Monday, February 08, 2010
Pursuant to Brian's post...
I hope both of these two things help further the discussion about the superbowl ad, the piece by Edward Campion, and Brian's incredibly thoughtful response. Are these two links directly related to the sexist nature of the Bud Light ad? No, but they should help to fill in the background.
Can Superbowl ads be sexist and anti-books?!
Here then is the ad’s anti-women and anti-reading worldview: Women, no matter what their goals, aspirations, or interests, have no other role in society other than getting fucked by men. Let women have their “little” book clubs, which can be easily interrupted on a masculine whim and which women will never dare object to. They will set everything aside to give you head or to serve you beer.
And, by the way, if you’re a man, you don’t even need to read to get ahead in the world. (Indeed, one of the commercial’s curious philosophical positions is that one cannot both enjoy beer — at least the stuff better than the undrinkable swill that is being sold in this commercial — and books. Speaking as a man who enjoys beer, books, and football, and who finds intelligent women far sexier than empty-headed centerfolds, I happily refute these stereotypes through my very existence.)
Thursday, February 04, 2010
Goings On in a World in Transition
Tucked inside BookBook, no one will ever see your MacBook, even when it’s right under their nose. Sitting on a coffee table, dorm room or desk, BookBook looks like a vintage piece of literature, not an expensive laptop. It’s a great disguise and a simple way to reduce the risk of your MacBook getting stolen.

Wednesday, February 03, 2010
Alumni magazines?
The cover story on this week's?, month's, quarter's? (what the hell is the publishing schedule of these things anyway?) issue of UMass Amherst Magazine is "The Secret Life of Books." In it, writer Eric Goldscheider ('93), takes a look at the job being done by Head of Special Collections and University Archives, Mr. Robert Cox. Right now, Cox is responsible for "the largest print-to-digital conversion project in the history of the campus, managing the transfer of the 100,000 piece W.E.B. Du Bois Library collection to electronic media." (Snooze.) However, that is not what interested me and what will be, I think, of interest to the 6 of you reading Survival of the Book is that Cox also decided to launch a project called The History of the Book Teaching Collection. It will be:
"...a teaching collection to illuminate book design, production, and distribution in support of curricula in history, literature, and art. Students could smell and touch 500-year-old paper, smack in the midst of the library's ever growing cache of electronic texts."
Pretty cool. The message of the collection is that notions of what a book is may be changing but that "students need to understand that those mythical objects called books were far more diverse than the museum pieces and limited editions found in most book-history collections," said Robert Cox. Indeed,
"Nowadays, when most people hear the word "book," they still tend to think of a printed, bound set of (usually) paper pages. But the notion of a "book" is now a jumping-off point for an evolving repertoire of modern reading tools, from e-textbooks to "vooks"--electronic books with embedded video. Though paper is a 2,000-year-old technology, (a highly portable revelation that followed cumbersome clay tablets), books can now be read on touch screens and e-readers, such as Kindles (God help us - Ed.)"
In a quick conversation I had with Mr. Cox, he said that part of the impetus for assembling this collection is that young people, in particular, are becoming "more and more distanced" from the book as a object and vehicle for information with all the concomitant ramifications that will have for our society and our culture. Additionally, the electronic/printed divide (as well as how young people utilize information) has become a site for study by the academy in and of itself:
"Academics," writes Goldscheider, "actively question the impact of electronic texts--on brains, on learning, on pedagogy. This year, an Amazon-supported trial of Kindles in classrooms at seven universities showed that many students and teachers still prefer old-fashioned bound-paper books because they can write in the margins, bend pages, add stickies, and locate passages more easily. E-readers are an emerging technology, so these shortfalls will likely be addressed in subsequent versions. Especially in education, electronic texts, which offer endless opportunities for layered reading and self-directed learning through instant cross-referencing, can trump old-fashioned books. Printed books stand as more or less finished statements and sentiments; they ask for reflection and response more so than interaction. In contrast, readers of electronic texts actively navigate a complex web, often writing or changing texts themselves along the way."
The collection, which is still being cataloged, is growing. Cox received a early donation of approximately 75 books from UMass librarian Barbara Parker which "illustrates the history of printing, binding, and book design dating from 1493 through 1900." The library has a small budget to buy more materials as they come along but this isn't going to be a dry history that follows a simple time line. "First, we wrote on stones; then we created movable type; then someone invented ink, blah, blah, blah." The focus of the collection is more on what people thought of when they thought of books. What did people of different times, economic situations, and cultural experiences across time think about when presented with a "book?"
"Humble, everyday texts play an important role in book history, which is why, explains cox the the libraries have a particular interest in collection books printed in rural and small-town New England. "They're what average people of the time thought of when they heard the word book.""
So what is stopping you from going by? I mean, how cool is this?:
"On the 25th floor of the library you can hold in your hands a rare 1676 edition of Thomas Hobbes's translation of the work of the Greek historian Thucydides. Handsomely bound in leather...the paper, made from pulped rags, still feels like cloth, dimpled and almost ready for ironing; these pages cannot be riffled, but must be lovingly turned. The ink, with lampblack as a key component, is remarkably dense. Run your finger over a page and you can feel the impression left by metal type."
Awesome, right?!?
"The current exhibition is not quite up and running just yet," says Cox, "but the materials are open to the public and, even though things aren't completely cataloged yet, we won't turn anyone away." Now, Cox said that it would be difficult to accommodate groups of more than 20 but anyone who comes up to the 25th floor will get to see, smell, touch, and yes, read the materials that make up the beginnings of this incredibly cool project.
The special collections hours are as follows:
Monday through Friday, 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., except major holidays. SCUA will be closed when the W.E.B. Du Bois Library is closed. If you are planning a visit from a distance, please contact us in advance to verify that the department will be open. A small number of collections are stored off site and advance notice will expedite service.
Directions to the UMass campus can be found here. If you go, tell Mr. Cox that you heard about this on Survival of the Book...just for larfs. I think I write for Brian as well when I write that we editors of SotB can't wait to get out there and see this for ourselves.
Monday, February 01, 2010
Amazon does Crazy Again, Macmillan Fights Back
The Macmillan ban went beyond Amazon's website: reportedly without notice to Kindle owners, Amazon went into the devices and removed Macmillan titles from wish lists and removed sample chapters of Macmillan titles. This move was reminiscent of the retailer's quiet pulling last year of some e-titles whose copyrights were in question (Shelf Awareness, July 19, 2009).
We don’t believe that all of the major publishers will take the same route as Macmillan. And we know for sure that many independent presses and self-published authors will see this as an opportunity to provide attractively priced e-books as an alternative.
There's one clear conclusion falling out of the ridiculous Amazon versus Macmillan books debacle that played out this weekend: Amazon really doesn't care about you, in fact it kinda hates you--pretty much whoever you are.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
J. D. Salinger, 1919-2010

**UPDATED 16:56 on 28/1/2010** As ever, the Guardian UK outdoes our own newspapers for a tribute to Salinger (plus various and sundry other links). You can find everything you ever wanted to know about J.D. here. You're welcome!
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Howard Zinn, dead at the age of 87.
The second time I was lucky enough to work with him was on a reissue of Francis Russell's A City in Terror: Calvin Coolidge and the 1919 Boston Police Strike. While he only supplied a blurb for this lost classic (which has since found its audience with Dennis Lehane discovering it and making it one of the bases for his novel The Given Day), his strong quote about the book and the stand he took for me in helping me calm the jittery nerves of a boss concerned about bringing back a history book from a long dead, unknown historian about a forgotten time in Boston history went a long way in shaping my editorial career. That's it. Not too much but I can honestly say that the time spent working with him will remain with me for the rest of my publishing career. Rest easy, my friend. The fight is now ours from here on out.
-Christopher
From the Boston Globe:


By Mark Feeney, Globe Staff
January 27, 2010 05:40 PM
Howard Zinn, the Boston University historian and political activist who was an early opponent of US involvement in Vietnam and a leading faculty critic of BU president John Silber, died of a heart attack today in Santa Monica, Calif, where he was traveling, his family said. He was 87.
"His writings have changed the consciousness of a generation, and helped open new paths to understanding and its crucial meaning for our lives," Noam Chomsky, the left-wing activist and MIT professor, once wrote of Dr. Zinn. "When action has been called for, one could always be confident that he would be on the front lines, an example and trustworthy guide."
As he wrote in his autobiography, "You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train" (1994), "From the start, my teaching was infused with my own history. I would try to be fair to other points of view, but I wanted more than 'objectivity'; I wanted students to leave my classes not just better informed, but more prepared to relinquish the safety of silence, more prepared to speak up, to act against injustice wherever they saw it. This, of course, was a recipe for trouble."
Certainly, it was a recipe for rancor between Dr. Zinn and Silber. Dr. Zinn twice helped lead faculty votes to oust the BU president, who in turn once accused Dr. Zinn of arson (a charge he quickly retracted) and cited him as a prime example of teachers "who poison the well of academe."
Dr. Zinn was a cochairman of the strike committee when BU professors walked out in 1979. After the strike was settled, he and four colleagues were charged with violating their contract when they refused to cross a picket line of striking secretaries. The charges against "the BU Five" were soon dropped, however.
Dr. Zinn was born in New York City on Aug. 24, 1922, the son of Jewish immigrants, Edward Zinn, a waiter, and Jennie (Rabinowitz) Zinn, a housewife. He attended New York public schools and worked in the Brooklyn Navy Yard before joining the Army Air Force during World War II. Serving as a bombardier in the Eighth Air Force, he won the Air Medal and attained the rank of second lieutenant.
After the war, Dr. Zinn worked at a series of menial jobs until entering New York University as a 27-year-old freshman on the GI Bill. Professor Zinn, who had married Roslyn Shechter in 1944, worked nights in a warehouse loading trucks to support his studies. He received his bachelor's degree from NYU, followed by master's and doctoral degrees in history from Columbia University.
Dr. Zinn was an instructor at Upsala College and lecturer at Brooklyn College before joining the faculty of Spelman College in Atlanta, in 1956. He served at the historically black women's institution as chairman of the history department. Among his students were the novelist Alice Walker, who called him "the best teacher I ever had," and Marian Wright Edelman, future head of the Children's Defense Fund.
During this time, Dr. Zinn became active in the civil rights movement. He served on the executive committee of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, the most aggressive civil rights organization of the time, and participated in numerous demonstrations.
Dr. Zinn became an associate professor of political science at BU in 1964 and was named full professor in 1966.
The focus of his activism now became the Vietnam War. Dr. Zinn spoke at countless rallies and teach-ins and drew national attention when he and another leading antiwar activist, Rev. Daniel Berrigan, went to Hanoi in 1968 to receive three prisoners released by the North Vietnamese.
Dr. Zinn's involvement in the antiwar movement led to his publishing two books: "Vietnam: The Logic of Withdrawal" (1967) and "Disobedience and Democracy" (1968). He had previously published "LaGuardia in Congress" (1959), which had won the American Historical Association's Albert J. Beveridge Prize; "SNCC: The New Abolitionists" (1964); "The Southern Mystique" (1964); and "New Deal Thought" (1966).
Dr. Zinn was also the author of "The Politics of History" (1970); "Postwar America" (1973); "Justice in Everyday Life" (1974); and "Declarations of Independence" (1990).
In 1988, Dr. Zinn took early retirement so as to concentrate on speaking and writing. The latter activity included writing for the stage. Dr. Zinn had two plays produced: "Emma," about the anarchist leader Emma Goldman, and "Daughter of Venus."
Dr. Zinn, or his writing, made a cameo appearance in the 1997 film "Good Will Hunting." The title characters, played by Matt Damon, lauds "A People's History" and urges Robin Williams's character to read it. Damon, who co-wrote the script, was a neighbor of the Zinns growing up.
Damon was later involved in a television version of the book, "The People Speak," which ran on the History Channel in 2009. Damon was the narrator of a 2004 biographical documentary, "Howard Zinn: You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train."
On his last day at BU, Dr. Zinn ended class 30 minutes early so he could join a picket line and urged the 500 students attending his lecture to come along. A hundred did so.
Dr. Zinn's wife died in 2008. He leaves a daughter, Myla Kabat-Zinn of Lexington; a son, Jeff of Wellfleet; three granddaugthers; and two grandsons.
Funeral plans were not available.
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Sunday, January 24, 2010
Gatz, or The Great Gatsby on stage
A theatrical tour de force, Gatz is conceived as a single six-hour production in which an ensemble of 13 actors bring to live every word of the novel with no text added and none removed. Gatz is a one-of-a-kind theatrical event defined by its radical commitment to one of the 20th century's greatest novels.
