What happens when a bunch of lawmakers decide that it’s a good idea to make booksellers register with the state government if they sell "sexually explicit material"?

I’m not sure what the answer is, but we’ll probably see a few lawsuits and some good court battles as a result. Basically, on March 13 the governor of Indiana signed into law a bill that requires booksellers to register with the state if they sell sexually explicit material. How do they define sexually explicit material, you ask? Here’s what Publishers Weekly is reporting:

"Sexually explicit material" is defined as any product that is "harmful to minors" under existing law.

I’m glad those genius lawmakers were specific enough so there’s no gray area (sarcasm!). Basically, any sexual content in a book sold at a bookstore could be seen as sexually explicit and thus is harmful to minors. This means that even classics like Shakespeare could qualify, not to mention a lot of contemporary literature, books on human sexuality, photography books with nude photos and…well… you get the idea.

Continue Reading

It appears that literary fabrications are nothing new. Earlier last week I wrote about the most current author to fake her own memoir (see Woman admits fabricating memoir). And tonight I came across an article in the New York Times Book Section. Throughout history authors have been faking their way to literary stardom:

But the history of literary fakers stretches far, far back, at least to the 19th century, when a slave narrative published in 1863 by Archy Moore was revealed as a novel written by a white historian, Richard Hildreth, and into the early 20th, when Joan Lowell wrote a popular autobiography, "Cradle of the Deep," about her colorful childhood aboard a four-masted ship sailing the South Seas; in fact, she had grown up almost entirely in Berkeley, Calif.

Continue Reading

It wasn’t all that long ago when James Frey confessed that much of his memoir had been fabricated, only after Oprah had selected it for her book club and boosted its popularity – before the book came crashing back down to earth. So it seems incomprehensible that anyone would fabricate a memoir with the James Frey debacle still somewhat fresh in our collective literary memory.

Yet it has happened again. According to a very recent article I stumbled across in the New York Times, a woman has confessed to fabricating her memoir:

In "Love and Consequences," a critically acclaimed memoir published last week, Margaret B. Jones wrote about her life as a half-white, half-Native American girl growing up in South-Central Los Angeles as a foster child among gang-bangers, running drugs for the Bloods.

Continue Reading

Whenever another independent bookstore shuts its doors for good, we all shake our heads and say “These indies are going to be extinct before too long”. However, the news might be not all bad. I came across an interesting article from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. The article contends that while independent bookstores appear to be declining, just the opposite is true:

Happily, the trend is running in the opposite direction, reports the American Association of Booksellers.

The trade group for independents reported 115 new members last year, the third year in a row that more than 100 openings were recorded.

While it’s not record-breaking growth, it does show signs that maybe independent bookstores are not easily giving up. I also have a feeling that many neighborhood indies have a very loyal customer base that keeps them going, even during these times of mega-bookstores and easy online ordering.

Continue Reading

Back in August 2007, I wrote a post (In China, internet propels novel popularity) about people in China embracing internet technology to produce and consume literature. I presented a fairly optimistic view of China’s infant literary scene.

However, there are still many problems in China for writers, especially concerning censorship. According to an article published in the Guardian Unlimited, censorship still exists, but the line that separates what is considered appropriate and what is taboo has been blurred:

"Censorship’s not quite the blunt instrument it used to be," says the Beijing-based journalist and translator Eric Abrahamsen. "Writers can publish books, but then there’s pressure exerted on publishers not to reprint them, or media organisations not to cover them."

Continue Reading

A few days ago I wrote a post about how a Catholic school board in Canada decided to ban The Golden Compass because of its perceived anti-religious stance (Canadian Catholic school board bans fantasy novel). Much to my dismay, I came across another article from the American Library Association website that the ban is spreading to the United States. Of course, just like every other book lover out there, I fell out of my chair upon reading this news.

According to the article, a public school in Colorado pulled The Golden Compass from its shelves. Then, when a brave librarian complained to the higher ups in the school district, the book returned to its proper spot on a library bookshelf a few days later. The other school to pull the book is a Catholic school in Wisconsin.

It should be noted that in the Colorado case, the book was removed after a middle school librarian raised concerns over the book’s "age appropriateness". Mindy Wandling, the librarian in question is also an evangelical Christian – making her justification for removing the book complete rubbish. While I hate to put words in people’s mouths, I can say with certainty that Wandling was probably offended by the book’s theme, and that it was written by a self-professed atheist.

Continue Reading

There’s one thing in this world that really makes me cringe: the banning of books! Whether a book is banned for insulting a particular belief system (usually religion), or because it contains too much violence, and there’s the always infamous "this book should be banned because it contains too much sex!"

Many people mistakingly think that banning books is a thing of the past. No one would dare ban a book in today’s enlightened age. Guess what? It still happens. Even books that most of us consider to be classics are banned. Contemporary books are banned as well. No book is safe from the elusive Big Bad Book Censor.

Continue Reading

As most of you literary buffs have probably heard by now, literary great and Pulitzer Prize winner Norman Mailer has died. According to a CNN article, Mailer was a very prolific writer:

He wrote constantly: novels, screenplays, articles (he was a key figure in the "New Journalism" movement of the 1960s), poems, polemics. He co-founded the Village Voice. He was married six times.

I guess he was also prolific in the marriage department as well. I can honestly say that I’ve never read any of Mailer’s work, but I’ve been intrigued by him in the past. Maybe this will prompt me to pick up one of his books during my next visit to the bookstore. Any suggestions?

Continue Reading

Tonight, as I was reading the many unread blog posts in my Google Reader page, I came across an interesting post from Critical Mass, the blog of the national book critics circle board of directors. The post was an essay written by Larry Dark, who is a former editor for the O.Henry Prize.

I actually felt a wave of relief fall over me as I read Dark’s essay, because in it, he gives his impressions on the state of short fiction, and all the "doomsday predictions" for the short story probably won’t come true. While it’s not as popular as it used to be, the short story is still a vibrant art form with a small but strong audience. And as Dark points out, publishing short fiction is still where many authors get noticed by editors and literary agents scouting out new talent:

Savvy agents in search of new talent look to literary magazines these days. And if you pick up a collection of short fiction and check the credits, you’ll see the range of publications that nurture writers.

I’ve always been amazed at the credentials some of these writers have who publish in the literary magazines. Many have numerous publishing credits to their name, have won contests, and a good number of them even have books on the market (or if they don’t, a book is in the works).

Continue Reading

Literary criticism is one of those subjects that only gets attention in the world of colleges and universities. Even there, however, the attention is scant, and mostly given by English professors and grad students.  There might be a handful of undergrad English majors who have an affinity for theory (I did), but most are content with creative writing and reading contemporary literature (sadly, even classics are getting less attention than they once did).

The debate about the utility of studying literary criticism is nothing new. What most people don’t realize, though, is that even avid, recreational readers engage in some form of criticism every time they form an opinion about a text. And those opinions can be classified into different schools of thought. Some people will read a text and see nothing but sexist characters that try to destroy the feminine. This is called feminist theory. Others might read the same text and read it in the context of its historical significance.
There are many other schools of thought. A few people stay strictly within the context of one of these schools. A majority, however, tend to move around the literary spectrum.

Continue Reading