Friday, April 22, 2011

Miscellaneous Somewhat Relevant Lit News


I'm sure many of you have heard about the critical "60 Minutes" segment last Sunday and the controversy that is swirling around Greg Mortenson and Three Cups of Tea (our book selection in November 2008). If not, here is a link to a San Francisco Chronicle article about the controversy. The article also has links to Greg Mortenson's response to the accusations.

Also related to one of our earlier selections (1906: A Novel by James Dalessandro from January of this year), on last Sunday, in honor of the 105th anniversary of the 1906 earthquake, the Chronicle printed the first of two articles containing excerpts from the diary of Leonie von Zesch, a resident of San Francisco, at the time of the quake. 23 years old, and a practicing dentist. The story of the woman herself and how her diaries were almost lost is almost as interesting as her observations of the quake. Check it out.

Related to yet another of our past selections (Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro from January 2007), they made a movie out of it. Silly me, I did not know that. Here's a comment from Mick LaSalle's column:

Dear Mick LaSalle: I was amazed that "Never Let Me Go" was not one of the 10 best nominees of 2010. Why didn't it get any nominations?

-- Bob Zimmerman, Lafayette, Calif.

Dear Bob Zimmerman: It can't have helped that it's about the most depressing movie imaginable. Academy voters get DVDs of the Oscar contenders, and a movie's chances go down if viewers feel like killing themselves after an hour.
Here's the official trailer.



In news about a book we didn't read but which was nominated at one time to be one of our selections, Water for Elephants has just been released as a movie. Here's the trailer for that.

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