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Sunday, July 05, 2020

Vale Charles Webb


Rudness is the weak person's imitation of strength.
-Yammerite




  Charles Webb, best known as the author of The Graduate, on which the famous movie was based, has passed away. 
       As Harrison Smith's obituary in The Washington Post makes clear, he was an unusual guy -- about as anti-materialist as seems possible:
He had sold the movie rights to his novel for a flat fee of $20,000 and never shared in the film's profits or in the proceeds from subsequent stage adaptations. He donated the book's copyright to the Anti-Defamation League and went on to sell or donate nearly everything else he had as well
       He did publish other books, but his debut overshadowed everything else. See also the Washington Square Press publicity page for The Graduate, or get your copy at Amazon.com or Amazon.co.uk 

   An interesting post at the CREWS Project's weblog, Pippa Steele on Depicting writing -- i.e. depicting the actual act of writing -- in classical times. 

    In The Guardian Alison Flood collects leading crime-fiction authors' comments on: "how they came up with their most famous creations, what it's like to live with them over decades and if they'll last the distance", in Me and my detective by Lee Child, Attica Locke, Sara Paretsky, Jo Nesbø and more. 
       Good fun. 



The World’s Most Famous Illegal Theatre Company Was Ready For The COVID Lockdown

Belarus Free Theatre — outlawed by its homeland’s dictatorship, forced to rehearse and perform in secret, and with its artistic directors living in asylum abroad — has years of experience using secure high-tech platforms to work together remotely and livestream its plays. The company has been unusually productive in the months since the pandemic arrived, and its newest production is already making news. – HowlRound



Early, Unfinished Story By Louisa May Alcott Published For First Time — With Invitation For Writers To Finish It

WORDSPosted:  

“Aunt Nellie’s Diary,” a 9,000-word piece written when Alcott was in her late teens, “is narrated by the 40-year-old title character, and follows her observations as a romantic triangle appears to unfold among her orphaned, fair-haired niece” and two friends. The fragment appears in the latest issue of The Strand Magazine, which will “post guidelines in the coming weeks” for writers to submit their own endings. – Yahoo! (AP)


MAY HE LIVE LONG, AND KEEP ALL HIS FACULTIES TO THE LAST DAY OF HIS LIFE:  Happy 90th Birthday Thomas Sowell – our nation turns its lonely eyes to you.


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