It's hard for me to believe that people who read very little (or not at all in some cases) should presume to write and expect people to like what they have written, but I know it's true.
-Stephen King, On Writing
This week, after years of effort, I finally gazed upon my coveted first book contract and suddenly realized it wasn't a period at all. It was a comma at best, maybe even a dreaded semicolon! In the News and First Timers
Cold River is a paperback First Timer as the eBook publishing contract expands to cover paper edition. The world isms created is ours, a look in the mirror, certainly, the way a good Shakespearean comedian can be so funny because they make fun of some little quirk that we identify with because we thought that idiosyncrasy was ours alone Papier: If upon a summers night
Art of Living & Literature Across Frontiers: A Homecoming
Once upon a time, Clayton James Cubitt took fashion photos like this for a living. Once upon a time as in a month ago.
His family didn't have much - his Mom lived in a trailer, earnt $6.95 an hour giving out food stamps in a hardscrabble town.
In Louisiana. When his family was homeless, and the town demolished so completely that only one building remained, he hired a car and charged the batteries on his camera and laptop and went home.
Sometimes art is all you can do, because it is a search for the truth, because there is some chance it will reverberate down the centuries when all the mewling cliches and excuses and lies from greedy, ugly parasitic people have gone. Go here, scroll to the bottom, and work up. I know its annoying, but time really does run forwards and in this case its rules should be obeyed. These photographs are part of a coherent body of work, with pictures, words, heartache, compassion, despair and rage all jammed and soaked and smashed together until it is some organic thing, sentient and calling. But here's one I feel I can take out:
• Why documentary is important [via soulful reel guru Barista ; My Real Vienna with no family ]
• · Writing is an art, publishing is a business and oftimes a broken business at that. Publicity and First Time Authors ; In the early middle ages, blue really was the new blac Peter Stothard
• · · Belarus is one of the most repressive and bizarre regimes in Europe. But Tom Stoppard, on a recent trip to the capital, Minsk, found a thriving opposition and a hunger for art that challenges the 'national psychosis' Accidental tyranny ; Live E-Panel - First Time Authors and Publicity; Loving books, hating words
• · · · Alan Bennett's childhood was distinctly unliterary. He learned his craft from performing and writing comedy, writes Nicholas Wroe. Bennett later came to value the 'clarity and determined ordinariness' of Larkin Sketchy beginnings ; Topple The Mighty is a new book about knocking down statues of unpopular leaders. So it is not on the official reading list for Tony Blair's Labour Party conference this week. Topple the mighty
• · · · · Our surburbs are filled with men and women who have been treated badly all their married lives. They don’t tell anyone, because there is shame in being treated badly. This proves the point about feelings of worthlessness or excessive or inappropriate guilt nearly every day Beyond Sadness ; This proves it wrong depressioNet provides a comprehensive online resource for Australians living with depression and our families and friends to come for information, help & support. depressioNet ; Do you need a job to find a job?
• · · · · · In the era of always-on connectivity, could the technology we surround ourselves with potentially harm us? Call in sick ; It will be surprising if The Proposition doesn't ruffle feathers and get people talking Film: The Proposition