The Writer's News Reprinted from the October/November 2008 issue of the Writer's Chronicle. News | Obituaries | Awards News 2008 Wallace Stevens Award & Academy Fellowship
Dissent Over Age-Banding of Children's Books A growing campaign against assigning appropriate age bands to children's books has recruited JK Rowling as its newest member, joining other well-known children's writers such as Anthony Horowitz, Terry Pratchett, and Alan Garner. The petition believes that imposing an age-banding on children's books is “ill-conceived, damaging to the interests of young readers and highly unlikely to make the slightest difference to sales.” The campaign formed in response to an initiative commissioned by the Children's Book Group of the Publishers' Association, which two years ago released a study that suggested that 86% of consumers were in favor of age-guidance. In direct response, Random House, Penguin, and Scholastic all eagerly jumped on board, announcing their plan to unveil book covers this fall with age-appropriate imprints indicating levels such as 5+, 7+, 9+, and 13+/teen.
Cider Press Review Controversy Poet Stacey-Lynn Brown recently took to her blog to speak out publicly against publishing group Cider Press Review, with which she was originally slated to work on publishing her book of poetry, Cradle Song. Brown alleges that Cider Press Review accepted her manuscript for their annual prize, only to revoke it for what they called “failing to fulfill contractual obligations.” Cider Press Review contests these allegations.
2008 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest Garrison Spik, a 41-year-old communications director and writer from Washington, D.C., is the winner of the 2008 Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest, a contest that began at San Jose State University in 1982. The competition is an international literary parody contest that honors the memory of writer Edward George Earl Bulwer-Lytton. Per the guidelines, contestants are asked to submit bad opening sentences to imaginary novels. This year's winning entry did just that: “Theirs was a New York love, a checkered taxi ride burning rubber, and like the city their passion was open 24/7, steam rising from their bodies like slick streets exhaling warm, moist, white breath through manhole covers stamped 'Forged by DeLaney Bros., Piscataway, N.J.'”
Voices From Iraq
Islamic Themes Incite Acts of Violence? The publication of The Jewel of Medina, a historical novel with Islamic themes, written by Sherry Jones, has been placed on hold by its publisher Random House, although it was originally scheduled to be released in mid-August. Random House spokeswoman Carol Schneider announced that publication of the novel has been “postponed indefinitely” after receiving word that the book might “incite acts of violence by a small, radical segment.” Schneider went on to say, “We thought it was not a good time, with tensions running as high as they do, to publish this.” Jones has signed a termination agreement with Random House and has begun to shop the book elsewhere.
More Plagiarism Crime novelist Lynda La Plante has been accused of lifting passages from Olga Lengyel's 1947 memoir Five Chimneys for her 1993 novel, Entwined. La Plante denies the plagiarism allegation, suggesting instead that a research assistant may be responsible. The two passages, which were spotted by an Australian reader, are nearly identical. Lengyel's 1947 memoir reads, “…three hundred and sixty corpses every half hour, which was all the time it took to reduce human flesh to ashes…” while La Plante's novel contains the line “three hundred and sixty corpses every half hour—all the time it took to reduce human flesh to ashes.” Literary editor Malcolm Knox commented, “Outsourcing any task always has its perils…”
Censorship in Pittsburgh? Jan Beatty's overtly sexual third collection of poems, Red Sugar, has created a stir due to a cancelled poetry reading in a bookstore in Pittsburgh's South Side. According to Bob Hoover of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Joseph-Beth Booksellers was concerned that other patrons or children could hear the explicit poetry over the store's sound system. Even though Beatty previously read her work at the store, she was told she would not be granted a reading from Red Sugar unless the store could select which poems they felt were appropriate. They also recommended that Beatty could only sign books without a reading or conduct a reading with the sound system turned off. Beatty refused, saying, "My position is that the store needs to contact me to apologize and to let me read with no strings attached."
Search For a New Face in Chinese Literature The Penguin Publishing Group has joined the Changjiang Art & Literature Publishing House in China to establish a new literary prize entitled “The Next—A Search for the New Face of Chinese Literature.” Penguin, requiring that entrants submit their manuscripts to be short-listed and eventually judged by the Chinese public, who will vote on the works until a winner is chosen, has dubbed the contest an “Apprentice-style competition.” An attractive prize of $146,000 in prize money, a publishing contract, an advance, and “the payment of any outstanding educational debts” lays the groundwork for a very competitive contest. John Makinson, Penguin CEO, says that the house is “committed to supporting up-and-coming writers around the world, whether they are from Shanghai or San Francisco,” according to Publishers Weekly.
New Spelling Not Error Bucks New University Professor Ken Smith, in an article published in the Times Higher Education Supplement, argues that the most common spelling errors should not be corrected, but rather, accepted as “variant spellings.” His proposal mentions specifically ten words he views as most commonly misspelled, which include “arguement” for “argument” and “twelth” for “twelfth.” Smith cites the acceptance of both “judgement” and “judgment” as evidence that an evolving language will inevitably produce these variant spellings. Smith is not suggesting that words should be learned the improper way, however. “All I am suggesting is that we might well put 20 or so of the most commonly misspelt words in the English language on the same footing as those other words that have a widely accepted variant spelling,” he clarified.
Obituaries
Awards The Mary McCarthy Prize in Short Fiction. Publication by Sarabande Books. Winner: Jerry Gabriel for Drowned Boy: Stories. Judge: Andrea Barrett. The Kathryn A. Morton Prize in Poetry. Publication by Sarabande Books. Winner: Karyna McGlynn for I Have to Go Back to 1994 and Kill a Girl. Judge: Lynn Emanuel. 2008 Tampa Review Prize for Poetry. $1,000 and Publication by University of Tampa Press. Winner: Benjamin S. Grossberg for Sweet Core Orchard. 2008 Cohen Awards for Best Poem and Short Story Published in Ploughshares. Winners: Jennifer Grotz for her poem “The Life and Times of George Van den Heuve” in the Spring 2007 issue edited by Edward Hirsch and Bret Anthony Johnston for his story “Republican” in the Fall 2007 issue edited by Andrea Barrett. 2007 New Rivers Press Many Voices Project (MVP). $1,000 and publication by New Rivers Press. Winners: Susan Barr-Toman for her novel When Love Was Clean Underwear; Elizabeth Oness for her poetry collection Fallibility; and Maya Pindych for her poetry collection Eye, Thus Precious. Judges: Ann Hood, Michael Hettich, and Alan Davis. 2008 National Magazine Award - Essay Category. Winner: New Letters for Thomas E.Kennedy's essay “I am Joe Prostate.” 2008 Donald Justice Poetry Prize. $1,000. Winner: John Poch for Two Men Fighting with a Knife. Judge: David Mason. 2008 Saturnalia Books Poetry Prize. $1,250 and Publication by Saturnalia Books. Winner: Sebastian Agudelofor Kitchen Subjects. Judge: Mark Doty. 2008 Idaho Prize for Poetry. Publication by Lost Horse Press. Winner: Philip Memmer for L U C I F E R, A Hagiography. Judge: M.L. Smoker. Glimmer Train June Fiction Open. Publication in Glimmer Train Stories. Winners: First Place ($2,000): Shimon Tanaka for “The Suit.” Second Place ($1,000): Christine Sneed for“Twelve + Twelve.” Third Place ($600): Horatio Potter for “Summer Help.” Narrative Magazine First Person Contest. Publication in Narrative Magazine. Winners: First Place ($3,000): Gina Ochsner for “On Principle.” Second Place ($1,750): Heather Brittain Bergstrom for “Celilo Falls.” Third Place ($1,000): Holly Wilson for “Night Glow.” |
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