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William Gaddis

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Former Students’ Recollections of Classes Taught by Famous Authors

By Emily Temple on

This week, we read a wonderful essay at The New York Review of Books from a former student of Vladimir Nabokov, a juicy read for anyone who wishes that they could have taken one of the genius writer’s classes (i.e., everyone). Inspired, we hunted around for more first-person recollections of classes taken with famous writers — whether they were famous at the time or only later on. Read through a few of the ones we found after the jump, and add your own memories (if you’re lucky enough to have them) in the comments. … Read More

Books

10 Illuminating Fan Letters From Famous Authors, To Famous Authors

By Emily Temple on

We recently spotted an excellent letter of admiration from William Gaddis to Don DeLillo over at The Daily Beast. It reminded us that writers are the biggest readers of all, and to that end are probably even bigger fanboys and fangirls than us commoners. To that end, we’ve collected a few wonderful fan letters (and one pointed anti-fan letter) from famous authors to their fellows, ranging from short and sweet to long and flowery. Check them out after the jump, and let us know if we’ve missed anything from the mailbag of literary ephemera in the comments. … Read More

Books

10 Notorious Literary Slogs That Are Worth the Effort

By Emily Temple on

There has been much discussion over the years as to whether Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick is The Great American Novel, simply A Great American Novel, or is just a lengthy collection of complaints about whales (not that many people admit to thinking the latter). But if you’ve been meaning to read it for years and have never quite gotten up the nerve (or the time), an awesome marathon reading begins tonight at WORD in Greenpoint, which also happens to be one of our very favorite bookstores. To celebrate the event, we’ve put together a list of notorious literary slogs — long, difficult, and/or complicated enough to scare even the strongest reader — that are definitely worth the effort. Read our list after the jump, and add on your own favorites in the comments! … Read More

Books

10 More Scathing Early Reviews of Classic Novels

By Emily Temple on

Well, we can never get enough of poking fun at the unduly critical, can we? Last week, we shared fifteen scathing early reviews of classic novels, and some of you pitched in with some of your own favorites. We took a few of your suggestions, both here and at Metafilter, added a few more of our own, and put together a second list of a few more critics who got it wrong, this time hating on Hemingway, Tolkien, Steinbeck and more. Now don’t get us wrong — everyone’s entitled to their own opinion, but that doesn’t make it any less fun to judge the past from the future. Click through to read ten more scathing early reviews of books we now consider to be classics, and chuckle over how you know better (or admit that you secretly agree) in the comments. … Read More

Books

Joshua Landsman’s Sketchbook Odes to His Favorite Authors

By Emily Temple on

We’ve all felt moved to scribble by our favorite writers or books from time to time — or at least, we know we have. But Joshua Landsman’s “Writers I Have Loved” project, which we spotted over at Imprint, takes that impulse and runs with it. Landsman keeps a gorgeous notebook filled with excellent drawings, musings and quotations from some of his favorite authors, from Samuel Beckett to Flaubert. But it’s not only gushing adulations and loving portraiture — Landsman also puts to paper the books that drove him to defenestration, and steps back far enough to consider the Google search results for William Gaddis. All in all, we think it’s a wonderful ode to the reading life, and we can’t help but feel inspired (again) to start up a little notebook of our own. But for now, click through to see some of our favorite pages from Landsman’s project, and then head here to see even more of his work. … Read More