Will Self: ‘I’m seen as a still-walking dead white man’

The novelist on his new collection of journalism, why he regrets criticising Sally Rooney and how he’s never shaken off the influence of JG Ballard“I’ll see your eidolon next Tuesday,” writes Will Self, 61, when I email to arrange a video call to discuss his new collection of journalism, Why Read: Selected Writings 2001-2021, which is centred on the concern (as he later told me, or my on-screen spirit-image) that “people are dumbing down their entire response to their own culture by their unfettered use of social media”. Self’s 26 previous books include Umbrella, shortlisted for the Booker prize in 2012, and its sequels Shark and Phone, the latter a single 624-page paragraph which the Telegraph called an “epic anti-tweet”. Speaking from his home in south London, he said he liked the description “because the book was a deliberate attempt to call people’s attention to what was being lost by the digital. I don’t think the Umbrella trilogy is that hard to read at all; it’s only hard to read in contrast to a tweet. By Donald Trump!”How did you pick the pieces in Why Read?Until fairly recently, certainly since 2001, I probably wrote an average of 150,000 words of journalism every year, so there’s a vast amount to choose from. My New York editor said that in the age of the web, collections like this need a theme or else readers feel they’re just getting a grab bag they could’ve sourced themselves. So the emphasis fell on the impact on reading and writing of what I choose to call... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2022-11-26 18:00:32 UTC ]
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Leslie Jamison: ‘I Was So Glad I Was Crying Over Something That Wasn’t a Man’

This week on The Maris Review, Leslie Jamison joins Maris Kreizman to discuss her latest collection, Make It Scream, Make It Burn, now available in paperback from Little, Brown. On how it’s okay to be obsessed with yourself: Leslie Jamison: I love how serious and passionate that my students are... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2020-01-09 09:48:36 UTC ]
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The White House wages war on transparency: Iran edition

In the days since the US military killed Qassem Suleimani, Iran’s fêted top security official, Iran’s leaders have repeatedly threatened retaliation. Yesterday, they volleyed ballistic missiles at two bases that house US troops in Iraq. No casualties were reported. On Twitter, Mohammad Javad... Continue reading at Columbia Journalism Review

[ Columbia Journalism Review | 2020-01-08 13:07:07 UTC ]
More news stories like this | News stories tagged with: #physical distance #online propaganda #prime minister #vanessa springora #elizabeth wurtzel #clinical depression #memoir

Such a Fun Age Satirizes the White Pursuit of Wokeness

Kiley Reid’s debut novel is a funny, fast-paced, empathetic examination of privilege in America. Continue reading at The Atlantic

[ The Atlantic | 2020-01-08 13:00:00 UTC ]
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Elizabeth Wurtzel, 'Prozac Nation' Author And Memoirist, Dead At 52

Wurtzel, who had breast cancer, gave new breath to the memoir and was a new voice for those struggling with clinical depression and addiction. Continue reading at HuffPost

[ HuffPost | 2020-01-07 21:47:12 UTC ]
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Elizabeth Wurtzel, journalist and author of Prozac Nation, dead at 52

Author of bestselling memoir about clinical depression, which made her ‘a hashtag before there was Twitter’, died from metastatic breast cancer Elizabeth Wurtzel, journalist and author of bestselling memoir Prozac Nation, has died at the age of 52.Writer David Samuels, Wurtzel’s friend since... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2020-01-07 16:51:54 UTC ]
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Big Lit Meets the Mexican Americans: A Study in White Supremacy

1. Introduction: Everybody Loves Diversity WHAT SELF-RESPECTING white progressive isn’t all in on diversity? Why, no one! Everyone’s for diversity. This includes all the main pillars of the American literary establishment, what I’ll call Big Lit — the Big Five publishers, The New York Times Book... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books

[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2020-01-02 18:00:51 UTC ]
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Sonny Mehta, Venerable Knopf Publisher, Is Dead at 77

Mr. Mehta was a voracious reader and instinctive decision maker who could spot great books and, coming from a paperback world, had no qualms about pushing them. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2019-12-31 15:37:45 UTC ]
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Publishing Legend Sonny Mehta is Dead at 77

Sonny Mehta, editor-in-chief of Knopf and chairman of the Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, died December 30 in New York City. He was 77. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2019-12-31 05:00:00 UTC ]
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Was This Decade The Beginning Of The End Of The Great White Male Writer?

In the 2010s, the publishing industry finally wrestled with its problems with diversity. Continue reading at HuffPost

[ HuffPost | 2019-12-22 13:00:22 UTC ]
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Hodder pays tribute to late author Frank White

The author and playwright Frank White, whose novel There Was a Time was published by Hodder in 2017, has died at the age of 92. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2019-12-18 09:56:16 UTC ]
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Ann and Jeff VanderMeer On Classic Fantasy, Fearsome Ducks, and Dead Astronauts

In this episode, taped live at the Miami Book Fair, writer Jeff VanderMeer and editor Ann VanderMeer talk to Fiction/Non/Fiction podcast co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell about editing The Big Book of Classic Fantasy anthology, historical understandings of fantasy, editing beyond... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2019-12-05 09:48:07 UTC ]
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Perumal Murugan said his career as a novelist was dead. Lucky for us, he was wrong.

In “The Story of a Goat,” animals articulate their own curious perspectives on their lives — and ours. Continue reading at The Washington Post

[ The Washington Post | 2019-11-26 12:00:00 UTC ]
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Choi, Broom and Sze among National Book Award winners; Teicher and White honoured

Last night’s 70th National Book Awards in New York saw Susan Choi, Sarah M Broom, Arthur Sze, Laszlo Krasnahorkai and Martin W Sandler annnounced as winners, respectively, in fiction, non-fiction, poetry, translated literature, and young people’s literature. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2019-11-21 10:45:49 UTC ]
More news stories like this | News stories tagged with: #susan choi #arthur sze #translated literature #national book award

Congratulations to National Book Foundation Lifetime Honoree Edmund White

Every now and then, Edmund White stops by my house for a party. A long-time non-drinker, he often arrives and leaves early, but in that short window, when he’s sitting on a stool or a chair or on the sofa, a little line forms. One by one men—and they’re usually men—enter the room, see him, […] Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2019-11-20 09:47:55 UTC ]
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Searching for the man behind the legend of Charlemagne

Medieval scholar Janet L. Nelson illuminates the warrior-king who profoundly shaped Europe. Continue reading at The Washington Post

[ The Washington Post | 2019-11-15 13:00:00 UTC ]
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Obituary: Tom Spurgeon, Comics Journalist, Editor, Blogger, Dead at 50

Tom Spurgeon, author, editor, comics critic, blogger, and executive director of the Cartoon Crossroads Columbus comics festival, died of unknown causes in Columbus, Ohio, on November 13. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2019-11-15 05:00:00 UTC ]
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Lonely White Men: On Michel Houellebecq’s “Serotonin”

FRANCES’S MICHEL HOUELLEBECQ leads something of a double career. A novelist of Prix Goncourt–winning distinction, Houellebecq is also his country’s best-selling author abroad and, on many accounts, currently its best. He is also reliably a prophet of current events: his third novel, Platform,... Continue reading at Los Angeles Review of Books

[ Los Angeles Review of Books | 2019-11-12 13:30:31 UTC ]
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