Author Archives: Emdashes

Book Giveaway: Daniyal Mueenuddin’s “In Other Rooms, Other Wonders”

Martin Schneider writes:
Emdashes is pleased to be hosting a book giveaway this week, for In Other Rooms, Other Wonders, Daniyal Mueenuddin’s first collection of short stories, which is being released today. Mueenuddin has had three stories in The New Yorker over the last two years, and there’s every reason to think that he will be a writer to watch for some time to come. As an example, here’s Publishers Weekly‘s review of the book:

In eight beautifully crafted, interconnected stories, Mueenuddin explores the cutthroat feudal society in which a rich Lahore landowner is entrenched. A complicated network of patronage undergirds the micro-society of servants, families and opportunists surrounding wealthy patron K.K. Harouni. In “Nawabdin Electrician,” Harouni’s indispensable electrician, Nawab, excels at his work and at home, raising 12 daughters and one son by virtue of his cunning and ingenuity-qualities that allow him to triumph over entrenched poverty and outlive a robber bent on stealing his livelihood. Women are especially vulnerable without the protection of family and marriage ties, as the protagonist of “Saleema” learns: a maid in the Harouni mansion who cultivates a love affair with an older servant, Saleema is left with a baby and without recourse when he must honor his first family and renounce her. Similarly, the women who become lovers of powerful men, as in the title story and in “Provide, Provide,” fall into disgrace and poverty with the death of their patrons. An elegant stylist with a light touch, Mueenuddin invites the reader to a richly human, wondrous experience.

Here are the rules: Drop us an email, subject line “NAWABDIN ELECTRICIAN” and please include your name and full mailing address. We’ll take all entries until 8:00 pm EST on Friday, February 13, and then the Random Number Generator will make its merciless decision. And good luck to all entrants!

Welcome to Lisa Hughes, New Publisher of The New Yorker

Emily Gordon writes:
From the New York Observer, masthead (or at least ownership statement) news:

The New Yorker’s publisher Drew Schutte is leaving the magazine to become the senior vice president and chief revenue officer of Condé Nast’s newly consolidated internet group, Condé Nast Digital.
…
Meanwhile, Lisa Hughes has been named the new publisher of the magazine, which makes her the third one that David Remnick will work with in the decade-plus he’s been The New Yorker‘s top editor. Ms. Hughes has been the publisher of Condé Nast Traveler since 1995, a 14-year span regarded as an eternity in publishing circles. A source tells us, "She’s tough, smart, but this will be a really big test for her."
Here’s the full release:

(Continue reading.)

Warm wishes and best of luck to Mr. Schutte (pictured here with “a reporter,” as they say in Talk of the Town), and we send Ms. Hughes good vibes as she takes on a tough role. (We know a little about these challenges, as companies like to say, as the editor of a magazine called Print.) Here’s to a prosperous and enjoyable career at The New Yorker.

Making Our Lives Suck Less: 2/25 Event With Avenue Q and [Title of Show] Stars

Here’s a press release we can believe in: what promises to be a scintillating and hilarious conversation with some of the creators of Emily’s favorite show, Avenue Q, and the acclaimed and wittily titled [Title of Show]. Here are the details:

**P.S. 107 Continues 5th Annual “Readings on the 4th Floor” Series With Focus on “Broadway Unbound”: The creators of Avenue Q and Title of Show along with the artistic director of the Vineyard Theatre talk about redefining the Broadway musical**

Brooklyn, January 26, 2009 – How do you convince a producer that a show featuring puppets for an adult audience and one about writing a Broadway musical will ever succeed in a theater world focused on risk aversion? On **Wednesday, February 25 at 7:30 p.m. on the 4th Floor of PS 107 in Park Slope, Brooklyn**, **Framji Minwalla**, visiting professor of drama at Fordham University, will moderate a panel that includes some of the most successful off-off Broadway talents to ever make it to The Great White Way.

**Jeff Bowen** and **Hunter Bell**, creators and stars in the Obie-award winning musical Title of Show, will be joined by their female lead, **Susan Blackwell**. **Jeff Whitty**, Tony Award-winning playwright (Best Musical 2004) of Avenue Q and Tales of the City will be joined by **Bobby Lopez**, Tony-award winning composer and lyricist for Avenue Q. **Doug Aibel**, artistic director of the Vineyard Theater, which took both of these shows to Broadway, will round out the panel. Anecdotes, spontaneous song and the trials and tribulations of creating musical theater that goes beyond the norm will be center stage in this evening of theatrical insight.

Broadway Unbound will be held on the 4th Floor of PS 107, which is located at 13th Street and 8th Avenue in Park Slope, Brooklyn. Tickets are $15 online at www.ps107.org or at the door.

This esteemed topical literary series continues to raise funds for the newly renovated fourth floor library/art/performance space of P.S. 107. It has featured everyone from Pulitzer prize-winning author Jumpha Lahiri, Interpreter of Maladies, to leading journalists including George Packer of The New Yorker.

Quick Inauguration Links: Poetry, Bluegrass, and Jill Lepore

Emily Gordon writes:
We’re all in a whirlwind—or, in my case, a state of advanced humility barely distinguishable from a blue funk—after the inauguration’s pomp and stirring addresses, in plain speech, rhetoric, verse, and song. While you’re coming down from the high—or, in my case, shooting for neutral—here are some links to savor and explore.
Jill Lepore: “Our Better History,” an “In the News” post on newyorker.com about Obama’s inauguration speech today, and a long piece written before today, “Have Inaugural Addresses Been Getting Worse?“ Is there anything Jill Lepore can’t write about, I wonder? She is my current favorite contributor to the magazine. I’m reading her piece now on the possibly exaggerated death of newspapers, and while I might add a footnote about doomsaying bloggers’ mixed motives (Vanessa Grigoriadis has a good handle on the panicked retaliation of the “creative underclass,” many of whom were probably editors of their high school or college papers), I am, as ever, all admiration. Her sprightly, scholarly sentences brighten the pages, and she teaches, too. I’d read anything by her, and thanks to the editors’ ever more frequent inclusion of her pieces, I intend to.
All the newyorker.com inauguration coverage, which includes…
Various responses to the George Packer post (and Packer’s post-post) on the choice of Elizabeth Alexander as inaugural poet, including this one from Book Bench writer Jenna Krajeski.
Elizabeth was my teacher when I was a graduate student at NYU, and I was thrilled to see her at the podium, calm and dignified. At the Irish bar where my workmates and I watched the inauguration telecast, the crowd was as alert and contemplative during her poem as it was during the most solemn, lively, and challenging moments of the prayers and speeches, if that’s any indication of how a poem goes over with a populace that persists in believing it doesn’t like poetry, the same populace that delights in song lyrics, nursery rhymes, rhyming slogans, hip-hop, and so on and so forth. I did a quick look around the web for the printed poem, but ran out of time; let me know if you spot it anywhere. (Update: Here’s one; thanks, reader!)
If you haven’t read much of Alexander’s poetry, you can read some in The New Yorker; here (via Digital Edition) are “Autumn Passage,” “When,” and “Smile,” which is perhaps particularly riveting reading today.
Finally, remembering hopeful inaugurations past, here’s a terrific White House concert from 1980 to download for free. It’ll either make you happy, or keep you happy, I swear it. (Then, if you like, you can read Philip Hamburger on Jimmy Carter’s inauguration on your Digital Edition.) From Jesper Deleuran of the Facebook fan group “Doc Watson Rules!!!” (which you should join, since he does):

Here is a link to a site, where you, among other things can find this live recording from 1980, where president Jimmy Carter had invited Doc Watson and Bill Monroe to play on the lawn of the White House. It is possible to download the 16 tracks from the concert. First 6 with Doc, then 7 with Bill Monroe and his band, and last but not least 3 tunes where Doc and Bill play together alone. This is a must for a Doc Watson fan.

http://croz.fm/files/category-doc-watson.php

Happy inauguration day, all, and before tomorrow, let’s all start by doing something small to honor the service Obama spoke of so passionately. Vain musclemen who never seem to notice the mothers struggling up the subway stairs with bags and carriages, I’m looking at you. Right after I finish looking at me, of course.

Joan Walsh in Salon on Barry Blitt’s Obama Cover

Emily Gordon notes this passage in Salon today:

Still, at times Obama seemed to have the best of both worlds, politically: The self-confidence that comes from being raised (and loved, intimately, from Day One) by the white majority, while also being protected from any perceptible threat of racism by black and white supporters admirably determined to identify and crush it when it surfaced….

Historians may find that this double force field protected Obama; certainly, we saw it in the primaries, when anything that could be remotely perceived as a racial diss to Obama, by the Clintons, their supporters or the media, ignited a firestorm and damaging charges of racism against whomever slurred — or simply slipped — in their treatment of the black Democratic candidate. I enjoyed the anti-racist media strikeforce when it hit Fox News for its idiotic “slips” labeling Barack and Michelle’s affectionate fist-bump a possible “terrorist” gesture, and describing Obama’s wife of 16 years as his “baby mama.” I liked it much less when it was directed at outlets I respect, like the New Yorker (or Salon). I still can’t believe the backlash against the New Yorker’s hilarious (in my opinion) fist-bump cover, sending up all the right wing’s dumbest, least believable slurs against Michelle and Barack Obama. His supporters howled with outrage, and his campaign bit back, too, with even Obama himself lamenting that the cartoon might be misunderstood by confused voters.

Emdashes Turns Four!

Founder and frequently meddling publisher Emily Gordon writes:
In blog years, we’re very mature: Emdashes turns four today. I began it in a red-floored Chelsea loft as a labor of love, an antidepressant, and a scratch for my irrepressible itch to sample new technology. Happily, these days, Emdashes reflects the hard work and enthusiasm of many others besides me. Since my first post (about Donald Antrim’s monumental essay “I Bought a Bed”) on December 31, 2004, Emdashes has grown and progressed in innumerable ways. The site looks the way it does because of my collaboration with House of Pretty, about whose whip-smart and big-hearted proprietors, Patric King and Su, I can’t say enough. Every week, you also see the elegant creations of Inkleaf Studio’s Jesse Ewing, chic cartoonist Carolita Johnson, our own Pollux, and my best pal, designer Jennifer Hadley, who adapted a 1943 Dorothy Gray ad into the Emdashes logo you see there above (referred to in-house as “pencil girl”).
What’s more, we now have a genuine staff of editors and regular contributors—including, though not limited to, current editor and total mensch Martin Schneider, ace literary columnist Benjamin Chambers, my scholarly old friend Jonathan Taylor, and my humblingly humble, multitalented new friend Paul Morris, a.k.a. Pollux (whom you can credit for the drawing of me as a prehistoric proto-blogger at right).
I’ve loved editing, and getting to know, the kind, witty, and meticulous New Yorker librarians, Jon Michaud and Erin Overbey, who write the indispensable column “Ask the Librarians.” (Look forward to a fresh installment soon!) The virtual and real-life conversations that the blog has inspired have enhanced my life immeasurably. I’ve soaked up more of the New Yorker Festival and New Yorker Conference, and more readings, lectures, gallery shows, conversations, softball games, histories, anthologies, and other things New Yorker, than I’d ever imagined experiencing (even in my previously acute state of preoccupation). Last year, the site won the coveted distinction of being a Webby Awards official honoree. Four years later, my personal affinity for The New Yorker, and the sometimes cryptic ways in which I try to express it, is only a part of the picture.
This isn’t a blog that had any model, particularly. It’s driven by the collective bees in our bonnets, who are erratic drivers. We write about pigeons. (A lot.) We do whatever we can to make Rea Irvin a household name. I’ve banned a number of words and phrases and pontificated on punctuation. We were entertained and pleased by a large number of submissions to our rename the upside-down question mark contest. We explore the “Best American” series like there’s no tomorrow. We’ve had crazy spikes we couldn’t have predicted—at one time, this site has been the #1 world resource on both the Ricky Gervais cult sensation “I Could Eat a Knob at Night” dance remix and iPod security, not to mention a surprising magnet of commentary on Knocked Up, tacos, and Brandenn Bremmer—while equally spirited analyses are met with baffled silence. We don’t mind a bit. We’ve had fascinating comments from friends and relatives of departed New Yorker writers and artists, all of whom we try to recognize when they pass away.
And we’ve had so much fun. Here’s to the next year—is that five or ten in blog years?—whatever it may bring! Happy new year, dear readers. And to Jasmin Chua and Ashby Jones, you were there when the twinkle met the eye. Thank you.

Roger Angell’s “Greetings, Friends!” Is Back, and Cheers for Francoise Mouly

Emily can’t stop writing, so she writes:
Dwight Garner (hi, Dwight!) has a lovely, and appropriately detailed, story about Roger Angell’s famous holiday poem, a tradition we’d been missing. I love that Angell edited Ogden Nash and now keeps the art of absurd partial rhymes from being entirely unjustly marginalized. I also like this quote from Paul Muldoon: “I myself make no distinction between ‘light’ verse and — what? — heavy verse.”
Elsewhere in noble production, the impossibly soignée Françoise Mouly is also, as you may know, a publisher of gorgeous and educational comics for children; Publishers Weekly praises her; and on Bookreporter.com, she blogs.

Banned Words and Phrases: Holiday Gratitude Edition

Emily writes (once again):
As longtime readers will know, I sometimes ban words and phrases. Though I find many non-standard uses of the language to be useful, lyrical, fascinating, or all three, others are just irksome. Here’s one that’s on the rise, and at the top of my current list of irritants (aside from the economy, short-sighted capitalists generally, and the futile war against our brute natures): abbreviations of the short, concise, one-syllable word “thanks.”
I’m used to (but that doesn’t mean I accept) the sign-off “thx.” To me, it conveys a lack of complete thanks, a partial, lackadaisical hiss. The sound it makes in my mind is the insincere, singsong “thinkssss” that workmates we’ve all known like to say with a scrunched-up smirk and bad intentions. I have a feeling that the brilliant David Shipley and Will Schwalbe, whose book Send: Why People Email So Badly and How to Do It Better I read recently and loved, would not approve of “thx.”
Now I’m seeing “thnx.” “Thanks” has only six letters. Even the silliest abbreviations are fine with me in instant messaging; that’s a fun puzzle of a medium, time is of the essence, and within it I require neither punctuation nor official spelling. But in email, especially business email, seriously, spell out “thanks.” Thanks!