Earth Abides surrounds a feral-looking Burt Lancaster, fresh off the set of John Huston's The Unforgiven, with a cast of New York stage actors and unknowns, among them a young Gena Rowlands and the unforgettably eccentric character actor Timothy Carey.
Since its inception in 1988, David Byrne's Luaka Bop label has been a sure-fire source of some of the best music I've ever heard, from its compilations of Brazilian and Cuban music to bands like Cornershop, Os Mutantes, and Tom Ze. — Read the rest
A Gambler's Anatomy is the latest novel from Copyfightingcertified genius Jonathan Lethem (previously) — a book about an international backgammon hustler who believes he is psychic — and who sports a huge tumor growing from his face.
Defender, to the death, of Jack Kirby’s Fourth World saga. Architect of Philip K. Dick’s induction into the Library of America. College drop-out. MacArthur Genius. Comic-book guy. Jonathan Lethem is a man of obscure obsessions and unabashed passions.
Rick Kleffel just posted his interview with Jonathan Lethem (MP3) about Lethem's new novel, Dissident Gardens, his latest New York City novel. It's about a Sunnyside Gardens family whose matriarch, Rose Zimmer, is being drummed out of the Communist Party. — Read the rest
Jonathan Lethem's latest is a book in the 33 1/3 series, Talking Heads' Fear of Music, a tribute to Talking Heads brilliant, seminal album, one of the greatest records of all time. In Wired, Geeta Dayal interviews Lethem about his book and the approach he took, and leaves me drooling for the chance to read it myself:
Lethem chose not to take a journalistic approach with Fear of Music; there are no interviews with the band members, Eno or anyone else involved in the album's creation.
Rick Kleffel and the Agony Column have a long podcast interview with Jonathan Lethem commemorating the publication of his new essay collection, The Ecstasy of Influence: Nonfictions, Etc., a discussion about how art builds on other art and how writing is done:
An interview about 'The Ecstasy of Influence: Nonfictions, Etc.'
In this interview with the literary journal AGNI, MacArthur-prize-winning author Jonathan Lethem discusses originality and the way that "influence" and copying from other writers are part of the creative process. Lethem's previous essay on this, The ecstasy of influence: A plagiarism, is a masterwork (I'm also a big fan of his novels, e.g. — Read the rest
Wagner James Au sez, "Jonathan Lethem's latest novel Chronic City includes a virtual world inspired by Second Life, so fittingly, this Sunday Lethem is promoting his book *in* Second Life on the Copper Robot show, using an avatar named PerkusTooth Riddler, based on the character Perkus Tooth from the book. — Read the rest
I just finished reading Jonathan Lethem's fantastic new novel Chronic City, a trippy, reality-questioning tale of strange Manhattan that falls right into the genre of fiction that I gravitate to — that of Philip K. Dick, JG Ballard, Don DeLillo's White Noise, Warren Ellis's Crooked Little Vein, and of course old-school noir. — Read the rest
Jonathan Lethem's extraordinary new novel Chronic City tells the story of Chase Insteadman, a washed up, grown up child actor living off his sitcom residuals in wealthy, Upper East Side New York. Chase is caught between two improbabilities: his fiancee, a dying astronaut stranded on a space-station walled off from Earth by a Chinese orbital minefield, from which vantage she commands daily headlines; and Perkus Tooth, a media-obsessed Philip-K-Dickian ex-rock-critic who lives in a weed-smoke- filled cave of a rent- controlled apartment from which he obsessively watches obscure movies and reads obscure books. — Read the rest
NPR's Morning Edition did a great segment on the privacy concerns raised by Google's deal with publishers and authors to make books available as search-results. I love the idea in principle, but I'm really worried that Google won't put a decent privacy policy in writing — for example, they won't promise to keep your reading history (which potentially includes the search terms you used, the pages you viewed, etc) secret from warrantless police requests. — Read the rest
A recent episode of Public Radio International's To the Best of Our Knowledge dealt with remix, reuse, and plagiarism, talking to some of my favorite people on the subject:
Author Jonathan Lethem talks to Jim Fleming about his "Harper's" Magazine essay, "The Ecstasy of Influence: A Plagiarism."
In the third issue of the online art/lit/culture journal Article, David Gill, author of the Philip K. Dick blog "Total Dick-head" writes about the new "prestigious" Library of America volume anthologizing four PKD novels and interviews the edition's editor, novelist and MacArthur "genius" Jonathan Lethem. — Read the rest
Jonathan Lethem has chosen Greg Marcks (writer-director of the feature "11:14") to direct the film adaptation of his latest novel, You Don't Love Me Yet. Lethem, a Macarthur-winning sf novelist, had previously announced that he'd give a no-upfront-money option to a director who promised to release all ancillary rights five years after the film's release. — Read the rest
I just finished Jonathan Lethem's latest novel, You Don't Love Me Yet, a funny, quiet, improbable book about an art-rock band in Los Angeles that might be making it big.
I'm an enormous Lethem fan, and have been since Gun With Occasional Music, a hard-boiled detective story by way of Philip K Dick, and I particularly love how versatile he is, every book really different from the last. — Read the rest
Eloisa sez, "Salon has a cool interview with Jonathan Lethem, writer, copyleft fighter, sf extraodinaire, about copyright paranoia and how the current copyright laws stifle creativity."
If you make stuff, it is not yours to command its destiny in the world.
Debcha sez, "Jonathan Lethem has some unusual terms for the film option for his latest novel, You Don't Love Me Yet; the option is only available to a filmmaker who is willing to release all ancillary rights to it (and the novel) into the public domain five years after the film's debut, so that 'any number of other kinds of artwork based on the novel's story and characters, or the film's: a play, a television series, a comic book, a theme park ride, an opera' could be made. — Read the rest
