Not a Review of Mailer's New Book
Shalom Auslander didn't review Mailer's <I>The Castle</I>. He really, really wanted to. He just couldn't bring himself to <I>read</I> it. I know what he means.
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It's An Old Joke
But the classics never stale.
If 10 Had More Numbers
This isn't exactly the way I submitted it to Tris, but if I created this list again tomorrow, it would again be different. So. My Top 10 of 2006 looked something like this:
Janis Ian on Copying
Meridian's resident genius, Bob Stuart, sends along this old but still appropriate article by Janis Ian. Be sure to read her follow-up, "Fallout," as well.
Bill Watterson on Comic Strips
The creator of <I>Calvin & Hobbes</I> gave a legendary (some say notorious) speech called "The State of Cartooning" in 1989. I'd heard of it, but never read it until <I>Planet Cartoon</I> posted it yesterday.
The Slow, Painful Death of Sony Corporation
Dave Taylor has it right, I think. Sony, once the personification of innovation, quality, and vision, now has none of them. That <I>is</I> the beginning of a lingering death.
Wrong, wrong, and wrong again!
Fiona Maddocks writes a fine rebuttal to Norman LeBrecht's <A HREF="http://www.scena.org/columns/lebrecht/070124-NL-tchaikovsky.html">grous… dismissal</A> of the BBC's Tchaikovsky Experience.
Admit it—You Hate Modern Art
That's Spengler's argument in this <I>Asia Times</I> essay, at any rate. Within that discussion, however, Spengler muses about why modern art is so much more popular with the public than "modern" music—and <I>that's</I> the <I>hmmm</I> part of his essay—that music, unlike the plastic arts, can only be experienced within time.
Kid Turns 70—Nobody Cares
Joseph Epstein muses on entering "early old age."
Acoustics From Another Position
"An audience member unhappy with the sound in their part of the auditorium can change seats, but we [concert pianists] cannot," Byron Janis says. "Therefore the position of the piano on stage is of utmost importance—moving it only a foot in either direction can make an enormous difference in the sound and therefore in the performance."