Dostoevsky v pornography (Afghanistan edition)

Porn is prevalent, more prevalent than Dostoevsky.

- Dan Clements, in The Times

'This interview was conducted... sitting on the ground in the hotel car park...'

Q. What is the contemporary literary scene like...? 

A. Well, the books are not getting sold. There is no excitement. People are quite despondent, and they don’t know where the work is going. They want to write—actually, a lot of people want to write. But where is this work going to go? Our young writers have trouble getting published by the publishing houses that we have... and so they resort to self-publishing.... But it’s too expensive for the market. There is also the fact that 50 percent of the population is illiterate. They can speak... but they cannot read or write.... And there is a big issue with egos. The old writers are not just the gatekeepers; they have entered and they have shut the gate firmly behind them so no one else can enter.... Another big problem is that when books are launched, it's in a gentrified area, so nobody else knows what is happening.

- Aaron Bady interviews Edwige-Renée DRO, in The New Inquiry

(Wait - what? They were talking about the Ivory Coast...?! So sorry. Unexpurgated version here.)

Thank fuck for Lydia Davis

If I went to an academic conference on literary theory, I would have been bored out of my mind! But a town meeting about potholes, that interests me.

- Lydia Davis, in conversation with Ane Farsethas

(Can't say I agree with her about the dictionaries, though. I like me a good dictionary.)

Zaftig vs Sidebottom

Extraordinary interview with Erica Jong in last Saturday`s Times. According to Jong a lot of the 'bad boy' writers who gave her books bad reviews had more than literary criteria on their minds. "I was too zaftig [curvy] to get a good review. Look at all the women who are praised. They`re either very, very skinny or very, very fat. Some of them are hunchback, and some of them enormously fat" - offensive remark about Hilary Mantel omitted [LOLZ] - "Not one of them is a woman you would want to f***." 

Some years ago I gave Jong`s Sappho`s Leap a very bad review in the TLS. At the time I thought I did this because it was a very bad book. Now I know differently. 

Glad she cleared all that up.

- Harry Sidebottom, on Facebook

In other news, I've just looked up a boozy interview I did with Dr Sidebottom. 1) I note Ms Jong was referenced; and 2) I can vouch his books have since also made it to Afghanistan.

Surrealest interview

INTERVIEWER: Clarice Lispector, where does this name, 'Lispector,' come from?
CLARICE LISPECTOR: I don't know. I asked ... It's a Latin name, right?