: <a href="http://www.charlotteobserver.com/636/story/601590.html">'Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned'</a> and <a href="http://www.viceland.com/int/v15n12/htdocs/wild-america-417.php">'Wild America'</a>. You won't be disappointed.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-15256010450146312932009-03-03T12:21:00.032+00:002009-03-03T17:21:10.038+00:00THE ESSENCE OF ADAPTATION<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/5e/Adaptation._film.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 260px; height: 385px;" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/5e/Adaptation._film.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>The <span style="font-style: italic;">Guardian Review</span> has an excellent, thought-provoking <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/feb/28/salman-rushdie-novels-film-adaptations">essay by Salman Rushdie</a> on the subject of literary adaptation. 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Section1 {size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt 72.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} --> </style><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0cm; mso-para-margin-right:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0cm; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} </style> <![endif]--> – whether it is the translation of a poem or the transfer of a novel to film – should be to capture the essence of the original work. Slavish "fidelity" to the source material is both misguided and futile, hence his apparent respect for what he describes as the "creatively savage" approach taken by <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0268126/">Spike Jonze and Charlie Kaufman's 2002 film</a>.<br /><br />However Rushdie also wishes to examine the notion of adaptation in its broadest sense. To do so, he says, "is to see that all the meanings of the word deal with the question of what is essential – in a work adapted to another form, in an individual adapting to a new home, in a society adapting to a new age. What do you preserve? What do you jettison? What is changeable, and where must you draw the line? The questions are always the same, and the way we answer them determines the quality of the adaptation, of the book, the poem, or of our own lives."<br /><br />In the course of the article, Rushdie reveals that he is working on a screenplay of <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Midnights-Children-Vintage-Classics-Rushdie/dp/0099511894/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1236098721&sr=1-1"><span style="font-style: italic;">Midnight's Children</span></a>, which is to be directed by <a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0576548/">Deepa Mehta</a>. It will be fascinating to hear his further thoughts on the adaptation process once this project comes to fruition.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-55248322281549508732009-03-03T09:16:00.013+00:002009-03-03T10:40:52.759+00:00THE TALENTED MR ROSSET<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.lulu.com/author/display_thumbnail.php?fCID=680438&fSize=320_&1236074747"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 221px; height: 322px;" src="http://www.lulu.com/author/display_thumbnail.php?fCID=680438&fSize=320_&1236074747" alt="" border="0" /></a>Barney Rosset, legendary New York publisher, is the subject of <a href="http://www.doubleofilm.com/"><span style="font-style: italic;">Obscene</span></a>, a documentary film released in the UK this week. View the trailer <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33-rTL8apZQ&eurl=http://thechagallposition.blogspot.com/2008_09_01_archive.html">here</a>, and read a New York Times feature <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/24/movies/24obsc.html">here</a>.<br /><br />Though Rosset relinquished <a href="http://www.groveatlantic.com/">Grove Press</a> some years ago, he is still Editor in Chief of the <a href="http://evergreenreview.com/">Evergreen Review</a>, which made its first appearance in 1957. The magazine now publishes most of its content online, and there are several short stories by new writers in <a href="http://evergreenreview.com/Contents.html">the current issue</a>.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-79655233928774179302009-02-06T09:02:00.013+00:002009-02-06T09:37:58.376+00:00INTRUDERS IN THE DUST<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.strandbooks.com/app/wwi/p/isbn/0307267563"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 185px; height: 276px;" src="http://www.strandbooks.com/app/wwi/p/isbn/0307267563" alt="" border="0" /></a>The latest New Yorker fiction offering is from a veteran of the magazine, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Millhauser">Steven Millhauser</a>. <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/features/2009/02/09/090209fi_fiction_millhauser">'The Invasion from Outer Space'</a> is a witty exploration of what occurs when our most deep-seated fears are made manifest, when events of which we have dreamed or which we have only experienced through books and films become reality.<br /><br />The imagery of 9/11 was so disturbingly familiar from popular culture that it has become difficult to revisit the cliches of the disaster movie, for example, without evoking that day. Millhauser turns this phenomenon on its head by taking as his subject a version of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_the_worlds"><span style="font-style: italic;">The War of the Worlds</span></a> in which the long-dreaded alien encounter turns out to be a bit of an anti-climax. The narrator wants 'terror and ecstacy', but all he gets is a coating of yellow dust.<br /><br />It's a tribute to the author's sensitivity and sense of humour that the story itself doesn't disappoint, and, unlike the extraterrestrial visitation, at just over 1500 words it doesn't outstay its welcome either.<br /><br />Steven Millhauser's most recent collection is called <a href="http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780307267566">Dangerous Laughter</a>.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-88022419062539649462009-01-30T09:18:00.038+00:002009-01-30T13:19:12.323+00:00VENICE OR LAS VEGAS<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.simonvanbooy.com/images/bookcover2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 295px; height: 444px;" src="http://www.simonvanbooy.com/images/bookcover2.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>A welcome online fiction showcase has been launched by <a href="http://www.harpercollins.com/imprints/index.aspx?imprintid=517986">Harper Perennial</a>, as reported by <a href="http://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/not-quite-joe-meek/">3:AM</a>. Curated by Cal Morgan, <a href="http://www.fiftytwostories.com/">Fifty-Two Stories</a> will publish new work every week this year by both established and emerging writers of the form.<br /><br />The series got off to an auspicious start with its first offering. <a href="http://www.simonvanbooy.com/authorbiography.htm">Simon Van Booy</a>'s <a href="http://www.fiftytwostories.com/?p=3">'The Missing Statues'</a> has a classic storytelling set-up: two strangers meet and fall into conversation about events from another time and place that are somehow connected to the here and now. One of them tries to comfort the other, saying: “I simply want to know why a missing statue has reduced a young American businessman to tears.”<br /><br />Like the statues of the title, everything in the story is at one remove from reality: the narrator speaks of Venice, but only as it is reimagined in Las Vegas. His tale involves a man who pretends to be an Italian gondolier, mimes the voice of Enrico Caruso and recognises his own daughter in a woman whose small child he befriends.<br /><br />British-born Van Booy's writing is highly coloured and romantic, but manages to skirt sentimentality. There is real feeling behind these facades, these masks and wishful imaginings.<br /><br />The story is taken from a forthcoming collection called <a href="http://www.harpercollins.com/books/9780061661471/Love_Begins_in_Winter/index.aspx"><span style="font-style: italic;">Love Begins in Winter</span></a>, which is published in the US in May, and <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Love-Begins-Winter-Simon-Booy/dp/1905636490/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1233320545&sr=1-2">in the UK in November</a>. It should be worth investigating, as should the rest of Cal Morgan's choices for Fifty-Two Stories this year.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-22380879840913739482009-01-27T07:14:00.025+00:002009-01-27T13:17:52.151+00:00F SCOTT HOT IN HOLLYWOOD<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/510gUJbXPWL._SL500_AA240_.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 240px;" src="http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/510gUJbXPWL._SL500_AA240_.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>The Roving Editor started life blogging about the links between literature and movies under the title <a href="http://wordonfilm.blogspot.com/">The Word on Film</a>. It seems appropriate to return to this relatively unexplored zone via <a href="http://www.all-story.com/">Zoetrope All-Story</a>, the literary magazine published by <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Ford_Coppola#Zoetrope_All_Story">Francis Ford Coppola</a>.<br /><br />This time last year we knew of <a href="http://wordonfilm.blogspot.com/2008/02/fitzgerald-and-faulkner-in-hollywood.html">two forthcoming films</a> based on F Scott Fitzgerald stories, <a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0421715/">The Curious Case of Benjamin Buttton</a> and <span style="font-style: italic;">Pat Hobby</span>. Here is screenwriter Eric Roth in the current issue of Zoetrope <a href="http://www.all-story.com/issues.cgi?action=show_story&story_id=402">on adapting <span style="font-style: italic;">Benjamin Button</span></a>. The magazine also carries <a href="http://www.all-story.com/issues.cgi?action=show_story&story_id=403">the story itself</a>, though it's not available to read online. It was originally published in the collection <a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tales-Jazz-Age-Scott-Fitzgerald/dp/1604242302/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203582527&sr=1-9">Tales of the Jazz Age</a>.<br /><br />Meanwhile the only update on <a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pat-Hobby-Stories-Scott-Fitzgerald/dp/0684804425/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203582371&sr=1-5">Pat Hobby</a> is that it is being lined up for production this year; the film company's synopsis reads: 'Fitzgerald’s beloved hack fights for a writer’s buck in the Hollywood studio system.'<br /><br />The author himself was no stranger to penury, of course, but these days he'd have found it a lot less difficult to make a beautiful dollar in Tinseltown: as well as the aforementioned adaptations, there is also news of yet another remake of <a style="font-style: italic;" href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Great-Gatsby-Penguin-Modern-Classics/dp/0141182636/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1233046140&sr=1-2">The Great Gatsby</a>, this time by <a href="http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/hr/content_display/film/news/e3i213af1e960abb3d8ec8ff1c76deca572">Baz Luhrmann</a>. However Variety has <a href="http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117997398.html?categoryid=3247&cs=1&query=gatsby">this cautionary tale</a> of the mixed artistic and box-office fortunes of F Scott on screen.<br /><br />Francis Coppola should be watching all of this with especial interest: he wrote the screenplay for the faithful but unloved <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0071577/">1974 adaptation of <span style="font-style: italic;">Gatsby</span></a>.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-38855006541439356552009-01-09T07:15:00.010+00:002009-01-09T08:54:43.036+00:00ONE TO WATCH IN 2009<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://i43.tower.com/images/mm112523321/rehearsal-eleanor-catton-paperback-cover-art.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 279px;" src="http://i43.tower.com/images/mm112523321/rehearsal-eleanor-catton-paperback-cover-art.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>Among a handful of literary names on the <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/jan/04/hotlist-books-fiction-brian-chikwava">Observer's 'hotlist' for 2009</a> is the young New Zealander <a href="http://www.victoria.ac.nz/vup/authorinfo/ecatton.aspx">Eleanor Catton</a>. From what I have seen of her work, the interest is entirely justified. <a href="http://www.nzetc.org/iiml/turbine/Turbi07/fiction/Catton1.html">'The Outing'</a> has the mingled humour and menace of a Hitchcock movie in miniature, while <a href="http://www.stuff.co.nz/sundaystartimes/4269063a20595.html">'Necropolis'</a> is a beautifully observed depiction of a dead-end job. It's no surprise to see that the author is a fan of <a href="http://www.nzetc.org/iiml/turbine/Turbi07/readingroom/CattonXXXX.html">Muriel Spark</a>.<br /><br />'The Outing' has apparently been reworked as a scene in Catton's debut novel <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Rehearsal-Eleanor-Catton/dp/0864735812/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1231488202&sr=1-1"><span style="font-style: italic;">The Rehearsal</span></a>. According to the Observer this is due to be published by Granta in the UK in July, though this edition is not currently listed on Amazon, and the publisher does not appear to have a <a href="http://www.grantabooks.com/">website</a> at present. More details when we have them.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-58533240913552783102008-12-17T19:08:00.016+00:002009-01-09T11:30:04.967+00:00THE BEST STORY OF THE YEAR?<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.newyorker.com/images/2008/09/22/p465/080922_r17743_p465.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 465px; height: 459px;" src="http://www.newyorker.com/images/2008/09/22/p465/080922_r17743_p465.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>BookFox's choices for <a href="http://www.thejohnfox.com/bookfox/2008/12/best-short-story-collections-of-2008.html">best short story collections of 2008</a> include a number of books that were featured on The Roving Editor. It is especially gratifying to see <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/09/one-of-great-pleasures-of-blogging-is.html">Glen Pourciau</a>'s <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Invite-Iowa-Short-Fiction-Award/dp/1587296926/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1220866721&sr=1-1">Invite</a> on the list, as this a strong debut from one of the most interesting new writers to emerge this year.<br /><br /><a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/10/james-joyce-once-claimed-that-if-dublin_06.html">Donald Ray Pollock</a> has attracted more coverage than Glen, but he deserves all the praise he has received. The challenge for him now will be to produce a worthy follow-up to <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Knockemstiff-Donald-Ray-Pollock/dp/1846551560/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1217926537&sr=1-1">Knockemstiff</a>. <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/08/lesbian-vampires-et-al.html">Nam Le</a>'s debut collection, <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Boat-Nam/dp/1847671616/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1221502356&sr=1-2">The Boat</a>, and <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/09/bengalis-and-dubliners.html">Jhumpa Lahiri</a>'s <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Unaccustomed-Earth-Jhumpa-Lahiri/dp/0747590001/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1221503132&sr=1-1">Unaccustomed Earth</a> are also excellent choices.<br /><br />One story I managed to overlook on its appearance in the New Yorker in September was <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/features/2008/09/22/080922fi_fiction_hemon">'The Noble Truths of Suffering'</a> by <a href="http://www.aleksandarhemon.com/">Aleksandar Hemon</a>. Set in Sarajevo, this is a darkly funny exploration of the writing life which shows how creativity can find inspiration in the midst of death, destruction and domesticity. I am grateful to another of our featured authors, <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/08/late-to-party.html">Joshua Ferris</a>, who has named it as 'the best story of the year' in <a href="http://www.granta.com/Online-Only/Books-of-the-Year">Granta's year-end round-up</a>.<br /><br />I would welcome nominations from readers of their favourite writers of short fiction in 2008, or for names we should be looking out for in 2009. Judging by the interest I have had in my post on <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/11/meet-well-tower.html">Wells Tower</a>, I fully expect him to feature prominently in next year's literary lists.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-5927435115025246452008-12-03T10:42:00.021+00:002008-12-04T10:51:59.508+00:00'DON'T WORRY ABOUT ME'<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.newyorker.com/images/2008/12/08/p233/081208_r18015_p233.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 233px; height: 235px;" src="http://www.newyorker.com/images/2008/12/08/p233/081208_r18015_p233.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amos_Oz">Amos Oz</a> is an another of those <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2008/09/ignorance-and-bliss.html">eminent living writers whose work I have only just sampled for the first time</a>.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/features/2008/12/08/081208fi_fiction_oz?currentPage=all">'Waiting'</a>, in this week's New Yorker, is a profound and powerfully atmospheric tale. Set in an almost deserted Israeli village on a sleepy Friday afternoon, it reads like an existential ghost story. The ghost in question is Benny's Avni's wife Nava, who has disappeared leaving only a note that says, 'Don't worry about me.' (That's a hell of a note to leave. If Raymond Carver had written the story, that's probably what it would have been called.)<br /><br />Benny, head of the District Council and pillar of the community, doesn't so much wait for Nava as embark on a journey in search of a woman he has never really known. All the while he is shadowed by a stray dog, which appears to be showing him the way:<br /><br />'He asked himself, Would it not be better to go straight home? After all, she might have returned and was perhaps resting, puzzled by his absence, maybe even worried about him. But the thought of the empty house terrified him, and he went on, limping, following the dog, who never looked back, his muzzle lowered as if sniffing the way.'<br /><br />I was reminded of the mundane, yet menacing terrain of John Cheever's 'The Swimmer'. In Oz's story, Benny's wanderings take him to a bomb shelter and the school where his wife teaches: 'The school’s metal gates were already locked for the Sabbath. Both the building and the playground were surrounded by an iron fence topped with barbed wire.'<br /><br />I don't know if 'Waiting' is from a forthcoming collection, but there is at least one <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Where-Jackals-Howl-Amos-Oz/dp/0099982005/ref=sr_1_12?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1228332723&sr=1-12">volume of Amos Oz's stories</a> in print, which I look forward to investigating further.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-63793401733265819492008-11-29T11:05:00.015+00:002008-12-01T11:15:44.107+00:00LONDON CALLING<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.litro.co.uk/covers/80.gif"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 178px; height: 356px;" src="http://www.litro.co.uk/covers/80.gif" alt="" border="0" /></a>I've recently come across two excellent magazines offering online literary content. <a href="http://www.thedrawbridge.org.uk/">The Drawbridge</a> has published work by the likes of Tobias Wolff, Siri Hustvedt, Irvine Welsh and DBC Pierre. The <a href="http://www.thedrawbridge.org.uk/issue_11/">current issue</a> features an excerpt from José Saramago's new novel, though, as with most of the articles, you'll have to <a href="http://www.thedrawbridge.org.uk/subscribe/index.html">purchase the print edition</a> to read the full text.<br /><br />I first came across Salena Godden's name in a mailing from <a href="http://www.litro.co.uk/">Litro</a> magazine. Her writing has also appeared in The Drawbridge, and you can read her entertaining story, 'The Walrus and the Diamond Ring' <a href="http://www.thedrawbridge.org.uk/issue_1/the_walrus_and_the_diamond_rin/">here</a>. Like The Drawbridge, Litro is a London-based publication. It was 'founded in 2005 by Mike Fell to provide commuters and office workers with a short story every week. Mike came up with the idea of Litro after finishing <em>Dubliners</em> by James Joyce somewhere near Mornington Crescent.' An admirable enterprise. I was glad to discover interesting work by two new names, <a href="http://www.litro.co.uk/?p=21">Carol Farrelly</a> and <a href="http://www.litro.co.uk/?p=38">Deborah Nash</a>.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-53964696253785998462008-11-14T15:18:00.011+00:002008-11-17T20:50:10.852+00:00THE READING WILL NOT BE TELEVISED<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhre7KeXfh4Ho5oGgZsmXtYzQvjPuRSQzn0AIAIWow2gXkjIBRRBU52iRMjZOiYSie-Ypg_R5_e1aX5m1FJB72kJoBFwTevPODZOWe6Jx2Su0HRbp9MjXr6pI73wCENzKG7FLm8ZmIpraJO/s320/DebOlinUnferth_2.JPG"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhre7KeXfh4Ho5oGgZsmXtYzQvjPuRSQzn0AIAIWow2gXkjIBRRBU52iRMjZOiYSie-Ypg_R5_e1aX5m1FJB72kJoBFwTevPODZOWe6Jx2Su0HRbp9MjXr6pI73wCENzKG7FLm8ZmIpraJO/s320/DebOlinUnferth_2.JPG" alt="" border="0" /></a>The Roving Editor spends rather less time in New York than in North Yorkshire, so unfortunately I missed <a href="http://www.stopsmilingonline.com/story_detail.php?id=871">Deb Olin Unferth</a>'s event <a href="http://beatrice.com/wordpress/2008/11/09/at-the-merc-unferth-vadino/">at the MercBar</a> this week. If her readings are as entertaining as <a href="http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=w1lRgdMZ3Xg&feature=related">this YouTube clip</a> suggests, it would have been well worth going along. Her phrasing and delivery of a story entitled 'Deb Olin Unferth' reminded me, weirdly, of <a href="http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=uTCQSk2l8bc">Gil Scott Heron</a>, though the content is uniquely (and literally) her own.<br /><br />I heard of Deb Olin Unferth through Ron Hogan's always diverting blog, <a href="http://www.beatrice.com/wordpress/">Beatrice</a>, and discovered a few short pieces by her <a href="http://www.bu.edu/agni/authors/D/Deb-Olin-Unferth.html">here</a>, and <a href="http://reader-of-depressing-books.blogspot.com/2005/12/la-pea-by-deb-olin-unferth-and.html">here</a>. The themes of theft and tourism seem to loom large in her work, and the sense of humour is bone-dry. I look forward to her debut novel, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Vacation-Deb-Olin-Unferth/dp/1934781096/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1226677208&sr=1-1">Vacation</a>, though this doesn't appear to have been picked up by a UK publisher as yet.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1716075898862523958.post-43467695465605816362008-11-07T13:07:00.020+00:002009-03-24T07:38:45.255+00:00MEET WELLS TOWER<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://media.us.macmillan.com/authors/258H/7576810.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 172px; height: 258px;" src="http://media.us.macmillan.com/authors/258H/7576810.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a>There's more than a touch of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saki">Saki</a> in <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/features/2008/11/10/081110fi_fiction_tower">'Leopard'</a>, a short story by Wells Tower in this week's New Yorker. Both writers seem to share an instinctive understanding of the battle lines separating children from adults. In 'Leopard', as in the collection <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Beasts-Super-Beasts-Saki/dp/1598183273/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1226067519&sr=1-6"><span style="font-style: italic;">Beasts and Super-Beasts</span></a>, the animal kingdom is a metaphor for the forces of nature that can invade the most ordered human existence.<br /><br /><a href="http://us.macmillan.com/author/wellstower">Wells Tower</a> is a new (and unusual) name, but something tells me we will be hearing it more often in the future. Oh, and I must also thank the author for adding a new word to my vocabulary: everything about his story is <a href="http://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-cop1.htm">copacetic</a>, in fact.<br /><br />UPDATE: Read The Roving Editor's review of Wells Tower's debut collection, <span style="font-style: italic;">Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned</span>, <a href="http://rovingeditor.blogspot.com/2009/03/read-wells-tower.html">here</a>.{ Seán Costello }http://www.blogger.com/profile/11468161174907646643noreply@blogger.com2