BookFox

Writers Strike Back!

So the vote for the Writers Guild of America to go on strike was 90% in favor, God bless 'em. The strike will happen on Monday - picket lines in both Los Angeles and New York. I must say that I didn't think the executives would let it go so far - I pictured an 11th hour agreement, with the studios holding out so long just to scare writers. Because it's clearly a bluff: the writers' demands are so commonsense and logical that it could only be due to politicking and enormous avarice that the studios are holding out. For instance, two main demands: that DVD residuals be increased from .3% to .6% (which Entertainment Weekly has improperly skewed as 3% to 6% - perhaps with ill-intentions). Also, the second main demand is that writers receive residuals for shows downloaded from the internet and for webisodes. I can't even conceive of a possible objection to the second demand: If a writer creates a show, then the medium of delivery - whether television or the internet - is immaterial. They should get residuals for whatever way it is broadcast.

So, I still have to bet that the studios will end up capitulating without a long delay. They have absolutely no ethical grounds for denying writers their residuals. It's just a game of leverage - of starting the strike in order to scare writers enough so the studios can develop a bargain slightly more in their favor and continue their kleptocracy.

But if they don't resolve the strike soon, the studios will obviously be doing fine and dandy with experienced, credentialed writers like this one who posted an open advertisment on Craig's List offering his 3.1 GPA and fresh-from-college skills.

Banned Books

Even though I'm a couple weeks late on banned books week, I've been reading, apropos of nothing, a number of banned books. I just finished Nabokov's Lolita and am reading Joyce's Ulysses - both wonderful, wonderful books (although so far my favorite is Lolita - Nabokov is a genius). I also have a longstanding fascination with the furor that still hovers over Salman Rushdie - as evidenced by the protests across Muslim countries this year when the Queen announced she would knight him. In fact, I read The Satanic Verses primarily because it had been banned (an ironic bit of logic - that banning usually leads to more readers than fewer). I've never tried to explain my fascination with the fatwa on Rushdie, although I've recognized that my obsession transcends normal explanations. I think it might be this: that imprisonment, censorship, death threats and other forms of oppression from governments and religious organizations do two things. One, they reaffirm what writers want to believe with all their heart: that their writing matters, that it triggers cultural tremors that shake up people's presuppositions about society. Two, it makes the writer's life into an action story, a Hollywood danger flick that might or might include some cloak-and-dagger fleeing in the night. At least that's how I imagine it. And I admit that it fascinates me only because I'm not the one being assassinated or jailed.

Well, over at Ward Six I found a post referencing Cities of Refuge. It's a program that provides asylum for writers persecuted in their native countries. They say it better:

A City of Refuge is a free space, unfettered by censorship or political repression, in which writers who have undergone such hardship may safely practice their craft.

Asylum is such a beautiful thing. It's at the core of that undervalued and yet crucial ethic: hospitality. By protecting writers who have been exiled from their countries (and there is a long list - check the website), we are exhibiting the most generous form of hospitality, not only taking others in and providing for their needs, but guarding them against the enemies that would be willing to hunt them down. A noteworthy static gleaned from the site:

Between January and June 2006, 19 writers were murdered, 33 had received death threats and 142 were imprisoned, according to International PEN's Writers in Prison Committee.

Sorry, I could chalk this up to naivety, but I think the numbers are higher than what I would have guessed. Aren't you surprised?

Interestingly enough, the term City of Refuge comes from the Old Testament, from the book of Deuteronomy and Joshua, where six cities were designated as places for murderers to flee. Inside the city, they were safe from persecution - including the right of relatives to kill them to avenge their kin. But this concept of the City of Refuge is just the opposite - it's not murderers hiding but the innocent seeking refuge from murderers.

Although. I wonder - even if this is only the wondering of someone who's been teaching too much rhetoric in freshman comp classes. Could there be a time when a country shouldn't offer asylum to a writer? I honestly can't think of one. I could think of examples when we shouldn't offer asylum to criminals, people whose crimes were much greater than putting pen to paper, in which case hospitality is upstaged by the ethic of neighborly duty and the moral decision would support extradition. But writers, at least in my judgment, seem to always deserve protection. I will admit, however, that in this case I might have a very slight bias.

It's been too long

Sorry for the absence of posting recently. I've been swamped with a number of things, including sending off a flock of short stories to literary journals, as well as trying to look for career opportunities for Fall, 2008, since I’m finishing my MFA degree at USC in May of 08. It looks like I’ll land adjunct work - not the most fiscally glorious, but if I can find literature classes to teach, certainly enjoyable. The last project has been writing my thesis - a collection of short stories. Between pounding out new drafts and agonizing over editing former drafts, all my creative imagination and time has been poured into the collection. But I'll certainly let everyone know when some of the stories get published (fingers crossed).

Reflections on Madeleine L'Engle

So Madeleine L'Engle, the writer of children's books, died last week. All I've been thinking about is how much I liked reading A Wrinkle in Time, how I thought the sequel - A Wind in the Door - wasn't nearly as good, and how I could tell you virtually nothing about the plot of either. That's the toll of too many years on my memory. All I know is that I'll have an excuse to read all my favorite childhood books again when I have kids: either out loud to them, or as a way to accompany them on their trips of imagination.

My other memory of A Wrinkle in Time is how my mother did not approve of it. She was the type of mother that read every book I was assigned for school and complained to the teacher if it contained above a certain number of curse words or more than a hint of sexual conduct. She was a model for censorship (which is rather ironic in light of my broad and morally indiscriminate consumption of books now). I'm not sure quite why she had a distaste for the Wrinkle book - perhaps it was too science-fiction-y, but the fantasy of Lewis and Tolkien never scared her. Perhaps if I read it again I would know. It could have been a foul word, it could have been the lack of explicit Christian-ness about it, or it could been some hearsay about the author. I don't think that my mother's aversion to the book hindered me from liking it - although it might have made it more difficult to obtain and read. It might have been one of the books read by flashlight under the covers late at night - oh, my subversive childhood!

But of all the pieces that I've seen this past week, people usually focus solely on L'Engle's fiction, on the books for children. Unlike most, I actually read some of her non-fiction as well. One of my favorites was her 1980 book Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art. It's a quiet, measured examination of what it means to write narrative through the lens of the transcendent. In terms of topic, it's reminiscent of Flannery O'Connor's Mystery and Manners, but in terms of tone, no one can match the terse, acerbic voice of Flannery. No, in Walking on Water L'Engle simply leads the reader through an examination of her own work and a meditation on how to write well in light of a religious worldview. It's worth a glimpse, if you're into that type of thing.

Adaptations

Stephanie Harrison’s Adaptations Collection.This is an interesting book I saw awhile back. A collection of thirty-five short stories that have been adapted into classic movies. From “All About Eve” to “Minority Report.”

I’ve always heard the idea professed that – in terms of adaptation - the worse the novel, the better the movie. The idea being – I suppose – that overly literary works don’t translate well to the big screen. Not as well as extroverted populist works with car chases and bloody shootouts anyway.

In other words, Mario Puzo’s Godfather novels aren’t entering the western canon anytime soon. But the film versions (one and two) would have to be included in any discussion of the greatest movies of all time.

Meanwhile, the 1967 film version of James Joyce’s Ulysses would probably not be included anywhere near that list. An unfair comparison maybe, after all they turned “Naked Lunch,” and “Lolita” into fairly decent films.

So is it the worse the short story, the better the film?

Interview at Emerging Writers Network

Okay, last post before I get out of the country, seriously. Over at Emerging Writers Network, Dan has a roundtable with numerous bloggers, and I am one of the interviewees. Always interesting to hear what your fellow bloggers say about their site, and also nice to see such attention being paid to the emerging blogger network.

Summer Posting

Hello loyal BookFox readers,

I'm taking off to South America with Mrs. BookFox for six weeks, until August 9th. Going to visit Chile, Argentina, Paraguay, and Uruguay. Why? Because neither of us has been there, no other reason. The vacation time is the blessed union of when a teacher marries another teacher. Since I'll be unable to post on a regular basis while I'm gallivanting about down there, I've tapped into a few of my literary friends to guest post while I'm gone. They'll be introducing themselves in the next few days and starting to offer their enormous stores of wisdom about all bookish things. Enjoy the consortium of guest bloggers, and enjoy the hot summer days.

Book Fight

In an age where organizations mount campaigns to rescue book reviews from death, the number of independent bookstores drop year by year, and publishers bemoan their profit margins and wail about the difficulty of their job, it's nice to see people fight over books. Yes, fight. No, not with words. More like fisticuffs, but less formal - a better analogy might be cage fighting. The altercations occurred at the annual book sale of the Alta Dena library sale here in Los Angeles, which is a fundraiser. Hardbacks: 75 cents. Paperbacks: 50 cents. The result: Sprinting and elbowing and shoving and screaming. Someone snatched the latest Jonathan Safran Foer out of an adolescent's eager grasp, someone else selfishly sequestered several boxes to a corner to sort through away from the throng, snarling if anyone ventured too close. Pandemonium erupted as four people tried to grab the same book at the same time - tables were upset. Next year, they might consider hiring an official referee. And some bouncers.

The violence was nice in the way that violence is hardly ever nice, because people fighting over books reassured me that people love books. I know that seems like a truism, but I it's easy to forget with all the whining and moping that goes on, such as people trumpeting about how good books - that is, literary books - don't sell anymore, that it's all about marketing and accessibility. It reassured me in a way that a hundred new book reviews couldn't - very tangible, watching people fighting over books. It reassured me that books still are important, that they still offer quite a bit of weight in our cultural currency.

But aside from being happy to watch people fight, I made out with a load of loot. About 40 hardcovers and 3 softbacks. Here's are just a couple of the highlights:

Kazuo Ishiguro: When We Were Orphans
Marianne Wiggins: Evidence of Things Unseen
Zadie Smith: On Beauty
A.M. Homes: Things You Should Know
Ben Fountain: Brief Encounters with Che Guevara
Michael Chabon: Summerland and The Mysteries of Pittsburg

So Mrs. BookFox, after gasping when she saw me carrying up a box of books (and then I told her there were two more boxes) said I shouldn't buy books for a while, seeing as I have plenty to read. I doubt I will restrain myself, but I will get going on some happy reading.

Open Letter

Dear Ed,

I miss you. I mean, the monkeys running your site are fun and all, but they're even crazier than you (or maybe I'm just adjusted to your frequency of crazy). Certainly Erin O'Brien is crazier than you. Every post of hers is labeled with breasts. You would never do that, Ed. You would probably go straight for a crotch joke.

Anyway, I know it's super-duper important, the stuff you're doing (like moving to New York, sniff, sniff, leaving us West Coast folk) that takes you away from your normal quota of twenty-five posts a day (containing a minimum of one rant, one snarky comment, one hyperlink fest, and one video), but you know how it is, we internet addicts get used to a daily dose of crack-candy, and we just can't do without our fix. (Next Critical Mass blog: All Bloggers shoot up!) So hope you come back soon.

Signed,

An uber-loyal Fan

aka from a "Dear John"

Reflections on a Year of Blogging

BookFox has nearly reached the ripe old age of One year, and, as I look back on my year of blogging, I find it interesting how this form of writing has affected my other writing. In addition to blogging, I am a short story writer. When it's all added up, I have written fewer fiction stories than in previous years, but not that many fewer. I find it far easier to surf the web for articles to link to or speculate on the latest novel than to buckle down and attempt to create a world (whether that says something about my skills as a fiction writer is something I'm going to ignore). This slight decrease, I believe, is something to be expected - any form of writing tends to drain the writer from the energy to tackle a different form of writing. Many of my friends are journalists or technical writers or work for advertising agencies, and all of them find it difficult to write for themselves (creatively) after eight hours of writing for others. But it's also a sacrifice that the writer has to be able to make - and it's done in the belief that diversifying the genres of your writing, is, in the long run, fruitful for creating a full set of well-rounded skills.

It's actually my journal writing that blogging has affected most. I have maintained a journal for more than a decade now, and my efforts occupy most of a row on my bookshelves - most are black, and bound, but a few have spiral loops and green covers. They are journals - not diaries - so they don't chronicle the day, they contain thoughts, story ideas, reflections, travel narratives, and any number of miscellaneous tidbits thrown in because they linger in my mind. As I look through my journal this last year, I've written virtually nothing in it, and I ascribe that mostly to concentrating on the blog. While I used to stack up lists of topics that I wanted to reflect upon in a personal, private manner, now I number sticky notes near the computer that remind me of my next newsworthy post. Even though my blog is not even a daily blog, like some of the superstar literary bloggers, it still occupies a solid chunk of my mind: much of my time is spent thinking about what I'll write about next. And so I've stopped journaling.

I don't mean in any way to diminish the act of blogging; in fact, I've loved it. I love the community. I love learning so much from my fellow bloggers (and from those who leave messages on my site). I love all the furious, rip-roaring literary throw-downs and rambunctious new titles that get everyone up in a tizzy. But I do want to highlight the cultural shift blogging is starting to create. Bloggers - and now I'm not talking about "professional" ones but also the "look what my kid did last week" blogs - have to prize the public over the personal. It's a focus on revelation, on disclosure, to a broad audience, which allows for wider dissemination of knowledge, but also creates less time for introspection. It's the introspection that I feel I've lost. I've stopped writing things that dig at why I do the things I do, that examine my psychological state of mind, or the course that my life is taking (which too often is hijacked by peripheral concerns).

For instance, today I would have journaled. I would have journaled that I saw an old woman fall. She split her head open on the edge of the sidewalk and started wailing. I called 911. She spurted streams of blood onto the cement; one hand pressed against her forehead, the other one cupped a pool of blood as if she could save it and put it back inside. She was Korean and we talked at each other without understanding. I touched her ankle to try to communicate that I was calling for help. When she got up and started walking, I tried to keep her still, but she wouldn't be stopped. She wandered in to the manager. When the ambulance came, I flagged them down and led them through the building. The paramedics were taken aback at the deepness of the gash, and decided to immobolize her neck on a flat board. Afterwards I regretted not trying to staunch the blood with my shirt. I had panicked, I admit. I wasn't thinking clearly. I thought: get professionals. When I should have taken off my shirt and tried to stop the profuse bleeding. I checked my jacket, pants, shirt, for blood splatters, but couldn't find any. Later, after teaching my USC class, my pen exploded in my bag at the gym. It soaked everything in a rich dark ink. My hands were covered. My books were smeared. It wouldn't wash off. I was more upset than I should have been, and then I realized why. I thought coincidental metaphors only came in books, but from reading Murakami I should have known better.

But instead of journaling, I suppose I just blogged about it. Just the act of blogging, though, the sending out to the world, affects the content I put up. If I had written this in my journal, it would have been different. It would have been longer, probably. It would have been more thoughtful. It would have had a messier scrawl and been written mostly in shorthand (okay, the last one isn't much of an improvement). And I never post personal stuff like this, so most of the time, if I don't journal about it, it gets lost in the ephemera of daily events.

After reading this post over, it seems to be a goodbye letter to the blogosphere. Sorry to disappoint expectations, but no. I'm not quitting. I'm just going to try to do a better job balancing all three of my writing responsibilities (and probably throw in a fourth, with various freelancing responsibilities, but whatever). Most importantly, I don't want to let my public communication, with my fiction and blogging, eclipse my private ponderings. To be a well-rounded individual, as well as a well-rounded writer, I want to find time for all of them. To see whether that will actually happen, you'll probably have to wait until the second year anniversary of BookFox.