carlthefish

Honestly it’s hard to understate how inspirational Michael Silverblatt was. We don’t talk about good readers as much as good writers, but he really embodied what a great reader could be. I long to be as perceptive and attentive as he was

@TheLuisPanini I miss him & “Bookworm.” He always pointed ahead of us all with his questions and commentary.

Years ago, while dining with Michael Silverblatt, Orhan Pamuk came up as a topic. He said, “You know, I was supposed to have dinner with him tonight.” “Why didn’t you?” I asked. “I had already made plans with you,” he said. “You’re nuts!” I yelled. Dear Michael, I will miss you.

Joseph Cotten on why 'The Magnificent Ambersons' (1942) was butchered after it was filmed: "We thought that ['The Magficent Ambersons' (1942) was a better Picture than 'Citizen Kane' (1941)] when we were making it. It was more expensive to make and the costumes were expensive. Much of the house was built as a fully working house. I mean, walls wouldn’t move out so our cinematographer, Stanley Cortez, had a hell of a challenge lighting scenes. One problem: it had no stars to entice patrons into the theater. We shot it very quickly, as I recall. I loved my part. Dolores Costello was so beautiful it was easy imagining I was in love with her. Orson wrote the script in two weeks using great gobs of dialogue from the book. When Anne Baxter came from Fox [to play] Lucy, she was accompanied by a guardian [because she was legally a minor]. It was Frank Lloyd Wright, her grandfather, the great architect. Orson showed him the footage already shot and Frank said, “Magnificent architecture. Story so so. For the scenes in winter, we shot in an icehouse so you could see our breath. And, yes, it is true—Agnes Moorehead’s hysterical scene on the stairs was shot a number of different ways, all believable. Aggie is that kind of actress, you see. We were shooting on December 7, 1941, Pearl Harbor day. That’s what killed us: American war anxiety. Suddenly the problems of a turn-of-the century family in Indianapolis became completely irrelevant. The first preview was before a bunch of louts expecting a Hopalong Cassidy western. Instead they got this strange film without titles at the beginning and an unseen narrator. They hollered back at the picture and the RKO [brass] heard about it and ordered it be cut down to eighty minutes. Bob Wise, our editor, stretched it to eighty-eight minutes, but at least forty minutes was lost. And the picture tanked with the public. Orson’s short reign as a golden boy was over." ('Conversations with Classic Film Stars', James Bawden & Ron Miller, 2016)

It's his birthday today -recognize him and this iconic television role?

@biancastone savior

After the leaves have fallen, we return To the plain sense of things. It is as if We had come to an end of the imagination, Inanimate in an inert Savior. Wallace Stevens from THE PLAIN SENSE OF THINGS

Immerse your classroom in the literary world of 2025 Nobel Prize laureate and author László Krasznahorkai. Teach your pupils to write like a Nobel Prize author and unlock their writing potential with our newly released Nobel Prize lesson. Don't miss the short video with our Nobel Prize expert Gustav Källstrand. The lesson is available here: bit.ly/3KNldgS

Safe to say that I think “The Young Left-Hander from Brown High”, would be a big fan of the “Steely-eyed Warrior from Longview, Texas”!!

Come on board the Kraszna train, darlings. You won’t regret it.

Bob Dylan sings Stephen Foster’s “Hard Times Come Again No More.” 🎥: WILLIE NELSON: THE BIG SIX-0 (1993)

Adidas lit up The Sphere in Las Vegas with every FIFA World Cup ball since 1970, teasing the official ’26 ball unveiling on October 2 ⚽️👀 (via @SphereVegas)

My latest cartoon for @newscientist p.s. my new book of science cartoons 'Physics for Cats' is out now. Visit tomgauld.com for details

And the end of all our exploring Will be to arrive where we started And know the place for the first time Little Gidding, Four Quartets — T. S. Eliot #botd

@AlexiLalas Piqué & Striker

Who ya got?

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.

With tomorrow (9/9) marking the official publication of SCHATTENFROH, we present to you now the introductory letter that review-writers received alongside their advance copies of the book. We hope that it will prepare you, as well.

@tony_robbo My personal favorite is RINGS, but AUSTERLITZ is the better book. I agree with your comment!

I’ve read quite a bit of Sebald but not, until now, Austerlitz. Oh my. It’s hypnotic in the sense I had absolutely no control over how to read it: an invisible thread pulls you through the warp and weft of it until you get to the end, unravelled.

@TheLuisPanini I recommend A Severed Head by Murdoch.

Yesterday’s purchases… I had read everything by Olga Tokarczuk available in English translation before she got the big prize, but nothing that was translated after it, so I need to remedy that. And The Sea, the Sea has been on my radar for many years. It’ll be my first Murdoch.

@bernardtjoy Pictures from an Institution / Randall Jarrell

Which is the funniest novel ever written?

"I'm a Man United fan, so I'm half fuming," says Christy Pym after scoring and saving a penalty for Grimsby 😂 Simply why we love football.

This made my day so adorable!! 🥰