Jean-Paul Sartre, the famous French existentist, never said "Hell is other people at breakfast," but if you Google that phrase you will dozens if not hundreds of websites and blogs that say he did so say that. That's the Internet for you, where one man's faux quote can go viral in a matter of days without anyone ever checking to see if the quote was what the man really said.
While Sartre's faux quote about hell being other people at breakfast was never written or uttered by the quote-worthy philosopher, many people today not only agree that the "breakfast" quote is a deep existential truth,
but that Sartre actually said that. Why? Because the Internet said he did.
What Sartre really wrote in a play called "No Exist" was "Hell is other people."
But when American essayist Jonathan Rauch wrote in an Atlantic magazine essay several years ago that "Hell is other people at breakfast," and jokingly quoting Sartre as saying such a thing, the faux quote went viral and is now believed to be by many people an actual quote from Sartre. Google it and you will see how wrong they are, and how Rauch was from the very beginning just joking - joking!
What Sartre did not say about people, breakfast and hell is a good example of how out of control fires can spread on the Internet without anyone bothering to put the fire out. Even today, Atlantic magazine has not corrected the faux quote in Rauch's essay, nor have the editors there added a note online to say that the essayist with merely joking when he wrote that thing about breakfast. So the meme continues to this day and is almost more popular and quoted than what Sartre really did say.
I frist spotted "hell is other people at breakfast" misattribution after reading it in a 12-page New York Times Weekly supplement tucked into a Chinese-language newspaper in Taiwan, where I live.
The fake quote has took on a life on its own, thanks to the speed at which people read online and the power of the Internet to spread false facts and quotes.
The Sartre faux quote is a good excuse to pause and take stock of how we use quotes of any kind in this online age.
Mary Schmich, the Chicago newspaper columnist, understands this well.
"Got a speech to give? A paper to write? A love missive that could use a rhetorical boost? How simple and tempting it is to fire up Google then snag whatever quotable quote pops up on whatever site," she wrote in a column a few years ago.
"Quote culprits come in many forms: school valedictorians and principals, businesspeople, students, journalists, ad writers," she added. "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone, or whatever, as the Bible, or maybe Stephen Colbert, once said."
"When something wrong gets out there today, it's like spilling red wine onto a white carpet," Charles Lipson, a University of Chicago professor who trains students in academic honesty, told Schmich when she asked him, for, uh, a quote. "You never get it out. And somebody keeps spilling more wine on top of it."
Fred Shapiro edits "The Yale Book of Quotations" and Schmich picked his brain tio find out if he had any rules for quotations.
"Any time you see a quote attributed to Mark Twain, figure that one is false. Similarly with Yogi Berra and Benjamin Franklin," Shapiro told her.
The key to discerning the accuracy of a quote, Shapiro told Schmich is always to look for when and where it was said, and if you don't know, be very wary.
If a quote is good, even a faux quote, why should a person care whether it's correct or who really said it?
While in general the true quote is better than the fake quote, sometimes the fake quotes take on a life of their own and become better with age.
In the future, American studenrts might not study Sartre's plays or see them performed on Broadway or Off-Broadway, but I am sure many of them will really think and agree that "hell is other people at breakfast."
Because, you know, for some people, it is.And Jonathan Rauch really wrote that in the Atlantic, so there!
Saturday, June 15, 2013
Saturday, May 25, 2013
The Gift of Siblings
FRANK BRUNI writes at the NYT paywall:
May 25, 2013
GIVEN what a mouthy thing I myself grew up to be, it’s shocking to me that I began talking later than most children do. But I didn’t need words. ........I had my older brother, ......Mark.
The way my mother always recounted it, I’d squirm, pout, mewl, bawl or indicate my displeasure in some comparably articulate way, and before she could press me on what I wanted and perhaps coax actual language from me, Mark would rush in to solve the riddle.
“His blanket,” he’d say, and he’d be right.
“Another cookie,” he’d say, and he’d be even righter.
From the tenor of my sob or the twitch of one of my fat little fingers, Mark knew which chair I had designs on, which toy I was ogling. He decoded the signs and procured the goods. Only 17 months older, he was my psychic and my spokesman, my shaman and my Sherpa. With Mark around, I was safe.
This weekend he’s turning 50 — it’s horrifying, trust me — and we’ll all be together, as we were at his 40th and my 40th and seemingly every big milestone: he and I and our younger brother, Harry, and our sister, Adelle, the last one to come along. We marched (or, rather, crawled and toddled) into this crazy world together, and though we had no say in that, it’s by our own volition and determination that we march together still. Among my many blessings, this is the one I’d put at the top.
Two weeks ago, the calendar decreed that we Americans pause to celebrate mothers, as it does every year. Three weeks hence, fathers get their due. But as I await the arrival of my brothers, my sister and their spouses in Manhattan, which is where we’ll sing an off-key “Happy Birthday” to Mark and drink too much, my thoughts turn to siblings, who don’t have a special day but arguably have an even more special meaning to, and influence on, those of us privileged to have them.
“Siblings are the only relatives, and perhaps the only people you’ll ever know, who are with you through the entire arc of your life,” the writer Jeffrey Kluger observed to Salon in 2011, the year his book “The Sibling Effect” was published. “Your parents leave you too soon and your kids and spouse come along late, but your siblings know you when you are in your most inchoate form.”
Of course the “entire arc” part of Kluger’s comments assumes that untimely death doesn’t enter the picture, and that acrimony, geography or mundane laziness doesn’t pull brothers and sisters apart, to a point where they’re no longer primary witnesses to one another’s lives, no longer fellow passengers, just onetime housemates with common heritages.
That happens all too easily, and whenever I ponder why it didn’t happen with Mark, Harry, Adelle and me — each of us so different from the others — I’m convinced that family closeness isn’t a happy accident, a fortuitously smooth blend of personalities.
IT’S a resolve, a priority made and obeyed. Mark and his wife, Lisa, could have stayed this weekend in the Boston area, where they live, and celebrated his 50th with his many nearby college buddies. Harry and his wife, Sylvia, could have taken a pass on a trip to New York: they’re traveling all the way from the Los Angeles area, their home. But we made a decision to be together, and it’s the accretion of such decisions across time that has given us so many overlapping memories, which are in turn our glue.
I’m also convinced that having numerous siblings helps. If you’re let down by one, you can let off steam with another. “There’s always someone else to turn to,” said George Howe Colt, the author of “Brothers,” a 2012 book about brothers through history and about his own three siblings, all male.
“It’s like a treasure chest: you have access to a lot of different personalities,” Colt told me. “With my brothers, I turn to them all. But I turn to them for different things.” That’s how it is in our brood, too.
Perhaps because the four of us belong to the same generation — just over eight years separate Mark and Adelle — each understands the others better than our mother, now gone, could ever understand us, or than our father ever will. And while our parents gave us values, we inadvertently assigned ourselves the roles we play. Popularity came more easily to Mark, so I resolved to be the more diligent student, needing to find my own way to stand out. Because Mark and I made relatively conventional choices, Harry, for a while, made less conventional ones: his claim to a distinct identity.
That’s how it goes in a pack of siblings, and I sometimes wonder, when it comes to the decline in fertility rates in our country and others, whether the economic impact will be any more significant than the intimate one. For better or worse, fewer people will know the challenges and comforts of a sprawling clan.
Those comforts are manifold, at least in my lucky experience. With siblings to help shoulder the burden of your parents’ dreams and expectations, you can flail on a particular front with lower stakes and maybe even less notice. Siblings not only pick up the slack but also act as decoys, providing crucial distraction.
They’re less tailored fits than friends are. But in a family that’s succeeded at closeness, they’re more natural, better harbors. As Colt observed of his siblings, and it’s true of mine as well, they aren’t people he would have likely made an effort to know or spend time with if he’d met them at school, say, or at work. And yet a reunion with them thrills him more than a reunion with friends, who don’t make him feel that he’s “a part of a larger quilt,” he said. His brothers do.
My friend Campbell, who’s as fond of her two sisters as I am of my siblings, put it this way: “With a friend, I have to be more articulate. With my sisters, I can be my most primal self: inarticulate, childishly emotional. I’ll have a fight with my sister and say, ‘O.K., I know we’re in a fight, but I need your advice on something,’ and we can just put the fight on hold. They’re the only people in the world you can be your worst self with and they’ll still accept you.”
My siblings have certainly seen me at my worst, and I’ve seen them at theirs. No one has bolted. It’s as if we signed some contract long ago, before we were even aware of what we were getting into, and over time gained the wisdom to see that we hadn’t been duped. We’d been graced: with a center of gravity; with an audience that never averts its gaze and doesn’t stint on applause. For each of us, a new home, a new relationship or a newborn was never quite real until the rest of us had been ushered in to the front row.
This weekend we clap for Mark, and as I plot his dinner menu and hit the liquor store, I have to decode what he wants. It won’t be difficult. I have decades of history to draw from, along with an instinct I can’t even explain.
A Half-Spanish Half-Icelandic Film Director -- Baltasar Kormakur Samper
A scene from “The Deep,” a movie about an Icelandic’s sailor’s ordeal directed by half-Spanish director Baltasar Kormakur.
[His Spanish father is Baltasar Samper a well known Spanish artist in Iceland].
The half-Spanish Icelandic director Baltasar Kormakur made his international reputation with such offbeat films as “101 Rekjavik,” a comedy about a sexually confused slacker, and “The Sea,” about dark family secrets in a remote fishing village. Yet he is making an impressive transition to American filmmaking with action fare like “Contraband,” a hit last year, and the comic-book-based “2 Guns,”coming this summer.
''Just because I was born in [Iceland] doesn't mean I want to spend the rest of my life telling stories for 300,000 people. It helps that I'm half-Spanish, because the market I can reach is much bigger,'' he told John Anderson of the New York Times.
That doesn’t mean he’s gotten with the whole Hollywood program. “For two weeks he didn’t know he had a trailer” on the set, said Mark Wahlberg, who stars with Denzel Washington in “2 Guns,” in which crooked cops take on the Mob. “He was just on the set, getting things done.”
The director, chagrined, admitted that it was true about the trailer. “I used it twice,” he said recently by phone from Budapest.
He was there to shoot an HBO pilot, but he was also planning a remake of “Jar City,” his 2006 hit, which helped whet the American appetite for Scandinavian noir.
“Humbly,” he said during an earlier interview in New York, “that was the beginning of the ‘crime wave,’ the first Scandinavian crime movie that came out in America.”
“It didn’t crack through in the way Stieg Larsson’s stuff did,” he said, citing the author of “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” and its sequels. “But it started that wave.”
What followed the wave, of course, was Iceland’s crash, which set back all aspects of the Icelandic economy, including a tight-knit film industry in which only a handful of films are made each year. But it has hardly slowed Mr. Kormakur, who resists the concept — one as old as studio movies — that a foreign director has to surrender to achieve success in Hollywood. Especially if, at the same time, he’s building an empire back home.
“You don’t have to necessarily start doing cocaine and sitting around a pool waiting for someone to call you,” Mr. Kormakur said. “If I never make another movie after ‘2 Guns’ in America, I wouldn’t see it as a failure. I would see it as an adventure I went for, and I’d keep doing what I do.”
What Mr. Kormakur does at home will hit American screens this week: “The Deep,” shortlisted for the foreign-language Oscar this year, tells the real-life tale of the fishing trawler Breki, which in 1984 went down with all hands save one: a sailor (played by Olafur Darri Olafsson, a regular in Kormakur films) who survived six hours in 40-degree water before reaching the volcanic shores of the Westman Islands, off the southern coast of Iceland. Baffled researchers concluded that the man’s unusually thick body fat made him, in effect, part seal.
It was an important moment in recent Icelandic history, one Mr. Kormakur said he had to get right, because of the national trauma and the sea’s importance to the economic and spiritual life of Iceland.
“It’s an almost mythical story,” he said. “Everyone in Iceland knows it. But what I didn’t want to do is create emotional porno. It’s so easy to fall into that. What I’m trying to say in the film is, this is inevitable. This is the country we choose to live in. It’s not even so much about the real guys in the accident; it’s about all the sailors in Iceland. It took a long time because I wanted to get it right.”
Getting it right meant getting in the water. For “The Deep’s” shipwreck scene, “two of the actors opted out when we were turning the boat over,” he said. “I wasn’t going to push them. I just said, ‘O.K., I’ll do it myself, give me a costume.’ ”
David Linde, a veteran of the American independent scene, met Mr. Kormakur during a salmon-fishing trip to Iceland and became a producer of “The Deep.” He said the director’s intent, as with all of his work, was to make a movie that was commercially viable worldwide.
“It’s a very, very important story in Iceland,” Mr. Linde said, “and a lot of people think it’s confined by that. But Balt never saw it that way.”
At the same time, the director was well aware of how attuned his home audience was to nuance. “People in Iceland would know if you were faking it,” Mr. Kormakur said. “I wouldn’t get away with ‘The Perfect Storm,’ and that was done with the best technique available at the time.”
No, he said, they had to shoot in the real Atlantic, with real bodies in the water. Mr. Olafsson recalled that, it was difficult for him to stay within the camera’s frame while he was swimming in the constantly moving ocean. A brake was needed. “We quickly realized there was no way around it,” the actor said from Los Angeles.
Re-enter Mr. Kormakur. “I asked for a rope,” he said, “and tied it around myself and jumped in and tied myself to Darri. I kept the rope under the water, kept myself out of the frame, and started backstroking. So while he’s swimming forward, he’s still stationary, because I’m swimming in the other direction. It was like a perpetual pool.”
Reflecting a widely held sentiment, Mr. Olafsson said Mr. Kormakur was “a very sweet guy to work with, but he doesn’t meddle” though “he’s still a perfectionist.”
“He’ll hire you,” he went on, “and immediately you know what is expected of you, and what to expect. He doesn’t say much but when he does, I think ‘O.K.’ because he’s always right.”
While most Americans will see only Mr. Kormakur’s directing work, his entertainment empire seems as vast as a lava field. There’s a TV production company, RVK; Blueeyes, a film-production company founded by Mr. Kormakur, 47, and his wife, Lilja Palmadottir; and TrueNorth, which has provided services and manpower for foreign projects shooting in Iceland, including “Oblivion” and “Thor 2.” He’s also producing his countryman Dagur Kari’s film “The Rocketman.”
“It’s tricky,” he said about the earning power of Icelandic films. “When they break through, they’re really strong, and then there are some that make nothing. But if you touch people’s hearts, they really come out.
“With ‘Jar City,’ it was incredible. Dozens of old people came out; they’d be on an escalator in a mall, lost, because they’d never been in a mall before, and they’re just trying to find the cinema. All these old people wandering around. It was great.”
Birth Name
Baltasar Kormákur SamperHeight
6 feet tall (186 cm)Mini Biography
Born in 1966. He graduated from The Drama Academy of Iceland and is one of Iceland's most popular and critically acclaimed actors of the younger generation, working amongst others with Oscar-nominee Fridrik Thór Fridriksson. But it is as a director and theatre entrepreneur he has really made his name. He has directed ten theatre productions, both at home and abroad. Baltasar Kormákur formed his own theatre with two partners and has directed a string of productions there as well as in The National Theatre of Iceland. Baltasar Kormákur's first feature film, 101 Reykjavík, starring Victoria Abril in one of the main roles, is now out.Baltasar Kormákur is an actor, producer and director whose work spans theater, movies and television. Born in Reykjavik, Iceland, he graduated as an actor from Iceland's National Academy of Fine Arts in 1990. He was immediately signed on by the National Theatre of Iceland, where he worked as one of the leading young performing artists until 1997. During the last two years of his assignment he also directed several ambitious works, after having produced and directed highly popular, independent stage productions alongside his projects with the National Theatre. In 2000, he wrote, directed, acted in and produced the feature film "101 Reykjavik," which became an international hit and earned the Discovery Award at the Toronto International Film Festival. Subsequently, Variety selected him as one of the "10 Directors to Watch," along with Alejandro González Iñárritu, Lukas Moodysson, Christopher Nolan and other newcomers at the time. Soon after, Kormákur started Blueeyes Productions and since then has maintained his focus on feature film writing, producing, and directing. His films "The Sea," "A Little Trip To Heaven," "Jar City" and "White Night Wedding" have all been very successful in Iceland, and won numerous international awards. Kormákur's "The Deep," which eerily captures the tragic real-life story of the lone survivor of a capsized fishing boat off the frigid Icelandic coast, premiered at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival and went on to become Iceland's Oscar nominee and was shortlisted for the foreign language Academy Award. It opened in Iceland on September 21, 2012 and took in over 50% of the country's boxoffice receipts that weekend and earned a record number of Edda Awards, 11 in all, including Best Film of the Year, Best Director and Best Actor in a Leading Role. Kormákur also has directed features in the United States, including "Inhale," an independent film produced by the LA based 26 Films, starring Dermot Mulroney, Diane Kruger and Sam Shepard and "Contraband," starring Mark Wahlberg, Ben Foster, and Kate Beckinsale, which took first place at the US box office during its opening weekend, early January 2012. Universal Pictures released "Contraband," which was a remake of Oskar Johansson's "Reykjavik Rotterdam," that starred Kormákur and he produced with Agnes Johansen through his Blueeyes Productions, along with Working Title Films. Kormákur's next film is the thriller "2 Guns," starring Denzel Washington and Mark Wahlberg, which Universal Pictures will release in August 2013. Other projects include the HBO pilot "The Missionary," a spy thriller he will direct and Mark Wahlberg, Steve Levinson and Malcolm Gladwell will produce; "Everest," the cautionary tale and real life adventure on the mountain in 1996 when eight climbers died in the span of two days, due to a series of horrific mishaps and bad decisions. Working Title Films and Emmett/Furla Productions will produce "Everest" with Kormákur. Also, "Viking," a big budget action adventure set in the world of the famed Norse warriors, which will film in Iceland. Kormákur optioned Iceland's beloved, Nobel Prize-winning book Independent People to develop as a feature film and will produce the American remake of "Jar City" along with CEO of Lava Bear Films, David Linde. He is also producing the Icelandic drama "Rocketman," which acclaimed Icelandic filmmaker Dagur Kari is directing. He also partnered with CCP Games, the world's leading independent developer of massive multiplayer games to bring the EVE Universe game to television. The new series will take its inspiration from the millions of people who have left their mark on the EVE Universe via stories submitted to the website. The RVK Studios team, in collaboration with CCP, will create an original concept and storyline set in the EVE Universe, a future history of rival societies trapped beyond a wormhole in a dystopian sci-fi world. All of Kormákur's films are made under his Blueeyes Productions, which also includes a television arm, RVK Studios, and an association with Dadi Einarsson and the Icelandic VFX company Framestore.
''It doesn't matter where my movies are set. Right now, I have a script that's set in Canada and is in English. Just because I was born on the island [Iceland] doesn't mean I want to spend the rest of my life telling stories for 300,000 people. It helps that I'm half-Spanish, because the market I can reach is much bigger.
''I don't see Hollywood as the big enemy, because this is where the money is, and not all of the companies are doing studio movies. I'm not tempted to sell out. If I'm going to become well known, I want it to be for something I'm proud of.
''The winters are too long, and there's only one airline, so it's difficult to escape when you feel frustrated or claustrophobic. The audience for our films isn't very large, so it's difficult to support an industry. But, Iceland is beautiful. Sometimes it's hard to imagine living anywhere else
Friday, May 24, 2013
Redefining the Author Appearance: 4 Proposed Categories
Redefining the Author Appearance: 4 Proposed Categories
I took my friend to a local bookstore to listen to a well-known, New York Times bestselling author speak. He was excited. He had never listened to an author speak before (other than me), and my hope was that this would be one of many author events that we could attend together in the future.
We joined an audience of more than 101 excited readers in a library adjacent to the bookstore. Most were clutching the latest copy of the author's book. Many were literally sitting on the edge of their seats in anticipation. I was one of them.
The author was introduced, and he thanked his audience for coming. He then proceeded to read from his book for 45 minutes without stopping. When he finished, he took three questions from the audience and retired to the rear of the library to sign copies.
On the way home, my friend told me that he would never attend another author event again.
I tried to explain that not every author reads for 45 minutes. Many tell stories about the writing of their book. They talk about their writing process. They share the sources of inspiration. Some will happily answer dozens of questions. Quite a few are genuinely entertaining. Funny, even.
My friend listened intently and then asked an important question:
"If that's the case, how am I supposed to know if I'm walking into an interesting talk or a straight-up reading like the one I was just subjected to?"
I've been pondering this question ever since. As authors (as well as event managers and publicists), we do a disservice to readers by not making it clear what to expect when we plan on speaking at a bookstore, library, school or similar venue. We seek to provide customers with a meaningful experience that will build brand loyalty, but we fail to define what that experience will be.
I'm not saying that reading to your audience for 45 minutes is necessarily wrong. In truth, many of the people seemed to enjoy this particular reading a great deal. Others (like my friend) were visibly annoyed. But what this author does when he speaks and what I do at my author events are two entirely different things. If we are not clear about our intentions to prospective audience members, we run the risk of alienating readers.
After much thought, I have come up with a solution. I would like to propose breaking the author appearance down into four distinct categories and advertise all future events using these categories. I want to make it clear to readers about what they should expect when they arrive to hear an author speak. I believe that this could go a long way in improving overall customer satisfaction and increasing the size of our audiences.
The Signing
I am not a fan of this format and often reject offers to appear in this capacity, but I've arrived at bookstores in the past and found myself unexpectedly forced into this type of appearance. At a signing, the author sits, usually near the front of the store, and signs books for anyone who is interested in purchasing one. Though this can be a waste of the author's time, it can also be surprisingly effective if managed properly.
At a signing at Market Block Books in Troy, New York, for example, booksellers introduced me to their customers over the course of three hours, and I found myself talking to a constantly changing audience for nearly the entire time. It wasn't a formal talk, but it gave me a chance to speak to readers on a more personal level. Bookseller Stanley Hadsell made it feel as if the bookstore had been transformed into my own personal living room for the morning, and I had a series of guests stopping by for a visit. When handled like this, the signing can be extremely successful for both the bookstore and the author.
More often, however, this type of event is a disaster. I've been stuck at a table near the front of the store for two hours and completely ignored by the staff. While I am more than willing to reach out to prospective readers, this format often makes me feel more like a carnival hawker than an author.
At one of these events, I managed to do quite well even though I was seemingly forgotten by the staff. I sold more than 20 books over the course of 90 minutes and also booked a wedding for my DJ company with a customer who had read my bio online before stopping by.
"I'm killing two birds with one stone," she said.
This, however, was the exception. Not the rule.
I once arrived at a Borders planning to speak only to discover that my event was scheduled as a signing. I was placed at a table near the front of the store and encouraged to greet customers as they entered. But when more than 20 people arrived to listen to me speak, I asked if we could convert the signing into a more formal talk. When the manager refused, I invited my audience to join me in the café. We turned the chairs in one direction, moved the book display onto a café table, and I conducted a more formal talk anyway. Sadly, the manager was never even aware of what I had done. She never returned once to check on me.
If done well, the signing can work. Unfortunately, it is rarely done well.
The Reading
Readers who attend this type of event should expect that the majority of the time will be spent listening to the author read from his or her latest book. The author may take questions, but this is not guaranteed.
Once again, this is not necessarily a bad thing.
I have seen David Sedaris speak on more than one occasion, and this is essentially what he does. He reads from his most recent book as well as unpublished essays and the work of an author who he is promoting. In doing so, he puts on a tremendous performance, and I wouldn't have it any other way. But there is a difference between a David Sedaris essay and a novelist who is reading the first three chapters from his latest literary novel. One may be quite entertaining while another may not.
This is obviously not my friend's preferred format, nor is it mine. But I also know that not every author is able to speak easily and comfortably to a large audience. Just because authors can communicate well on the page does not mean that we are all public speakers. The reading is a way for some authors to interact with readers in a way that is most comfortable for them. They should simply make it clear what they intend while promoting the event.
The Book Talk
At an event like this, readers should expect the author to speak primarily about his or her latest book. This will likely include a short reading, but much of time will be spent listening to the author speak extemporaneously about the book, the process of writing the book, the inspiration for the book and taking questions from the audience. This tends to be an ideal event for audiences that have already read the book, though previous knowledge of the book is not necessarily required.
For a long time, this was the kind of talk that I delivered on a regular basis, and it worked well. It still works well when I visit with a book club.
But what I eventually discovered was that some of the stories that my audiences liked best had little to do with my latest book and more to do with my life as a writer, a teacher, a husband, a father and an occasional fool. As I began to refine my methods, I discovered that if my audience got to know me as a person, they were more likely to purchase my book, explore my backlist, reach out to me on social media and become a lifelong reader of my work.
I discovered that instead of simply talking about a book, I should use the book as a reason to tell stories of almost any kind, as long as they were honest and entertaining.
This brings me to the last category of appearance:
The Author Talk
This is the kind of event that I like to do the most. Rather than relying on a specific book to anchor my talk, I simply tell stories about my life as an author and a reader. I certainly discuss my books and am more than happy to answer questions about them (I love taking questions and offer prizes for the most unusual or challenging question asked), but mostly I tell stories. Sometimes my stories relate to elements of my novels, but I am just as likely to talk about how I fell in love with reading and writing, my journey to publishing my first novel and the experiences I've had since my first book hit bookstore shelves five years ago. I tell stories about being a husband, a father, a teacher and more. Anything to entertain my audience. Oftentimes I bring a stack of books to recommend as well, and each of these recommendations comes with a story.
Rather than attempting to convince my audience about the appeal of a specific novel, my goal is to let the audience get to know me as a person. I try to be as honest, insightful, amusing and entertaining as possible.
I have two reasons for preferring this format:
1. If my audience members choose to spend a couple hours of their evening with me, they deserve to be entertained.
2. If my audience leaves the bookstore liking me as a person, they are likely to become lifelong readers of my work, both in print and online.
While I tend to think that the author talk is the most effective category of author appearance, I am also naturally suited to this kind of talk, so I am admittedly biased. As an experienced storyteller with organizations like The Moth and a lifetime full of amusing, unfortunate and unusual stories to tell, it is easy for me to stand before an audience and turn every question asked into another opportunity to tell a story.
But if I was a writer as gifted and hilarious as David Sedaris, I would read from my work every time.
And if every one of my appearances took place at Market Block Books and was hosted by bookseller extraordinaire Stanley Hadsell, I would chose the signing model every time.
Different models work best for different authors and different settings, though I think that if given time, I could teach almost any author to use the Author Talk model effectively and to their great advantage.
The most important part, however, is differentiating these author events for the public. We must let our audiences know what to expect. If we were more specific about the kind of talk that readers will hear, perhaps our audiences would be larger and our readership would grow faster. Most important, customers would leave satisfied.
I cringe when I see a bookstore or library advertise one of my upcoming events as a "reading by Matthew Dicks."
Like I said, there is nothing wrong with this kind of appearance. It's simply not what I do.
I will not be reading anything at my appearance. I may not even bring a copy of my book with me.
What I plan on doing is telling the story about how Mr. Compopiano inspired me to become a writer in tenth grade by giving me the chance to impress girls with badly written satire.
I'll tell my audience about how my wife's family is still convinced that I was once a burglar after reading my first novel.
I'll describe how two near-death experiences and an armed robbery led to the existential crisis that infuses the protagonist of my latest book.
I'll explain how some of the first books that I ever read as a child were Jaws and Helter Skelter.
I'll tell stories from my classroom. Stories about authors who I've had the honor of meeting over the years. Stories about my long-suffering wife and my perfect little children. If a story is good, I am likely to tell it.
I'll make my audience laugh, and if I am lucky, I'll make them cry, too. And I'll be sure to tell them why they should be purchasing the work of William Shakespeare, Nicholson Baker, Kate DiCamillo and Billy Collins before they purchase any of mine.
It will be an Author Talk because that is what I do.
That is what I want my audiences to expect to hear when they take a seat before me.
The author was introduced, and he thanked his audience for coming. He then proceeded to read from his book for 45 minutes without stopping. When he finished, he took three questions from the audience and retired to the rear of the library to sign copies.
On the way home, my friend told me that he would never attend another author event again.
I tried to explain that not every author reads for 45 minutes. Many tell stories about the writing of their book. They talk about their writing process. They share the sources of inspiration. Some will happily answer dozens of questions. Quite a few are genuinely entertaining. Funny, even.
My friend listened intently and then asked an important question:
"If that's the case, how am I supposed to know if I'm walking into an interesting talk or a straight-up reading like the one I was just subjected to?"
I've been pondering this question ever since. As authors (as well as event managers and publicists), we do a disservice to readers by not making it clear what to expect when we plan on speaking at a bookstore, library, school or similar venue. We seek to provide customers with a meaningful experience that will build brand loyalty, but we fail to define what that experience will be.
I'm not saying that reading to your audience for 45 minutes is necessarily wrong. In truth, many of the people seemed to enjoy this particular reading a great deal. Others (like my friend) were visibly annoyed. But what this author does when he speaks and what I do at my author events are two entirely different things. If we are not clear about our intentions to prospective audience members, we run the risk of alienating readers.
After much thought, I have come up with a solution. I would like to propose breaking the author appearance down into four distinct categories and advertise all future events using these categories. I want to make it clear to readers about what they should expect when they arrive to hear an author speak. I believe that this could go a long way in improving overall customer satisfaction and increasing the size of our audiences.
The Signing
I am not a fan of this format and often reject offers to appear in this capacity, but I've arrived at bookstores in the past and found myself unexpectedly forced into this type of appearance. At a signing, the author sits, usually near the front of the store, and signs books for anyone who is interested in purchasing one. Though this can be a waste of the author's time, it can also be surprisingly effective if managed properly.
At a signing at Market Block Books in Troy, New York, for example, booksellers introduced me to their customers over the course of three hours, and I found myself talking to a constantly changing audience for nearly the entire time. It wasn't a formal talk, but it gave me a chance to speak to readers on a more personal level. Bookseller Stanley Hadsell made it feel as if the bookstore had been transformed into my own personal living room for the morning, and I had a series of guests stopping by for a visit. When handled like this, the signing can be extremely successful for both the bookstore and the author.
More often, however, this type of event is a disaster. I've been stuck at a table near the front of the store for two hours and completely ignored by the staff. While I am more than willing to reach out to prospective readers, this format often makes me feel more like a carnival hawker than an author.
At one of these events, I managed to do quite well even though I was seemingly forgotten by the staff. I sold more than 20 books over the course of 90 minutes and also booked a wedding for my DJ company with a customer who had read my bio online before stopping by.
"I'm killing two birds with one stone," she said.
This, however, was the exception. Not the rule.
I once arrived at a Borders planning to speak only to discover that my event was scheduled as a signing. I was placed at a table near the front of the store and encouraged to greet customers as they entered. But when more than 20 people arrived to listen to me speak, I asked if we could convert the signing into a more formal talk. When the manager refused, I invited my audience to join me in the café. We turned the chairs in one direction, moved the book display onto a café table, and I conducted a more formal talk anyway. Sadly, the manager was never even aware of what I had done. She never returned once to check on me.
If done well, the signing can work. Unfortunately, it is rarely done well.
The Reading
Readers who attend this type of event should expect that the majority of the time will be spent listening to the author read from his or her latest book. The author may take questions, but this is not guaranteed.
Once again, this is not necessarily a bad thing.
I have seen David Sedaris speak on more than one occasion, and this is essentially what he does. He reads from his most recent book as well as unpublished essays and the work of an author who he is promoting. In doing so, he puts on a tremendous performance, and I wouldn't have it any other way. But there is a difference between a David Sedaris essay and a novelist who is reading the first three chapters from his latest literary novel. One may be quite entertaining while another may not.
This is obviously not my friend's preferred format, nor is it mine. But I also know that not every author is able to speak easily and comfortably to a large audience. Just because authors can communicate well on the page does not mean that we are all public speakers. The reading is a way for some authors to interact with readers in a way that is most comfortable for them. They should simply make it clear what they intend while promoting the event.
The Book Talk
At an event like this, readers should expect the author to speak primarily about his or her latest book. This will likely include a short reading, but much of time will be spent listening to the author speak extemporaneously about the book, the process of writing the book, the inspiration for the book and taking questions from the audience. This tends to be an ideal event for audiences that have already read the book, though previous knowledge of the book is not necessarily required.
For a long time, this was the kind of talk that I delivered on a regular basis, and it worked well. It still works well when I visit with a book club.
But what I eventually discovered was that some of the stories that my audiences liked best had little to do with my latest book and more to do with my life as a writer, a teacher, a husband, a father and an occasional fool. As I began to refine my methods, I discovered that if my audience got to know me as a person, they were more likely to purchase my book, explore my backlist, reach out to me on social media and become a lifelong reader of my work.
I discovered that instead of simply talking about a book, I should use the book as a reason to tell stories of almost any kind, as long as they were honest and entertaining.
This brings me to the last category of appearance:
The Author Talk
This is the kind of event that I like to do the most. Rather than relying on a specific book to anchor my talk, I simply tell stories about my life as an author and a reader. I certainly discuss my books and am more than happy to answer questions about them (I love taking questions and offer prizes for the most unusual or challenging question asked), but mostly I tell stories. Sometimes my stories relate to elements of my novels, but I am just as likely to talk about how I fell in love with reading and writing, my journey to publishing my first novel and the experiences I've had since my first book hit bookstore shelves five years ago. I tell stories about being a husband, a father, a teacher and more. Anything to entertain my audience. Oftentimes I bring a stack of books to recommend as well, and each of these recommendations comes with a story.
Rather than attempting to convince my audience about the appeal of a specific novel, my goal is to let the audience get to know me as a person. I try to be as honest, insightful, amusing and entertaining as possible.
I have two reasons for preferring this format:
1. If my audience members choose to spend a couple hours of their evening with me, they deserve to be entertained.
2. If my audience leaves the bookstore liking me as a person, they are likely to become lifelong readers of my work, both in print and online.
While I tend to think that the author talk is the most effective category of author appearance, I am also naturally suited to this kind of talk, so I am admittedly biased. As an experienced storyteller with organizations like The Moth and a lifetime full of amusing, unfortunate and unusual stories to tell, it is easy for me to stand before an audience and turn every question asked into another opportunity to tell a story.
But if I was a writer as gifted and hilarious as David Sedaris, I would read from my work every time.
And if every one of my appearances took place at Market Block Books and was hosted by bookseller extraordinaire Stanley Hadsell, I would chose the signing model every time.
Different models work best for different authors and different settings, though I think that if given time, I could teach almost any author to use the Author Talk model effectively and to their great advantage.
The most important part, however, is differentiating these author events for the public. We must let our audiences know what to expect. If we were more specific about the kind of talk that readers will hear, perhaps our audiences would be larger and our readership would grow faster. Most important, customers would leave satisfied.
I cringe when I see a bookstore or library advertise one of my upcoming events as a "reading by Matthew Dicks."
Like I said, there is nothing wrong with this kind of appearance. It's simply not what I do.
I will not be reading anything at my appearance. I may not even bring a copy of my book with me.
What I plan on doing is telling the story about how Mr. Compopiano inspired me to become a writer in tenth grade by giving me the chance to impress girls with badly written satire.
I'll tell my audience about how my wife's family is still convinced that I was once a burglar after reading my first novel.
I'll describe how two near-death experiences and an armed robbery led to the existential crisis that infuses the protagonist of my latest book.
I'll explain how some of the first books that I ever read as a child were Jaws and Helter Skelter.
I'll tell stories from my classroom. Stories about authors who I've had the honor of meeting over the years. Stories about my long-suffering wife and my perfect little children. If a story is good, I am likely to tell it.
I'll make my audience laugh, and if I am lucky, I'll make them cry, too. And I'll be sure to tell them why they should be purchasing the work of William Shakespeare, Nicholson Baker, Kate DiCamillo and Billy Collins before they purchase any of mine.
It will be an Author Talk because that is what I do.
That is what I want my audiences to expect to hear when they take a seat before me.
Reactions to the CLI FI meme -- subgenre of sci fi or new litetary term for climate novels and films?
''great stuff, dan.....thanks for sharing it with me.....i accept everything you are fighting for, but i have sort of stopped thinking there is anything that will make a difference even if we all began to cooperate......re
be well....
keep fighting.....''
http://open.salon.com/blog/danbloom/2013/05/02/in_a_warming_world_cli_fi_is_a_literary_term_that_works
''[Our blog] has always been about showing up the weaknesses of lapdog reporters, most of whom are not lapdogs because they have to be, but because they choose to be.''
In 2009, REDACTED and a hip and insightful media and book blogger, who we have always respected and admired and still consider our friend, wanted the NAMES of people he wanted to take down in a big blog post and I said REDACTED , I cannot release names of reporter friends their emails to me were private, you should not even ask. But ask REDACTED did: SEE BELOW:
RE: ''REDACTED has always been about showing up the weaknesses of lapdog
reporters, most of whom are not lapdogs because they have to be, but
because they choose to be.''
Dear [Sir]-- All good and helpful, thanks. One question: regarding all the
emails
you replicate for my point 3: are they posted somewhere? Do you have a
personal website where you can post those excerpts exactly as you have
to
me? Further, why not add Motoko Rich to that mix? Or Hillel Italie? Those are the
biggies, the ones that will get this the most attention. Let me know if
possible. Thanks, REDACTED
EARLIER same year same month REDACTED had written to me:
Dear [Sir],
First of all, of course I know you speak the truth. You don't need to
prove it to me.
But, and I hope you'll forgive me, your defense of Motoko Rich and Hillel Italie is
bullshit. (And why would you defend one NYT reporter, Rich, and not the
other guy, Joe Berger, who did the same exact thing?) You're willing to bludgeon the
little PW reporter, Judith Rosen, in Boston, who's a freelance working for peanuts
with absolutely no clout to get people to talk and a readership of, at
best, hundreds not even thousands, while people like Rich and Italie have
far more power and exponentially bigger readerships and pull down six
figure salaries to report the truth and don't do it. You can't blame the
organization. They can report these things if they want to, and don't.
This is the same kind of lazy cowardice that caused the press to not
report the truth about George Bush and his bullshit reasons for going to
war.
REDACTED has always been about showing up the weaknesses of lapdog
reporters, most of whom are not lapdogs because they have to be, but
because they choose to be.
To me, it was this choice that led to this fiasco -- yes, incredible
irresponsibility on the part of the publisher, but also of the media that
should have figured it out, because it was patently ridiculous on the face
of it.
Okay, spleen vented, but here's the thing: I don't really have enough to
make an interesting story out of what you've given me that's on the
record. There's a stray early posting -- I could say this guy might have
been on it first. But that's as far as it goes. My bigger interest -- in
saying not only did all these people in media and publishing had the story
and refuse to do anything -- is unverifiable. I only have it from you off
the record. I will keep it that way, rest assured, but as I said in my
earlier email, without substantiation of the three points i raised I don't
see what there is for me to post. You did God's work and the only ones who
are going to know are those of us you spoke to off the record.
I'm glad you did it, regardless. I just wish the more important
ramifications of it -- the revelation of the greater milieu that let it
happen, maybe even cause it to happen -- could have been part of the
revelation.
All best to you, sincerely and as ever --
REDACTED
REDACTED has always been about showing up the weaknesses of lapdog
reporters, most of whom are not lapdogs because they have to be, but
because they choose to be.
RE: ''REDACTED has always been about showing up the weaknesses of lapdog
reporters, most of whom are not lapdogs because they have to be, but
because they choose to be.''
Dear [Sir]-- All good and helpful, thanks. One question: regarding all the
emails
you replicate for my point 3: are they posted somewhere? Do you have a
personal website where you can post those excerpts exactly as you have
to
me? Further, why not add Motoko Rich to that mix? Or Hillel Italie? Those are the
biggies, the ones that will get this the most attention. Let me know if
possible. Thanks, REDACTED
EARLIER same year same month REDACTED had written to me:
Dear [Sir],
First of all, of course I know you speak the truth. You don't need to
prove it to me.
But, and I hope you'll forgive me, your defense of Motoko Rich and Hillel Italie is
bullshit. (And why would you defend one NYT reporter, Rich, and not the
other guy, Joe Berger, who did the same exact thing?) You're willing to bludgeon the
little PW reporter, Judith Rosen, in Boston, who's a freelance working for peanuts
with absolutely no clout to get people to talk and a readership of, at
best, hundreds not even thousands, while people like Rich and Italie have
far more power and exponentially bigger readerships and pull down six
figure salaries to report the truth and don't do it. You can't blame the
organization. They can report these things if they want to, and don't.
This is the same kind of lazy cowardice that caused the press to not
report the truth about George Bush and his bullshit reasons for going to
war.
REDACTED has always been about showing up the weaknesses of lapdog
reporters, most of whom are not lapdogs because they have to be, but
because they choose to be.
To me, it was this choice that led to this fiasco -- yes, incredible
irresponsibility on the part of the publisher, but also of the media that
should have figured it out, because it was patently ridiculous on the face
of it.
Okay, spleen vented, but here's the thing: I don't really have enough to
make an interesting story out of what you've given me that's on the
record. There's a stray early posting -- I could say this guy might have
been on it first. But that's as far as it goes. My bigger interest -- in
saying not only did all these people in media and publishing had the story
and refuse to do anything -- is unverifiable. I only have it from you off
the record. I will keep it that way, rest assured, but as I said in my
earlier email, without substantiation of the three points i raised I don't
see what there is for me to post. You did God's work and the only ones who
are going to know are those of us you spoke to off the record.
I'm glad you did it, regardless. I just wish the more important
ramifications of it -- the revelation of the greater milieu that let it
happen, maybe even cause it to happen -- could have been part of the
revelation.
All best to you, sincerely and as ever --
REDACTED
REDACTED has always been about showing up the weaknesses of lapdog
reporters, most of whom are not lapdogs because they have to be, but
because they choose to be.
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
An Open Letter to Hendrik Hertzberg at the New York magazine re the use and mis-use of the term misnamed "scare quotes"
Rick
first read this since you totally misundertstand the original intent and meaning of the illcoined and malcoined term we now sadly call SCARE QUOTES.
http://open.salon.com/blog/danbloom/2012/07/07/everything_you_ever_wanted_to_know_about_scare_quotes
re YOU WROTE:
The Washington Legal Foundation—a sort of right-wing A.C.L.U. without the civil, the liberties, or the union, though it is, of course, proudly American—took up a quarter of the Times’ Op-Ed page yesterday with an advertisement notable for its use of scare quotes.
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/hendrikhertzberg/2013/05/diet-overlords-vs-legal-overlards.html
first read this since you totally misundertstand the original intent and meaning of the illcoined and malcoined term we now sadly call SCARE QUOTES.
http://open.salon.com/blog/danbloom/2012/07/07/everything_you_ever_wanted_to_know_about_scare_quotes
re YOU WROTE:
The Washington Legal Foundation—a sort of right-wing A.C.L.U. without the civil, the liberties, or the union, though it is, of course, proudly American—took up a quarter of the Times’ Op-Ed page yesterday with an advertisement notable for its use of scare quotes.
http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/hendrikhertzberg/2013/05/diet-overlords-vs-legal-overlards.html
Scare quotes, as you are no doubt aware, are quotation marks used not in order to mark off verbatim quotations, highlight unfamiliar phrases, or indicate book titles and the like but in order to be heavily “ironic,” if you “get my drift.”The Foundation, taking a break from defending God-given freedoms such as the right to bear cigarettes and the right to emit greenhouse gases against the depredations of politically correct worrywarts obsessed with not “getting cancer” and having a “livable planet,” is currently on a tear about an even more fundamental onslaught on human liberty.
The Times ad, or advertorial, condemns “the alarming, catchy phrases being used to describe our favorite foods and beverages.”
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