Subject
Nabokov & reading by novelist Zadie Smith
From
Date
Body
EDNOTE. NAOKV-L thanks Troy Patterson for so handsomely responding to my
request for details on Zadie Smith re Nabokov.
----- Original Message -----
From: <troy_patterson@ew.com>
>
> ---------------- Message requiring your approval (114
lines) ------------------
> The introduction, titled 'Dead Men Talking', consists of her commentaries
on "half a dozen commonplaces." Ms. Smith, who once told me that she thinks
VN is "the bee's knees," first mentions him in discussing idea No. 5, Sir
Francis Bacon's "Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and
writing an exact man," on page xxxiii:
>
>
> To me, each writer's prose style dramatizes their belief regarding what
reading may demand of writing and vice versa. Hemingway, for example,
believed in the primacy of reading; he thought that there should be no
artificial interruption in its natural smoothness and speed. He subjugated
the vanities of writing to the realities of reading. Nabokov, on ther other
hand, thought Hemingway was a Philistine. Nabokov thought reading should
equal the performative act of writing, that it should be a reenaction of the
act of writing (although no reader, except possibly his wife, proved equal,
in Nabokov's mind, to the task).
> Somewhere between the writing that has forgotten entirely what reading is
and the writing that is a slave to what reading is--that's where I try to
be.
> (N.B.: I guess you know how Sir Francis Bacon died.)
>
> 6. Vladimir Nabokov: 'A work of art has no importance whatever to society.
It is only important to the individual, and only the individual reader is
important to me.'
> Role models--individuals endowed with wide-ranging socio-symbolic
significance--have no place in fiction. Role models are bullshit. People who
move through the world playing roles, attending to roles, aspiring to roles,
looking for models to help them find new roles--these people are not
partaking fully in this whole existence-thing, which is about doing it for
real. We would rather not read that way (leaning over a pond, waiting for
the water to settle, and all so our own mirrored faces might rise toward us
like Plath's 'terrible fish'), no, nor write that way either. To this some
folks will object. [the following two sentences are italicized] Oh, I see.
So you're not political. No! Don't believe it! You are political! You are
the most political fucking person in the world because when you read, when
you write, you won't let a single human being be obscured behind the dread
symbolic bulk of somebody or something else. Every time you open a novel or
put pen to paper you dra!
> matize your belief in the miraculous, incommensurable existence of six
billion individuals. One of whom died three hundred and seventy-seven years
ago while attempting to freeze a chicken.
>
>
> And there she ends her piece.
>
> Yours,
> Troy Patterson
>
> > ----------
> > From: D. Barton Johnson
> > Reply To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
> > Sent: Monday, February 2, 2004 12:50 PM
> > To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> > Subject: Fw: 11-page introduction by novelist Zadie Smith is also a
treasure ...
> >
> > EDNOTE: zADIE sMITH ALLUDES TO vn IN HER WORK SO IT MIGHT BE INTERESTING
TO LEARN WHAT VN "PRECEPT" FOR READERS SHE PICKS. IF ANYONE HAS THE BOOK,
PLEASE ADVISE NABOKV-L AND QUOTE.
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Sandy P. Klein
> > Sent: Sunday, February 01, 2004 10:26 PM
> > Subject: 11-page introduction by novelist Zadie Smith is also a treasure
...
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
http://www.sunspot.net/features/booksmags/bal-bk.argu01feb01,0,5266086.story?coll=bal-society-utility
> >
> > How are anthologists doing with the best of the best?
> >
> > _____
> >
> > By Steve Weinberg
> > Special to The Sun
> > Originally published February 1, 2004
> >
> >
> >
> > The growing genre of annual compilations is a very mixed bag indeed
> >
> > Only after reading an advertisement from the venerable publisher
Houghton Mifflin did I start noticing the depth and breadth of a phenomenon
in the book world. Visits to bookstores heightened my awareness. The full
extent of the phenomenon dawned on me a few days later as I scanned my
bookshelves at home, filled with titles I had never thought of as related. >
> >
> > The phenomenon is the proliferation of anthologies offering the "best
of," as in The Best American Poetry 2003. Houghton Mifflin, the most
expansive "best of" publisher, has registered the phrase "The Best American
Series" as a trademark. Its series now consists of eight books, covering
recipes, essays, short stories, mystery stories, sports writing, travel
writing, science/nature writing and a vague category rendered as The Best
American Nonrequired Reading.
> >
> > Best-selling author Dave Eggers has noticed the phenomenon, too. In the
foreword to the The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2003 (Houghton
Mifflin, 368 pages, $27.50), Eggers, employing the ironic tone that infuses
his writing, says, "The purpose of this book is to collect good work of any
kind - fiction, humor, essays, comics, journalism - in one place for the
English-reading consumer. The other books in the Best American series are
limited by their categories, most particularly the popular but constraining
Best American Catholic Badger Mystery Writing. This collection is not so
limited, which is why, we think, it dominates all similar collections,
making them whimper and cower in a way that is shameful."
> >
> > What is going on here? Hard to say, but it probably has something to do
with a desire for prepackaging in a hurried society. Prepackaged
anthologies, in which a stranger decides "the best" for readers, could be
considered akin to prepackaged dinners, in which a stranger decides the
menu.
> >
> > Prepackaged meals are generally inferior to home cooking. What about
prepackaged anthologies? It depends. Each has at least some literary merit.
Phrased another way, none is a total waste of money or time.
> >
> > That stipulated, some "best of" anthologies are superior to others,
based on the range of publications where the selections first appeared, the
quality of the writing, the diversity of the authors represented, the
value-added material included (if any) with each selection, the incisiveness
of the foreword and/or introduction, the thoroughness of the back matter (if
any), plus the hard-to-gauge but nonetheless meaningful knowledge and
enthusiasm of the guest editor making the choices each year.
> >
> > Given the world-is-my-oyster approach (fiction, humor, essays, comics,
journalism) of Eggers' The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2003, it ought
to shine, and it does. In his 13-page foreword, Eggers not only explains the
selection process, but also entertains and enlightens with paragraphs
ranging in tone from Dave Barry to Anne Tyler. Eggers notes that, given the
volume's original purpose upon its unveiling during 2002 to introduce high
school and college students to "good writing from contemporary writers," he
relies heavily on recommendations from - guess who? - high school and
college students. He provides brief biographies for each of the students.
> >
> > The 11-page introduction by novelist Zadie Smith is also a treasure. She
expounds on six precepts for readers, selected from Samuel Johnson, Logan
Pearsall Smith, Laurence Sterne, James Joyce, Francis Bacon and Vladimir
Nabokov.
> >
> > As for the 25 selections, only nine are from widely available
periodicals (two each from Esquire, The New Yorker and The New York Times
Magazine; one each from Time, The Atlantic Monthly and Harper's). Also
represented are what publishing insiders normally call "literary
quarterlies" (although not all of them literally appear four times annually)
such as Mississippi Review, Story Quarterly, Zoetrope, Tin House, Columbia
Review and Alaska Quarterly Review (twice). Cartoon panels from Lynda Barry
are included. There is a selection from an online-only magazine, Nerve.com.
The satiric tabloid The Onion is represented. So is Eggers' creation,
McSweeney's, an occasional magazine sometimes published at book length
between hard covers. >
> >
> > Despite my extensive periodicals consumption, I encountered publications
unfamiliar to me - Little Engines, 7x7, Modern Humorist, Shout and
Pindeldyboz. (Unfortunately, Eggers provides no information about any of the
represented publications. Fortunately, he provides useful information about
each author.)
> >
> > The most surprising unifying topic, maybe just short of Catholic Badger
Mystery Writing, is recipes. The Best American Recipes 2003-2004 (Houghton
Mifflin, 300 pages, $26) suggests an obvious question: How did editors Fran
McCullough and Molly Stevens know where to look for extraordinary recipes?
Did they sneak into residential kitchens while everybody slept to rifle
through drawers and cabinets? No. It turns out they read lots of already
published cookbooks, magazines and newspapers and checked Web sites as well.
The result is nourishment for the brain as well as the palate.
> >
> > When it comes to value-added, probably the top "best of" is Best
Newspaper Writing 2003 (400 pages, $14.95), published by the Poynter
Institute in conjunction with Bonus Books. The winners and runners-up in
each of eight categories constitute the guts of the volume. The bonuses
include interviews with winners and runners-up, extended biographical
material about each author, and a bibliography of new books and articles
about reporting and writing.
> >
> > Using value-added as a standard, The Best American Magazine Writing 2003
(464 pages, $14.95) has almost nothing to offer. Compiled by the American
Society of Magazine Editors and published by HarperCollins Perennial, each
of the 17 nonfiction pieces and two fiction entries contains an introduction
of a few sentences maximum.
> >
> > Furthermore, almost all the selections appeared in easy-to-find,
large-circulation national magazines. Any anthology collecting writing by
the likes of Michael Paterniti, Tim Cahill, Gary Smith, Anne Fadiman, Ian
Frazier, Katha Pollitt, Joyce Carol Oates and E.L. Doctorow is worth owning.
But the overall effort seems uninspired, more a dutiful endeavor than a
joyful one.
> >
> > The Best American Poetry 2003 (288 pages, $16), published by Scribner,
reprints selections from 45 periodicals, almost none of them widely
circulated or well-known in any respect. For the most part, poetry in the
United States - despite a devoted following - is absent from the mainstream
media. The poems appeared in small journals such as Barrow Street,
Mid-American Review, Poetry Northwest and Third Coast.
> >
> > Each poem is presented unadorned - no attempt at explication whatsoever.
Because some of the poems are approachable and some are forbidding, the
unadorned approach by guest editor Yusef Komunyakaa and series editor David
Lehman is both the good news and the bad news.
> >
> > Best New American Voices 2004 (Harvest, 324 pages, $14), published by
Harcourt, contains no previously published pieces. Instead, the 17 short
stories have been culled from the top writing programs in the United States,
most of which are affiliated with universities. Mining the fiction of
wannabe writers paying tuition seems like a stretch for a "best of" book. No
doubt the editors could reply by saying that if Misha Angrist or Liza Ward
(the first and last authors anthologized in this volume) ever becomes
famous, you, dear reader, will have seen her name here first.
> >
> > All in all, I would rather not quibble with the "best of" phenomenon or
any of the entrants in the "best of" publishing sweepstakes. I am so busy
with my own magazine writing, book authorship, reviewing, family members and
leisure pursuits that I lack the time to keep up with every genre that
interests me. So, publishers, keep those "best of" anthologies coming. I
promise to look at them, and perhaps purchase some.
> >
> > Steve Weinberg is a 35-year veteran of investigative reporting for
newspapers, magazines and book publishers. His 1992 book about the craft of
biography, Telling the Untold Story, is still in print from the University
of Missouri Press. He browses so many periodicals that he carries around a
master li> st to keep track of which issue he read most recently.
> >
> > The Baltimore Sun
> >
> > September 19, 2003 Baltimore Sun front page
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > _____
> >
> > What are the 5 hot job markets for 2004? Click here to find out.
> >
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> This message is the property of Time Inc. or its affiliates. It may be
> legally privileged and/or confidential and is intended only for the use
> of the addressee(s). No addressee should forward, print, copy, or
> otherwise reproduce this message in any manner that would allow it to be
> viewed by any individual not originally listed as a recipient. If the
> reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby
> notified that any unauthorized disclosure, dissemination, distribution,
> copying or the taking of any action in reliance on the information
> herein is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication
> in error, please immediately notify the sender and delete this message.
> Thank you.
>
>
request for details on Zadie Smith re Nabokov.
----- Original Message -----
From: <troy_patterson@ew.com>
>
> ---------------- Message requiring your approval (114
lines) ------------------
> The introduction, titled 'Dead Men Talking', consists of her commentaries
on "half a dozen commonplaces." Ms. Smith, who once told me that she thinks
VN is "the bee's knees," first mentions him in discussing idea No. 5, Sir
Francis Bacon's "Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and
writing an exact man," on page xxxiii:
>
>
> To me, each writer's prose style dramatizes their belief regarding what
reading may demand of writing and vice versa. Hemingway, for example,
believed in the primacy of reading; he thought that there should be no
artificial interruption in its natural smoothness and speed. He subjugated
the vanities of writing to the realities of reading. Nabokov, on ther other
hand, thought Hemingway was a Philistine. Nabokov thought reading should
equal the performative act of writing, that it should be a reenaction of the
act of writing (although no reader, except possibly his wife, proved equal,
in Nabokov's mind, to the task).
> Somewhere between the writing that has forgotten entirely what reading is
and the writing that is a slave to what reading is--that's where I try to
be.
> (N.B.: I guess you know how Sir Francis Bacon died.)
>
> 6. Vladimir Nabokov: 'A work of art has no importance whatever to society.
It is only important to the individual, and only the individual reader is
important to me.'
> Role models--individuals endowed with wide-ranging socio-symbolic
significance--have no place in fiction. Role models are bullshit. People who
move through the world playing roles, attending to roles, aspiring to roles,
looking for models to help them find new roles--these people are not
partaking fully in this whole existence-thing, which is about doing it for
real. We would rather not read that way (leaning over a pond, waiting for
the water to settle, and all so our own mirrored faces might rise toward us
like Plath's 'terrible fish'), no, nor write that way either. To this some
folks will object. [the following two sentences are italicized] Oh, I see.
So you're not political. No! Don't believe it! You are political! You are
the most political fucking person in the world because when you read, when
you write, you won't let a single human being be obscured behind the dread
symbolic bulk of somebody or something else. Every time you open a novel or
put pen to paper you dra!
> matize your belief in the miraculous, incommensurable existence of six
billion individuals. One of whom died three hundred and seventy-seven years
ago while attempting to freeze a chicken.
>
>
> And there she ends her piece.
>
> Yours,
> Troy Patterson
>
> > ----------
> > From: D. Barton Johnson
> > Reply To: Vladimir Nabokov Forum
> > Sent: Monday, February 2, 2004 12:50 PM
> > To: NABOKV-L@LISTSERV.UCSB.EDU
> > Subject: Fw: 11-page introduction by novelist Zadie Smith is also a
treasure ...
> >
> > EDNOTE: zADIE sMITH ALLUDES TO vn IN HER WORK SO IT MIGHT BE INTERESTING
TO LEARN WHAT VN "PRECEPT" FOR READERS SHE PICKS. IF ANYONE HAS THE BOOK,
PLEASE ADVISE NABOKV-L AND QUOTE.
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Sandy P. Klein
> > Sent: Sunday, February 01, 2004 10:26 PM
> > Subject: 11-page introduction by novelist Zadie Smith is also a treasure
...
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
http://www.sunspot.net/features/booksmags/bal-bk.argu01feb01,0,5266086.story?coll=bal-society-utility
> >
> > How are anthologists doing with the best of the best?
> >
> > _____
> >
> > By Steve Weinberg
> > Special to The Sun
> > Originally published February 1, 2004
> >
> >
> >
> > The growing genre of annual compilations is a very mixed bag indeed
> >
> > Only after reading an advertisement from the venerable publisher
Houghton Mifflin did I start noticing the depth and breadth of a phenomenon
in the book world. Visits to bookstores heightened my awareness. The full
extent of the phenomenon dawned on me a few days later as I scanned my
bookshelves at home, filled with titles I had never thought of as related. >
> >
> > The phenomenon is the proliferation of anthologies offering the "best
of," as in The Best American Poetry 2003. Houghton Mifflin, the most
expansive "best of" publisher, has registered the phrase "The Best American
Series" as a trademark. Its series now consists of eight books, covering
recipes, essays, short stories, mystery stories, sports writing, travel
writing, science/nature writing and a vague category rendered as The Best
American Nonrequired Reading.
> >
> > Best-selling author Dave Eggers has noticed the phenomenon, too. In the
foreword to the The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2003 (Houghton
Mifflin, 368 pages, $27.50), Eggers, employing the ironic tone that infuses
his writing, says, "The purpose of this book is to collect good work of any
kind - fiction, humor, essays, comics, journalism - in one place for the
English-reading consumer. The other books in the Best American series are
limited by their categories, most particularly the popular but constraining
Best American Catholic Badger Mystery Writing. This collection is not so
limited, which is why, we think, it dominates all similar collections,
making them whimper and cower in a way that is shameful."
> >
> > What is going on here? Hard to say, but it probably has something to do
with a desire for prepackaging in a hurried society. Prepackaged
anthologies, in which a stranger decides "the best" for readers, could be
considered akin to prepackaged dinners, in which a stranger decides the
menu.
> >
> > Prepackaged meals are generally inferior to home cooking. What about
prepackaged anthologies? It depends. Each has at least some literary merit.
Phrased another way, none is a total waste of money or time.
> >
> > That stipulated, some "best of" anthologies are superior to others,
based on the range of publications where the selections first appeared, the
quality of the writing, the diversity of the authors represented, the
value-added material included (if any) with each selection, the incisiveness
of the foreword and/or introduction, the thoroughness of the back matter (if
any), plus the hard-to-gauge but nonetheless meaningful knowledge and
enthusiasm of the guest editor making the choices each year.
> >
> > Given the world-is-my-oyster approach (fiction, humor, essays, comics,
journalism) of Eggers' The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2003, it ought
to shine, and it does. In his 13-page foreword, Eggers not only explains the
selection process, but also entertains and enlightens with paragraphs
ranging in tone from Dave Barry to Anne Tyler. Eggers notes that, given the
volume's original purpose upon its unveiling during 2002 to introduce high
school and college students to "good writing from contemporary writers," he
relies heavily on recommendations from - guess who? - high school and
college students. He provides brief biographies for each of the students.
> >
> > The 11-page introduction by novelist Zadie Smith is also a treasure. She
expounds on six precepts for readers, selected from Samuel Johnson, Logan
Pearsall Smith, Laurence Sterne, James Joyce, Francis Bacon and Vladimir
Nabokov.
> >
> > As for the 25 selections, only nine are from widely available
periodicals (two each from Esquire, The New Yorker and The New York Times
Magazine; one each from Time, The Atlantic Monthly and Harper's). Also
represented are what publishing insiders normally call "literary
quarterlies" (although not all of them literally appear four times annually)
such as Mississippi Review, Story Quarterly, Zoetrope, Tin House, Columbia
Review and Alaska Quarterly Review (twice). Cartoon panels from Lynda Barry
are included. There is a selection from an online-only magazine, Nerve.com.
The satiric tabloid The Onion is represented. So is Eggers' creation,
McSweeney's, an occasional magazine sometimes published at book length
between hard covers. >
> >
> > Despite my extensive periodicals consumption, I encountered publications
unfamiliar to me - Little Engines, 7x7, Modern Humorist, Shout and
Pindeldyboz. (Unfortunately, Eggers provides no information about any of the
represented publications. Fortunately, he provides useful information about
each author.)
> >
> > The most surprising unifying topic, maybe just short of Catholic Badger
Mystery Writing, is recipes. The Best American Recipes 2003-2004 (Houghton
Mifflin, 300 pages, $26) suggests an obvious question: How did editors Fran
McCullough and Molly Stevens know where to look for extraordinary recipes?
Did they sneak into residential kitchens while everybody slept to rifle
through drawers and cabinets? No. It turns out they read lots of already
published cookbooks, magazines and newspapers and checked Web sites as well.
The result is nourishment for the brain as well as the palate.
> >
> > When it comes to value-added, probably the top "best of" is Best
Newspaper Writing 2003 (400 pages, $14.95), published by the Poynter
Institute in conjunction with Bonus Books. The winners and runners-up in
each of eight categories constitute the guts of the volume. The bonuses
include interviews with winners and runners-up, extended biographical
material about each author, and a bibliography of new books and articles
about reporting and writing.
> >
> > Using value-added as a standard, The Best American Magazine Writing 2003
(464 pages, $14.95) has almost nothing to offer. Compiled by the American
Society of Magazine Editors and published by HarperCollins Perennial, each
of the 17 nonfiction pieces and two fiction entries contains an introduction
of a few sentences maximum.
> >
> > Furthermore, almost all the selections appeared in easy-to-find,
large-circulation national magazines. Any anthology collecting writing by
the likes of Michael Paterniti, Tim Cahill, Gary Smith, Anne Fadiman, Ian
Frazier, Katha Pollitt, Joyce Carol Oates and E.L. Doctorow is worth owning.
But the overall effort seems uninspired, more a dutiful endeavor than a
joyful one.
> >
> > The Best American Poetry 2003 (288 pages, $16), published by Scribner,
reprints selections from 45 periodicals, almost none of them widely
circulated or well-known in any respect. For the most part, poetry in the
United States - despite a devoted following - is absent from the mainstream
media. The poems appeared in small journals such as Barrow Street,
Mid-American Review, Poetry Northwest and Third Coast.
> >
> > Each poem is presented unadorned - no attempt at explication whatsoever.
Because some of the poems are approachable and some are forbidding, the
unadorned approach by guest editor Yusef Komunyakaa and series editor David
Lehman is both the good news and the bad news.
> >
> > Best New American Voices 2004 (Harvest, 324 pages, $14), published by
Harcourt, contains no previously published pieces. Instead, the 17 short
stories have been culled from the top writing programs in the United States,
most of which are affiliated with universities. Mining the fiction of
wannabe writers paying tuition seems like a stretch for a "best of" book. No
doubt the editors could reply by saying that if Misha Angrist or Liza Ward
(the first and last authors anthologized in this volume) ever becomes
famous, you, dear reader, will have seen her name here first.
> >
> > All in all, I would rather not quibble with the "best of" phenomenon or
any of the entrants in the "best of" publishing sweepstakes. I am so busy
with my own magazine writing, book authorship, reviewing, family members and
leisure pursuits that I lack the time to keep up with every genre that
interests me. So, publishers, keep those "best of" anthologies coming. I
promise to look at them, and perhaps purchase some.
> >
> > Steve Weinberg is a 35-year veteran of investigative reporting for
newspapers, magazines and book publishers. His 1992 book about the craft of
biography, Telling the Untold Story, is still in print from the University
of Missouri Press. He browses so many periodicals that he carries around a
master li> st to keep track of which issue he read most recently.
> >
> > The Baltimore Sun
> >
> > September 19, 2003 Baltimore Sun front page
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > _____
> >
> > What are the 5 hot job markets for 2004? Click here to find out.
> >
>
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> This message is the property of Time Inc. or its affiliates. It may be
> legally privileged and/or confidential and is intended only for the use
> of the addressee(s). No addressee should forward, print, copy, or
> otherwise reproduce this message in any manner that would allow it to be
> viewed by any individual not originally listed as a recipient. If the
> reader of this message is not the intended recipient, you are hereby
> notified that any unauthorized disclosure, dissemination, distribution,
> copying or the taking of any action in reliance on the information
> herein is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication
> in error, please immediately notify the sender and delete this message.
> Thank you.
>
>