“Two iconic works — one billed as the most expensive book in the world and the other the most important book in all of English Literature — will go under the hammer at a Sotheby’s auction here on December 7.”
Tag: 10.20.10
Higher IQ = Higher Alcohol Consumption: Studies
Studies in the UK and US found that children who scored higher in intelligence before age 16 tended to consume more alcohol as adults. “So why do smarter kids end up drinking more? Hypotheses abound.”
‘I Want to See Emily Dickinson’s Chamber Pot’: In Defense of Writer’s House Museums
Laura Miller: “People try to bribe the tour guides at Hemingway’s house in Key West to let them type on his typewriter, as if the author’s genius had somehow infused his tools. … My motivation is entirely the opposite; I want to be inoculated against any tendency toward idol worship via a reminder that even genius is a product of flesh and blood.”
Study: Twitter Can Predict Stock Market
“The emotional roller coaster captured on Twitter can predict the ups and downs of the stock market, a new study finds. Measuring how calm the Twitterverse is on a given day can foretell the direction of changes to the Dow Jones Industrial Average three days later with an accuracy of 86.7 percent.”
Cleveland Has Lots Of Graffiti Artists – Are They Any Good?
“Do they have anything to say to the rest of us? Do they deliver any new ideas, or is theirs just a collage of fake names scrawled out in fat letters, ego trips that mean nothing except to the writers and their crews?”
Forgotten Sondheim Musical Released on DVD
“Evening Primrose was originally broadcast on ABC Stage 67, a cultural TV series that featured dramas, musicals and other entertainment. The musical, with an original score by Sondheim, starred Anthony Perkins, Dorothy Stickney, Larry Gates and Charmian Carr.”
BBC to Freeze License Fee, Cut 4% From Budget
“The BBC will have to cut £140m a year from its annual £3.6bn budget to meet the cost of freezing the TV licence fee for six years and new funding commitments, including the World Service.”
Ballet San Jose Celebrates 25 Years
“The company set up shop in Silicon Valley in 1985 as the West Coast component of a daring joint venture with the Cleveland Ballet. The latter folded in 2000 over what artistic director Dennis Nahat calls ‘a $350,000 disagreement,’ but the South Bay component has prospered.”
Stolen Juan Gris Canvas Recovered in Florida
An untitled 1926 oil painting by Juan Gris, “stolen from a St. Louis County home more than six years ago – now valued at up to $1million – has been located in Florida and will be returned, the FBI said Tuesday.”
Philip Seymour Hoffman to Play Willy Loman on B’way
“The director Mike Nichols confirmed on Wednesday that he would mount a Broadway revival of Death of a Salesman next fall starring Philip Seymour Hoffman as Willy Loman and Linda Emond as Linda Loman.”