More specifically concerning: publishing
The Histories of Books
29 October 2002, around 17.10.
To write the much-lamented Cicero essay, I happened to check two small pamphlets out of the library, both Teubner editions of short works by Sallust (or an anonymous author in the style of Sallust). Both had been edited by A. Kurfess (who also edited the Teubner edition of Sallust’s other works [1956]) and had belonged […]
dedication
14 November 2003, around 12.38.
Although the new A. S. Byatt collection Little Black Book of Stories is something of a disappointment because three1 of the five stories have been published before, the last paragraph in the book book almost makes up for it: Finally, this book is dedicated to my German translator and to my Italian translators, all good […]
colonoscopy
29 January 2004, around 18.43.
As the abandonment of periodic arrangement really makes the colon useless, it would be well (though of course any one who still writes in formal periods should retain his rights over it) if ordinary writers would give it up altogether except in special uses, independent of its quantitative value, to which it is being more […]
tetrad
31 August 2008, around 0.12.
We always associate the word ‘book’ with printing, and think of it in terms of format and typographical convenience, but such mechanical criteria do not apply to notebooks, whose beginning and end are determined only by the unity of the poetic impulse which gives birth to a given series of poems. In other words, a […]
The Business of Books
21 July 2013, around 4.38.
By André Schiffrin, Verso, 2000.
open rejection
19 October 2013, around 11.32.
Your novel has been read by several of us, and we are very sorry that we have had to conclude that we cannot make an offer of publication. It is quite readable and has vitality, but, in general, it is our impression that you have not yet sufficiently mastered the technique which is necessary to […]
A Publisher Speaking
3 January 2014, around 5.20.
By Geoffrey Faber, Houghton Mifflin, 1935.
Citation (51)
4 March 2014, around 8.28.
fury and despair…
A Feeling for Books
20 March 2015, around 5.04.
By Janice Radway, Univ. NC Press, 1997.
Crambe repetita (36)
15 April 2015, around 9.04.
Allen Lane, quoted in Penguin Portrait.
a critical perspective
20 May 2024, around 7.26.
The forger, in sum, treats his reader as a flight simulator treats a pilot; he offers a vivid image of the specific text and situation that he seeks to represent, but only a vague and obviously unreal one of their periphery. Like the pilot in training, the reader in question is mesmerized by the deliberately […]