"Chicano writers from El Paso are the most progressive, open-minded, far-reaching, and inclusive writers of them all."

Octavio Romano

Sunday, November 21, 2010

More book and literary news...plus some Chicano writer news



Book and Literary News 
We didn't finish this yesterday, so here's the last part


Chicano Writer News

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Fall 2010 Issue of Pluma Fronteriza is out

The fall 2010 issue of Pluma Fronteriza: Newsletter of Chicano(a) and Latino(a) Writers of the El Paso/Cd. Juarez Border Region is out. Lots of great news on Chicano and Mexicano writers from the frontera: Alicia Gaspar de Alba, Carlos Morton, Rafael Jesus Gonzalez, Ben Saenz and much, much more.

Download a free copy by clicking here: Download Pluma.

 Alurista and UT Pan Am Mexican American Studies Vandalism


This article on "hate" and vandalism of the Mexican American Studies Program at UT Pan Am briefly mentions Alurista (The Pan American): Students voice ‘no more hate’ concerns.

Fukahuatl

In the Mix Today: Boyle Heights funk and bluesman gets back in the groove mentions artist/poet Rubén “Funkahuatl” Guevara.


raulrsalinas' legacy

St. Edward's University's Hilltop Views has a story on raulrsalinas and his Resistencia Bookstore in the aftermath of salinas' passing. Check out Bookstore puts up a fight.

Aztlan Undergrounds win awards
Aztlan Underground won four Native American Music Awards. "If you’re a teacher teach, if you’re a poet, write poetry, if you do music, write music, and everything is a bridge to a better world." (KUOR). READ MORE.

Literary news

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In Trying To Get Kids to Read, Don't Give Them Books


Related somewhat to our our series "Our People Are Not Reading Our Literature," check out Will giving children books make them not want to read
(The Telegraph).

From the UK, an article in The Telegraph, Literacy concerns as a fifth of youngsters admit hardly ever reading books. The article states, "A fifth of youngsters have admitted to "hardly ever" reading a book while a third say they only pick up a book occasionally, according to a new survey." READ MORE.


Bush Plagiarized

Check out the Best Plagiarized Lines from Bush’s Book on the Borowitz Report.

Advance Poetry Seminar Out at MIT

"MIT has just sent a truly depressing message—we believe in Facebook more than we believe in the power of the poem to change, inspire, and remake the world," says a student quoted by The Tech as MIT cut its Advance Poetry Seminar citing funds shortage. READ MORE

Dickens in Trouble

Charles Dicken's originals in trouble. See U.K. museum seeks aid for Dickens manuscripts (CBS News).

...please sir may I have somemore

Speaking of the Dicken's check out this youtube.com short of the worker house diet in Dicken's Oliver Twist diet. SEE IT NOW.

Need a Slow Hand

Need for "slow poetry" is what Adam Roberts write about in his article for The Atlantic. "It's in this context that poet and critic Dale Smith's provisional term Slow Poetry is useful.** Slow Poetry does not describe a school of poetry or even a kind of poem, but rather a new kind of attention to our reading practices. It takes its cue from the Slow Food movement—which as Michael Pollan and Barbara Kingsolver have eloquently written, is not a matter of swallowing the bitter pill, but rather a restorative, pleasure-driven awakening. Yum" READ MORE.

Neruda in Your Moscow Commute

Neruda and Mistral while on the subway in Moscow. Check out Chilean poets in Moscow metro (Voice of Russia).

Speaking of Russia, we mentioned Nabokov in our last post, see this list of movies Hollywood should not touch with a ten-foot pole. Sure, "Gone with the Wind" and The Godfather made good novel to book transition, but The Scarlet Letter and the Grinch Who Stole Christmas? See Unfilmable Books: 15 Great Books Not Coming to a Theatre Near You. Also, check out Random House's new website about the intersection of the written word and film. SEE IT NOW.

Comtemporary Posts Self-Promoting

Self-Promotion in contemporary poetry is the topic Tony Lopez tackles in PORES - A Journal of Poetics. Read it now.

Who Need Librarians?

Are Librarian Really Needed Read Why we still need librarians (Marketplace).

MFA programs assembly lines?

Are MFA programs becoming assembling lines for cheap YA fiction. Check out A Fray Over Frey’s Play to Prey on M.F.A.’s in the Chronicle of Higher Education. "If any M.F.A. program is to blame—and there’s a more obvious villain—it’s not because it failed to educate in business law but because it landed starry-eyed students in debt."


Recession Books Sales


Publishers Weekly reports "Bookstore sales had their worst month of 2010 in September, with sales down 7.7%, to $1.51 billion, the U.S. Census Bureau reported this morning. The September decline follows a 6.5% drop in August and resulted in a 2.6% decline in bookstore sales, to $12.31 billion, for the first nine months of the year. For the entire retail segment, September sales were up 7.6% and nine month sales increased 6.3%." READ MORE.

I'm Going to Be a Part of You...Brooklyn, New York

New York City literary agents moving to Brooklyn? Check out this article on the exodus of agents from NYC (New York Times). READ MORE.

Supply and Demand

We mentioned Johanna Skibsrud's novel The Sentimentalists and the mixed blessing of winning a grand prize. "Jack Rabinovitch, founder of the Scotiabank Giller Prize, joined the throng of publishers, journalists and agents who jammed the telephone lines to Kentville, N.S., on Thursday, begging tiny Gaspereau Press to outsource the production of Johanna Skibsrud’s prize-winning but scarce debut novel, The Sentimentalists...Gaspereau is hand-printing 1,000 copies a week of The Sentimentalists, which since winning the Giller Prize on Tuesday has vaulted past Keith Richards’s Life and George W. Bush’s Decision Points to the top of the Amazon.ca bestseller list. Demand for the book is sufficient to justify the production of about 1,000 copies a day, according to industry sources" (The Globe) READ MORE.

New Media

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Conn AG Goes after Amazon and Apple

Ouch! Connecticut's Attorney General announced an investigation into Amazon and Apple's potential anti-competitive pricing of e-books (Marketplace). Hear the story.

Barnes y Noble

Publishers Weekly reports that Barnes and Noble has opened up a Spanish-language e-book store. Take that English Only!

Write the Next Plot for Resident Evil

If no one is reading your latest work, try writing video games (The Observer). See Scrawl of Duty: Novelists and Journos Defect to Video Game Industry.

Libraries in the Digital Age

"Materials that can be checked out and read from a home computer, smart phone or e-reader are in the minds of libraries as they try to reinvent themselves" (Chicago Tribune). Read Libraries reinvent themselves as they struggle to remain relevant in the digital age.

Literary periodicals alive again in the digital age

"Thanks to the internet," says The Guardian," which has eased the burden of print and distribution costs, literary periodicals are flourishing anew." READ MORE.

Poem on your juices

Poems on your juice bottles. Check out Indie Swiss Pubs Promote Books on Juice Bottle Labels (Publishing Perspectives).

Before you buy that e-reader, see 5 reasons you don't need a e-book reader on PCWorld.

Hardback v. E-books

For a look at hardcover and e-book sales comparisons, see Same-Day E-Book Sales Propel Grisham's Thriller (Wall Street Journal).

UK Protest over e-books, one star

From The Guardian, "Earlier this week, Amazon.co.uk was forced to accept new commercial terms from big publishers Penguin, Hachette and HarperCollins, who have switched to the "agency model" for their ebooks. On this model it is publishers, not retailers, who set the selling price." Because of this, UK readers protested by giving mass "one-star" reviews to major writers. Read Stars fall in Amazon protest about ebook prices.

No Money In the Digital Future

 Are Writers Powerless to Make a Living in the Digital Age? "If the future is one in which writers are not paid, then it also is one in which writers lack clout." READ MORE. (Publishing Perspectives).

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 Tomorrow:

I could not find my folder on Lalo Delgado Not Too Objective Observations, so we'll just post some poems tomorrow for Lunes con Lalo.

This Week:


Hopefully I finish some book reviews. Also, Recent Chicano(a) Theatre and Performance books.



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