“Via yet another enhancement for Amazon Prime, subscribers who also own Kindles can borrow one (and only one) book per month from about 5,000 available titles. Once borrowed, you keep the book for as long as you like.”
Tag: 11.03.11
The Case For Snarky Snobs
“There is a societal value to snarky snobs. We need snarky snobs, we love them, we look to them with interest even if we’re not going to slavishly follow their proclamations: We want at least to know what the snarky snob position is.”
There, There, Nice Little Art Forgers…
“German newspaper Frankfurter Rundschau calls the group a “nice family of counterfeiters”, and most media outlets, from the local newspaper Badische Zeitung to the popular weekly magazine Der Spiegel, have been calling Beltracchi a filou, or rogue.”
Neighbors Complain GPS Bringing More Tourists To The Hollywood Sign
“Local residents say satellite navigation systems are making it easier for tourists to find their way through the area’s winding roads and narrow alleyways in their quest to take photographs close to the sign.”
UK Library Visits Significantly Down
Yearly figures show “a drop in the number of static and mobile public libraries from 4,612 to 4,579. And they show a 2.9% drop in the number of book loans to 300.22 million.”
Biology Teacher Wins France’s Top Literary Prize
“Alexis Jenni received the Prix Goncourt for his debut, L’Art Francais De La Guerre (The French Art of War). As is traditional, the 10 Euro (£8.60) prize was handed out at the Drouant restaurant in Paris.”
Klimt Looted By Nazis Sold For $40 Million
Litzlberg on the Attersee was returned to Georges Jorisch, 83, by Salzburg’s Museum of Modern Arts in July.
Why I Write Longhand Rather Than Type
“Everything I’ve ever written was composed in notebooks first. I have hundreds of them filled with my scribbles tucked away in boxes. I also buy them obsessively, so I probably have just as many empty notebooks lying around the house ready and waiting to be filled. I find that writing longhand I can enter a zone of comfort I find hard to achieve when sitting in front of a screen – I find typing annoying.”
New York Is, Briefly, The Capital Of Australian Dance
“The first week of November has turned into unofficial Australian dance week in New York as three of the country’s leading companies” – the Australian Ballet, Sydney Dance Company, and Chunky Move – “find themselves there at the same time.”
Meet Iran’s Evangelist Of Jazz
Nat Hentoff introduces readers to “Ehsan Khoshbakht, 29, a young Iranian dissident and jazz aficionado whose blog, ‘Take the ‘A’ Train,’ is dedicated to spreading the jazz gospel as a voice for freedom inside his native country.”