Author Topic: In the New Yorker...  (Read 1921061 times)

Offline serious crayons

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Re: In the New Yorker...
« Reply #70 on: June 08, 2009, 02:46:28 pm »
Thanks to you, F-R, Rapt is in my reading pile.


Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: In the New Yorker...
« Reply #71 on: June 08, 2009, 03:35:21 pm »
Need to amass a stack of summer reading materials, and taking suggestions!!

Proust would probably keep you busy the entire summer. ...  ;D
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: In the New Yorker...
« Reply #72 on: June 09, 2009, 01:19:04 pm »
So, at lunch today I was reading Louis Menand's "A Critic at Large" piece on creating writing programs--and books about creative writing programs--in the June 8 & 15 issue, and I came across a sentence that immediately made me think of Annie Proulx.

Substitute "Annie Proulx" for "Raymond Carver" in this sentence: "The meaning of one of Raymond Carver's stories is not only what the story says; it's also the way the story says it."

Just think. "Brokeback Mountain" would be a very different short story without Annie Proulx's colloquialisms, regionalisms, and vulgarities.
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

Offline serious crayons

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Re: In the New Yorker...
« Reply #73 on: June 09, 2009, 03:44:48 pm »
I love Raymond Carver. But it was in the New Yorker, I believe, that I first read how much the qualities I think of as characterizing a Raymond Carver were actually edited in by Gordon Lish, sometimes against Carver's wishes. And now I'll never feel exactly the same way about Raymond Carver. Damn you, New Yorker!


Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: In the New Yorker...
« Reply #74 on: June 11, 2009, 02:55:08 pm »
The Franzen story started out great -- the characters are perfect reflections of the kinds of people who live in my neighborhood -- but my enthusiasm about it dwindled as it went along. The Menand article was not particularly memorable or profound. Oddly enough, I liked Louis Menand's writing better before he became a New Yorker staff writer, about a decade ago.

I don't think Menand was out to be profound, but I found the article interesting and informative. And I enjoyed Jonathan Franzen's story. More interesting than some of the stuff they sometimes run that's "translated from the Azerbaijani," or whatever.
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

Offline serious crayons

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Re: In the New Yorker...
« Reply #75 on: June 11, 2009, 03:36:28 pm »
I don't think Menand was out to be profound, but I found the article interesting and informative. And I enjoyed Jonathan Franzen's story. More interesting than some of the stuff they sometimes run that's "translated from the Azerbaijani," or whatever.

Well, profound was probably an overstatement, but I didn't get much out of it that was particularly interesting. Though maybe because I'm already pretty familiar with those writing programs, and some of the criticisms of them.

I know what you mean about the "translated from ..." stories. I rarely read those. Maybe because for me New Yorker stories are so slice-of-life, their appeal often dependent on the way they illuminate some subtle nuance of culture, that it's better to start from a POV of a shared culture. That said, I have read New Yorker stories by foreign writers that I liked a lot. Sometimes they read like regular New Yorker stories, just set in a different place.


In other New Yorker news, I stumbled across an online reference to an article in the May 18 issue by Jonah Lehrer, the brilliant, seemingly 17-year-old writer and science expert who has been published in a lot of places recently. Somehow I had missed it the first time around, though it's on a subject I've always found interesting: those late-'60s experiments in which a researcher offered little kids one marshmallow, then told the kids he was leaving the room for a few minutes and that they could have a second marshmallow if they did not eat the first one until the researcher returned. Apparently the kids who waited were found, years later, to be much more successful in school, careers, and the rest of life.

Apparently an effort is now underway to contact those same people, now in their 40s, and do more testing.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/05/18/090518fa_fact_lehrer


Offline Jeff Wrangler

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Re: In the New Yorker...
« Reply #76 on: June 11, 2009, 03:48:25 pm »
In other New Yorker news, I stumbled across an online reference to an article in the May 18 issue by Jonah Lehrer, the brilliant, seemingly 17-year-old writer and science expert who has been published in a lot of places recently. Somehow I had missed it the first time around, though it's on a subject I've always found interesting: those late-'60s experiments in which a researcher offered little kids one marshmallow, then told the kids he was leaving the room for a few minutes and that they could have a second marshmallow if they did not eat the first one until the researcher returned. Apparently the kids who waited were found, years later, to be much more successful in school, careers, and the rest of life.

Apparently an effort is now underway to contact those same people, now in their 40s, and do more testing.

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/05/18/090518fa_fact_lehrer

I read that article; it interested me because the older I get, the less patience I seem to have.  ;D  I never bothered to check the author blurb, however.
"It is required of every man that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide."--Charles Dickens.

Offline serious crayons

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Re: In the New Yorker...
« Reply #77 on: June 11, 2009, 04:01:50 pm »
I read that article; it interested me because the older I get, the less patience I seem to have.  ;D  I never bothered to check the author blurb, however.

I have only become aware of this guy over the past month or two, but suddenly I seem to be seeing him everywhere and he seems pretty brilliant. Which is annoying, because from the photo you might think he was still in high school.

http://www.jonahlehrer.com/articles



Offline oilgun

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Re: In the New Yorker...
« Reply #78 on: June 11, 2009, 04:11:40 pm »
I have only become aware of this guy over the past month or two, but suddenly I seem to be seeing him everywhere and he seems pretty brilliant. Which is annoying, because from the photo you might think he was still in high school.

http://www.jonahlehrer.com/articles




His book HOW WE DECIDE looks interesting but you're right, how old is this guy, sixteen?  I totally feel inadequate after seeing his list of published articles  :o

Offline southendmd

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Re: In the New Yorker...
« Reply #79 on: June 11, 2009, 05:48:48 pm »
His book HOW WE DECIDE looks interesting but you're right, how old is this guy, sixteen?  I totally feel inadequate after seeing his list of published articles  :o

I don't know if this will make you feel less inadequate, but, according to this source, he is 26.

http://www.ideafestival.com/Dynamic/Speakers/Show_Bio.cfm?ID=21023