Phonies Can't Cross This Bridge
Tuesday is here to provide your literary briefing. We find Tuesday to be a busy day at the office. Monday might be a day to set up meetings or make a few calls, but mostly everyone is letting everyone else get settled, which means that really nobody gets working until Tuesday. Wednesday is a good day for meetings, but once you get to Thursday and Friday, well, the weekend is on the mind. So, Tuesday. Here it is, and here are a few links to step away from the hectic world, like Jerry. As in Salinger, in Cornish. We escape through Deadspin, and we have the a list of their “Stories That Don’t Suck.” We’d love to read a novel about the current financial crisis, but, according to Telegraph, it ain’t happening. Stephen Fry escaped across the United States, just don’t start calling him Alexis. Finally, please enjoy our links so you don’t spend the rest of the day cussin’ (we’re from the American South) like Giles Turnbull. – Andrew Geer
– His most famous character, Holden Caulfield, said it was impossible to find a place that is “nice and peaceful,” but J. D. Salinger may have found something close for himself in the woods of this tiny town. Here Mr. Salinger was just Jerry, a quiet man who arrived early to church suppers, nodded hello while buying a newspaper at the general store and wrote a thank-you note to the fire department after it extinguished a blaze and helped save his papers and writings. — Cornish, N.H. in The New York Times
– “There’s something about writers. I don’t know why but I feel I ought to know the person as well as the work and so ordinarily I try to schedule a walk beforehand, just to chat with the person, talk about books, family, anything at all. But I understand you’d rather not go on and on with this, so we’ll work quickly.” — Stories That Don’t Suck in Deadspin
– One of the best things about being a writer is that nobody tells you what to do. You don’t have a boss, or rather, you are your own boss. A corollary of that is that when you ask yourself why you are doing what you are doing, you don’t always have an immediate answer. — Modern Stories in Telegraph
The Fifth Head of Rushmore
– In 1831, French politician and thinker Alexis de Tocqueville visited the still growing United States, traveled widely and took copious notes. He assembled those notes in two volumes, published five years apart, titled “Democracy in America,” that are still studied and quoted today. The title “Stephen Fry in America” echoes de Tocqueville’s classic, but also puts the reader on notice that the ambition here is scaled back. — Stephen Fry in The Washington Times
– “Arseholes, bastards, fucking cunts, and pricks!” With those words, Ian Dury taught me at least half of the essential basic swearing vocabulary I would need in adult life. He spat them out, right at the start of “Plaistow Patricia.” It was the start of side two of his album New Boots and Panties, released back in the days when albums had sides, and sides were carefully thought out. — Cursing in The Morning News
Video: Ian Dury’s Clever Bastards
