Of broad interest to readers working in that Venn diagram space where writing, publishing, and cyberspace come together.
A gathering of mostly accessible academic pieces on the changes wrought on literature and criticism by the internet.
“There is more to the online literary debate than ‘if you liked that, you’ll love this,’ ” writes University of Cambridge professor Kasia Boddy in her foreword. There surely is: the internet can be a place of bots awarding points to dubious books and haters tearing a book’s ratings down; it can be an echo chamber or a wind tunnel, useful or useless. Online critic Scott Esposito, who has been at it since nearly the beginning of blogs, charts the recent evolution of the Web as a means of literary communication, noting, for instance, that he scarcely reads New York Times book reviews anymore, since digests are so readily available online: “why bother, when a tweet will tell you everything you need to know about said review?” One suspects that as a stalwart of literary culture—and he’s a little self-congratulatory there—Esposito is not entirely serious, but he does make the significant point that he and others first learned of the likes of Knausgaard, Ferrante, and so forth via social media. Jonathon Sturgeon writes ruefully of being an “online hack,” pushing out copy for hits and “moving worstward,” while, more reassuringly, Will Self assures the writers in the audience that it’s OK to live in isolation: “you cannot write while you’re having a conversation.” Of the more noteworthy pieces, essayist Lauren Elkin considers the positive effects that reaching for a broader audience might have on academic criticism (“criticism wants to go outward”), while theoretician and publisher Michael Bhaskar proposes that publishing itself is a form of criticism (via gatekeeping, editing, promoting, and so forth). Interestingly, many of the contributors, though fully part of the system, worry about the “overproduction of content,” as writer Orit Gat puts it—though Gat herself suggests that still more platforms are wanted for digital production.
Of broad interest to readers working in that Venn diagram space where writing, publishing, and cyberspace come together.Pub Date: Nov. 30, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-682190-76-0
Page Count: 224
Publisher: OR Books
Review Posted Online: Sept. 30, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2017
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s...
Music journalist and musician Wald (Talking 'Bout Your Mama: The Dozens, Snaps, and the Deep Roots of Rap, 2014, etc.) focuses on one evening in music history to explain the evolution of contemporary music, especially folk, blues, and rock.
The date of that evening is July 25, 1965, at the Newport Folk Festival, where there was an unbelievably unexpected occurrence: singer/songwriter Bob Dylan, already a living legend in his early 20s, overriding the acoustic music that made him famous in favor of electronically based music, causing reactions ranging from adoration to intense resentment among other musicians, DJs, and record buyers. Dylan has told his own stories (those stories vary because that’s Dylan’s character), and plenty of other music journalists have explored the Dylan phenomenon. What sets Wald's book apart is his laser focus on that one date. The detailed recounting of what did and did not occur on stage and in the audience that night contains contradictory evidence sorted skillfully by the author. He offers a wealth of context; in fact, his account of Dylan's stage appearance does not arrive until 250 pages in. The author cites dozens of sources, well-known and otherwise, but the key storylines, other than Dylan, involve acoustic folk music guru Pete Seeger and the rich history of the Newport festival, a history that had created expectations smashed by Dylan. Furthermore, the appearances on the pages by other musicians—e.g., Joan Baez, the Weaver, Peter, Paul, and Mary, Dave Van Ronk, and Gordon Lightfoot—give the book enough of an expansive feel. Wald's personal knowledge seems encyclopedic, and his endnotes show how he ranged far beyond personal knowledge to produce the book.
An enjoyable slice of 20th-century music journalism almost certain to provide something for most readers, no matter one’s personal feelings about Dylan's music or persona.Pub Date: July 25, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-06-236668-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Dey Street/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 15, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
BOOK TO SCREEN
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
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