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This is the first of what I hope will be many "guest reviews" here at Booklad. Scott Ingalls is the director of a recent short film called "he Wright Bros. Episode 4". You can see the film and the previous episodes at channel101.com. I worked as an actor on this episode. So, when we shot the first scene a few weeks ago, I found myself at Scott's supercool "faux Elizabethan" apartment in West Hollywood. It used to part of Charlie Chaplin's Studio, as his guest cottages, and is a wonderful place to shoot a scene set in the late 1800's. Of course, actors always have to wait and I made a bee-line to Scott's bookshelves. They were very impressive with sections on design, film, modern fiction, graphics and travel. I could see Scott had broad interests and was a good reader. So I asked him what he was reading and he said "Underground London: Travels Beneath the City Streets" by Stephen Smith. He showed me the book and it looked so interesting I knew I wanted Scott to do a guest review. Well, here it is. PS. They took a neat picture of Scott with the book, but he didn't send it along with the review! I think I can forgive him (this time...)
UNDERGROUND LONDON TRAVELS BENEATH THE CITY STREETS by Stephen Smith, Little,Brown, 2004,
ISBN 0316 861340
Stephen Smith has a distinct, personal voice, and he takes what could be a dry history, or stoic travel guide, and really creates his own story out of his discoveries, and so it is not only the arcane and forgotten passages, and practices, that lie beneath London, but also his journey through them, that the reader is allowed to glimpse in UNDERGROUND LONDON.
Interspersed among the conversationally written pages are rare gems of exciting antiquity, that inspire the reader to delve deeper into the topics that are so colorfully introduced in the book. For the avid Anglophile, the text may be too remedial to be truly enjoyed; to the initiate, maybe a basic historical text should be read first, in order to fully enjoy the author’s many witty references, but for those with a foundation of English history, and a basic taste of modern British culture, the book can be a easily dipped into and enjoyed to readers taste, making it a very good bed-time read.
I bought this book, second hand, in a charming used bookstore near Queensgate, on my last visit to London. It was almost midnight, and the store was open. In the shop window the owner had arranged only books with a red (or predominantly red) book jacket. Frankly, the shop had me at “open”, but the display was too good to resist. The shopkeeper was friendly and exceptionally helpful. We had the place virtually to ourselves, and soon had assembled a tower of books at the register. I can easily say that I enjoyed buying the book much more than the text itself. I am planning to relocate to London this year, and I am currently doing research for another show based, not surprisingly, on some of the more mysterious parts of London.
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Since 1975, Mike Hoy and his publishing company, Loompanics,... -
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Katharine Thalberg died on Jan. 6 at the Aspen Valley...
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A few days ago I was researching book reviews and came...
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Scottish novelist Ali Smith has won the 2005 Whitbread Novel Award with her novel "The Accidental", it was announced yesterday. The Whitbread is a world-class literary award that goes to the best first novel, novel, poetry, biography and children's book from an author living in the UK or Ireland. The Whitbread has always been a great source for interesting and consistently good books (unlike many of the American award-winners). Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nightime by Mark Haddon won the Novel award in 2003 and was one of my favorite books of the last few years. Vernon God Little by D.B.C. Pierre ( a controversial winner) was another outstanding read. While Ali Smith's book will leap to the top of my "to read" list, I haven't read any of her books yet. Ms. Smith will be taking home a check for Fifty Thousand pounds sterling.
Ironically, the Whitbread prize will be looking for a new sponsor because the giant brewer Whitbread has stopped funding the award last year. I'd like to suggest that the prize committe consider other great brew makers of the world as sponsors. How about the "Dos Equis Award"? Or the "Blatz Prize"? My favorite would be the "Old Peculiar Award"
The other winners include:
First Novel: "The Harmony Silk Factory" by Tash Aw
Biography: "Matisse the Master" by Hilary Spurling
Children's: "The New Policeman" by Kate Thompson
Poetry: "Cold Calls" by Christopher Logue -
Over at the National Endowment for the Arts, they are working overtime to squeeze out the 200k they need to organize giant reading groups around the country to read one of four American novels: "Their Eyes Were Watching God", "The Great Gatsby", "To Kill a Mockingbird" and "Fahrenheit 451". I say "squeeze" sarcastically because it seems like a pittance compared to what they should be putting out for this project. I applaud the NEA for doing something to get people interested in books and reading, but they should have come up with three times that amount. Still, considering the political climate towards anything cultural in these United States, we should be grateful that there is any money at all.
The program looks to be the result of a study the NEA did last year called "Reading at Risk" in which, based on questions from the 2000 Census, they apparently found a steep decline in reading across a wide range of Americans. I've downloaded the free pdf file and am reading it now. Pick up one for yourself here.
Er...I have to admit I haven't read "Their Eyes Were Watching God" yet, but I hope to remedy that situation this year. Personally, I like the list of books the NEA are using. I would have thrown in a Mark Twain or a J.D. Salinger, but I suppose they don't want any controversy. Too bad, controversy gets the blood pumping and the brain thinking.
"When a thing ceases to be a subject of controversy, it ceases to be a subject of interest"
-William Hazlitt (1778-1830)
PS. At Grand Text Auto there's a lively critique of the NEA report. Check it out here. -
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