A book that was published in 1943, but... "One chapter in particular might have been written in 2012, not 1943. Its title: "Political Action for the 99%."
"Many of us have become cynical where politics is concerned. Corruption, class legislation and political irresponsibility no longer move us to indignation. Instead, we shrug our shoulders, as if to say, 'What can you expect?' This attitude threatens the whole democratic fabric of our country.
'The people's will must be made effective'
"Let there be no mistake: the political life of the country will be controlled, if not by the people, then by the vested interests. Indifference on our part is precisely the guarantee that special privilege will continue to rule. The people's will must be made effective. To achieve this end, they must gain control of economic and political power."
From: http://thetyee.ca/Books/2012/01/06/Prophets-Of-The-Occupiers/
Prefer a novel? Here's one, published in 2012, for the Occupy Movement, the 99percenters, and whistleblowers: WikiJustice.
05/03/2012
What literary biographies teach us
"The literary bio is an oddly enduring genre. People who read have always been interested in the story behind the stories, but you’d think that of all the people you might want to know more about, writers would probably be somewhere near the bottom of the list. After all, most of them don’t actually do very much but sit at a desk somewhere and write. That’s their job. And aside from what can be gleaned from autobiographies and memoirs (an entertaining but not very trustworthy genre that becomes even more doubtful when penned by people who have spent their lives making things up), an author’s rich inner life, crucible for the imaginative alchemy that transforms experience into art, has to be pieced together mainly from circumstantial evidence.
So what’s the take away? One of the reasons we read biography is for the life lessons they offer. While there are infinite paths to immortal literary fame, what helpful hints can be gleaned from the lives of the greats:
First, experience a traumatic episode early in your childhood or youth that you will then be able to draw upon for inspiration and raw material for the rest of your life.
Second, find yourself a self-denying partner who will support you and accept your eccentricities, moodiness, alcoholism and infidelities as expressions of your genius.
Finally, have a lot of kids and give up other hostages to fortune so that you will be compelled by financial necessity to keep writing."
More: http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/books/bookreviews/article/1140789--dickens-tolstoy-j-g-ballard-and-kurt-vonnegut-were-literary-geniuses-in-these-bios-other-writers-try-to-capture-what-made-them-so-writerly
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So what’s the take away? One of the reasons we read biography is for the life lessons they offer. While there are infinite paths to immortal literary fame, what helpful hints can be gleaned from the lives of the greats:
First, experience a traumatic episode early in your childhood or youth that you will then be able to draw upon for inspiration and raw material for the rest of your life.
Second, find yourself a self-denying partner who will support you and accept your eccentricities, moodiness, alcoholism and infidelities as expressions of your genius.
Finally, have a lot of kids and give up other hostages to fortune so that you will be compelled by financial necessity to keep writing."
More: http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/books/bookreviews/article/1140789--dickens-tolstoy-j-g-ballard-and-kurt-vonnegut-were-literary-geniuses-in-these-bios-other-writers-try-to-capture-what-made-them-so-writerly
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www.SPYWRITER.com
03/03/2012
Literary self-censorship
"The suppression of literature is an ancient tradition that probably started with the invention of writing and which thrives today all over the world. In the west we generally venerate those authors who stand up against acts of silencing by the authorities. But what are we to think when an author suppresses himself?
The easiest form of self-suppression is to have an idea and not write it, and we may well wish that more authors would exercise this prerogative. It gets more complicated once the book exists, however – even in unpublished manuscript form. Since we usually don't know about the successful suppressions, the most famous cases of authorial efforts at self-silencing are those of writers who attempted and failed to quash the publication of works they had written but did not wish to see the light of day."
Here are some examples of self-censored writers and their works: http://m.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/feb/28/authors-censor-themselves-martin-amis?cat=books&type=article
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www.SPYWRITER.com
The easiest form of self-suppression is to have an idea and not write it, and we may well wish that more authors would exercise this prerogative. It gets more complicated once the book exists, however – even in unpublished manuscript form. Since we usually don't know about the successful suppressions, the most famous cases of authorial efforts at self-silencing are those of writers who attempted and failed to quash the publication of works they had written but did not wish to see the light of day."
Here are some examples of self-censored writers and their works: http://m.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/feb/28/authors-censor-themselves-martin-amis?cat=books&type=article
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www.SPYWRITER.com
02/03/2012
Writing as a manufacturing job
Writing books is a job, not unlike that of a worker on a manufacturing line, where the publishing model forces one to churn out books as mass products (consider a certain suspense writer who signed a publishing contract to produce and deliver 17 novels in 3 years):
"Since when did being a writer become a career choice, with appropriate degree courses and pecking orders? Does this state of affairs make any difference to what gets written?
In the last thirty or forty years, the writer has become someone who works on a well-defined career track, like any other middle class professional, not, however, to become a craftsman serving the community, but to project an image of himself (partly through his writings, but also in dozens of other ways) as an artist who embodies the direction in which culture is headed.
One of the myths about creative writing courses is that students go there to learn how to write. Such learning, when and if it takes place, is a felicitous by-product that may or may not have to do with the teaching; the process of settling down to write for a year would very probably yield results even without teachers. No, the student goes to the course to show himself to teachers who as writers are well placed (he imagines!) to help him present himself to the publishers. Most creative writing courses now offer classes on approaching agents and publishers and promoting one’s work. In short, preparing for the job."
More: http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2012/feb/28/writers-job/
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www.SPYWRITER.com
"Since when did being a writer become a career choice, with appropriate degree courses and pecking orders? Does this state of affairs make any difference to what gets written?
In the last thirty or forty years, the writer has become someone who works on a well-defined career track, like any other middle class professional, not, however, to become a craftsman serving the community, but to project an image of himself (partly through his writings, but also in dozens of other ways) as an artist who embodies the direction in which culture is headed.
One of the myths about creative writing courses is that students go there to learn how to write. Such learning, when and if it takes place, is a felicitous by-product that may or may not have to do with the teaching; the process of settling down to write for a year would very probably yield results even without teachers. No, the student goes to the course to show himself to teachers who as writers are well placed (he imagines!) to help him present himself to the publishers. Most creative writing courses now offer classes on approaching agents and publishers and promoting one’s work. In short, preparing for the job."
More: http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2012/feb/28/writers-job/
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www.SPYWRITER.com
The benefits of reading fiction
Why is literature important to us?
"literature develops critical thinking skills.
The reader can observe from multiple points of view and is allowed to freely develop ideas about the plot and characters. Readers can be skeptical about actions taken by the characters or of plot points.
As critical thinking is sharpened by literature, those skills can be used to solve everyday life problems, allow a person to see different points of view and call into question set standards.
Literature extends out of the English class and into virtually any study. By adding reading to one’s daily routine, we find that we become well-rounded people in thought and in ideas. It can be applied to almost any discipline and cannot possibly be a hindrance."
More benefits: http://www.coscampusonline.com/2012/02/27/literature-and-our-life/
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www.SPYWRITER.com
"literature develops critical thinking skills.
The reader can observe from multiple points of view and is allowed to freely develop ideas about the plot and characters. Readers can be skeptical about actions taken by the characters or of plot points.
As critical thinking is sharpened by literature, those skills can be used to solve everyday life problems, allow a person to see different points of view and call into question set standards.
Literature extends out of the English class and into virtually any study. By adding reading to one’s daily routine, we find that we become well-rounded people in thought and in ideas. It can be applied to almost any discipline and cannot possibly be a hindrance."
More benefits: http://www.coscampusonline.com/2012/02/27/literature-and-our-life/
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www.SPYWRITER.com
Leftist beliefs cause cancer (with a little help from the CIA)
"The gun fired a frozen liquid poison-tipped dart, the width of a human
hair and a quarter of an inch long, that could penetrate clothing, was
almost undetectable and left no trace in a victim’s body."
"It was a case destined for the X-Files and conspiracy theorists alike, when Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez speculated that the US might have developed a way to weaponise cancer, after several Latin American leaders were diagnosed with the disease. The list includes former Argentine president, Nestor Kirchner (colon cancer) Brazil’s president Dilma Rousseff (lymphoma cancer), her predecessor Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (throat cancer), Chavez (undisclosed), former Cuban president Fidel Castro (stomach cancer) Bolivian president, Evo Morales (nasal cancer) and Paraguayan president Fernando Lugo (lymphoma cancer). What do they have in common besides cancer? All of them are left-wing leaders. Coincidence? In his December 28, 2011 end-of-year address to the Venezuelan military, Chavez hinted that the US might have found a way to give Latin American leaders cancer.
“Would it be so strange that they’ve invented the technology to spread cancer and we won’t know about it for 50 years?” Chavez asked. “It is very hard to explain, even with the law of probabilities, what has been happening to some leaders in Latin America. It’s at the very least strange,” he said. Chavez said he received warning from Cuba’s former leader Fidel Castro, who has survived hundreds of unsuccessful assassination attempts. “Fidel always told me, ‘Chavez take care. These people have developed technology. You are very careless. Take care what you eat, what they give you to eat … a little needle and they inject you with I don’t know what’,” he said."
More: http://www.guardian.co.tt/lifestyle/2012-02-27/cancer-secret-weapon
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www.SPYWRITER.com
01/03/2012
Reading novels cover to cover helps students build confidence
"Literary fiction is an art that seeks to create an immersive experience for the reader, but we often don't approach it that way with our students. We parcel out books in pieces and ask students to analyze them along the way without the ability to understand a work in its entirety. This is sort of like asking students to interpret a corner of a painting. Without the entire context, it lacks meaning and can become frustrating."
So, this 7th grade English teacher came up with an idea, and put it into action in her class:
"Let students read novels in their entirety. Then let them talk about what they find interesting in the book, facilitating the group's exploration of the text."
"Leading a whole-novel study is like throwing a boomerang. If the boomerang is carved well, and I aim it properly, it will take a journey and come back to me. If the literary work is artfully written and meaningful to students, and I support the class well, they will arrive at all the learning objectives I am responsible for teaching and then some. What's more is that they build stamina, confidence, critical thinking, and the habit of reading whole books by themselves."
More: http://www.edweek.org/tsb/articles/2012/02/29/02sacks.h05.html
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www.SPYWRITER.com
So, this 7th grade English teacher came up with an idea, and put it into action in her class:
"Let students read novels in their entirety. Then let them talk about what they find interesting in the book, facilitating the group's exploration of the text."
"Leading a whole-novel study is like throwing a boomerang. If the boomerang is carved well, and I aim it properly, it will take a journey and come back to me. If the literary work is artfully written and meaningful to students, and I support the class well, they will arrive at all the learning objectives I am responsible for teaching and then some. What's more is that they build stamina, confidence, critical thinking, and the habit of reading whole books by themselves."
More: http://www.edweek.org/tsb/articles/2012/02/29/02sacks.h05.html
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www.SPYWRITER.com
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