Poets & Writers
Published on Poets & Writers (https://www.pw.org)

Home > Unscrupulous Agents in India, Charles Bukowski to Sell Pants, and More

Unscrupulous Agents in India, Charles Bukowski to Sell Pants, and More [1]

by
Evan Smith Rakoff
8.11.11

Every day Poets & Writers Magazine scans the headlines—from publishing reports to academic announcements to literary dispatches—for all the news that creative writers need to know. Here are today's stories:

Fiction is a booming market in India—with success stories such as Vikram Seth (author of the best-selling A Suitable Boy) and Chetan Bhagat (who sold over a million copies of his first two books combined)—spurring a wealth of eager young novelists to see their books in print. However, the literary agency model is a novelty in South Asia, and unscrupulous “agents” easily dupe many authors. (Publishing Perspectives [2])

Wired [3] magazine contrasts features of Barnes & Noble's Nook Friends with the Amazon Kindle social network, and the disparate ways the two companies created the software's default social-media settings.

This past February, poet Elizabeth Bishop, who died in 1979, would have turned one hundred-years-old. To celebrate the occasion, Farrar, Straus and Giroux published three new volumes of her writing: Poems edited by Saskia Hamilton, Prose edited by Lloyd Schwartz, and Elizabeth Bishop and The "New Yorker": The Complete Correspondence edited by Joelle Biele. The Millions [4] asks, "What would Bishop say about all the fuss?"

Slate [5] explains how to be a faster writer.

In light of the news of the Poe House and Museum in Baltimore's struggle to maintain solvency [6], the New Yorker [7] takes a look at some of Edgar Allan Poe's other homes.

It seems certain Facebook users do not like books or reading. (Galleycat [8])

If you've ever been curious what a contemporary New York City novelist's writing desk looks like, Jennifer Gilmore, author of Something Red, describes hers: "Here is my space. It’s also a closet." (Write Place, Write Time [9] via Vol. 1 Brooklyn)

As a sequel to Levi's use of a Walt Whitman poem in one of its "Go Forth" commercials, the blue jeans company has licensed a Charles Bukowski poem to help sell its pants. (Harriet [10])


Source URL:https://www.pw.org/content/unscrupulous_agents_charles_bukowski_to_sell_pants_and_more

Links
[1] https://www.pw.org/content/unscrupulous_agents_charles_bukowski_to_sell_pants_and_more [2] http://publishingperspectives.com/2011/08/india-literature-rise-in-agents/ [3] http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2011/08/amazons-newish-social-network-now-lifting-even-more-info-from-facebooktwitter/ [4] http://www.themillions.com/2011/08/anniversaries-anesthesia-and-elizabeth-bishop.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+themillionsblog/fedw+%28The+Millions%29 [5] http://www.slate.com/id/2301243/pagenum/all/#p2 [6] http://www.pw.org/content/was_albert_camus_murdered_poe_museum_broke_and_more [7] http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2011/08/edgar-allan-poe-house-baltimore-new-york.html [8] http://www.mediabistro.com/galleycat/i-hate-reading-facebook-page-earns-437800-likes_b36149 [9] http://writeplacewritetime.tumblr.com/post/8776099174/jennifer-gilmore [10] http://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2011/08/bukowski-poem-in-a-levis-advertisement/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+HarrietTheBlog+%28Harriet%3A+The+Blog%29