The July 18 issue of the TLS has a report on the Fred Astaire Conference, held in June at Oriel College, Oxford. I’ve been to a fair number of academic conferences in the last couple of years–some more entertaining than others–and I wish this one had been in the travel budget. Thanks to my dad,… Continue reading »
Archives for August 2008
Monthly archives for August, 2008
“Elephant Legs Are Much Bendier Than Shakespeare Thought”
Everybody gets it wrong sometimes. (Via PlayShakespeare.com.)
Put Down the Marker and Back Away Slowly
Ever felt the impulse to whip out a red pen and go to town on a badly written menu or sign? Resist it. From the Arizona Republic: Two self-anointed “grammar vigilantes” who toured the nation removing typos from public signs have been banned from national parks after vandalizing a historic marker at the Grand Canyon…. Continue reading »
Parting Shots
As a working journalist (for the time being, anyway), I haven’t said much about the seeming death spiral of the newspaper industry: the hemorrhage in subscriptions and ad revenue, the to-the-marrow cuts in newsrooms. (In management parlance, this is sometimes referred to as “rightsizing.”) If I had a brilliant idea about how to save the… Continue reading »
Conventional Wisdom
That’s conventional as in conventions, “stultifying media spectacles where no one expects anything to happen.” So says Chris Lehmann in a Q&A posted today by Harper’s. Chris is a senior editor at CQ, the nonfiction editor of Booforum, and a very sharp guy. (He’s also a good friend of mine from my Book World days,… Continue reading »
