International Literacy Day and some Literary News from the Week

Richard Lea over at The Guardian's Book Blog is certainly attracting more of my attention.

Yesterday he asked "Go on, what's your favourite word?" (see below) as well as questioning whether we might be Man Booker-Prized-Out in the UK, given that sales for this year's shortlist are less than enthusiastic, in comparison with previous years...

In consideration of the Man Booker shortlist, Lea also covers the controversy over Ian McEwan's "On Chesil Beach", which is shorter than his usual works and deserves the label "novella" in the eyes of some, including the author himself.  Lea quotes The Daily Mail:  'It's a "controversy" swiftly dealt with in the Times, which quotes the judges' decision that the book is eligible "because the dictionary definition of a novella is 'a short novel'," and quotes the chairman of the judges, Howard Davies: "We don't think of it as slight."'

Short? Slight?  Oh for the continued debate over word meanings.  I can't see this one dying quickly.  And if book sales are not as before, I can only see the controversy helping to bump them up.

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But time for some fun, let's revisit Richard Lea's post "Go on, what's your favourite word?"   Lea made the post, as today is International Literacy Day, according to the UN. 

Thus I offer up one of my favourite words:"ecclesiastical".

"Ecclesiastical" clicks off the tongue and that's why I love it.  It's like speaking with a small pyramid in your mouth. And unless you are proficient in Greek, the word offers no suggestion as to what it relates to.  Here's the definition from AskOxford.com:

ecclesiastical

  • adjective relating to the Christian Church or its clergy.

  — DERIVATIVES ecclesiastically adverb.

  — ORIGIN Greek ekklesiastikos, from ekklesiastes ‘member of an assembly’.

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Finally, just in case you've missed it, Cheltenham's Literature Festival is now booking.  And for those who visit/revisit this site looking for information on Neil Pearson and his forthcoming book Obelisk, Pearson will be talking to John Walsh there on Sunday 14 October at 10am.  Amazon has the publication date as 1 October 2007, so I guess the book will be on sale at the festival.  Some time after 11am on that Sunday morning, expect to see a long queue of women at the book signing...

Comments

[crimeficreader]

Anne,

I have a small Booker collection spanning almost, or possibly more than, twenty years. Most unread. I tried, I really did. But not for me.

Interestingly, I listened to a radio programme this evening where Ian Rankin was interviewed by Paul Blezard for his digital radio OneWord radio programme "Between the Lines" and the Booker came up in conversation. The question posed was why had Ruth Rendell not been a winner (let alone a shortlister) during her (prolific) time of writing? And why the absence of crime fiction?

This is a long drawn out debate, but Rankin re-sealed the lid tonight. If it comes to commercial success over literary (as never the twain shall meet in lterary eyes), he's happy with the commercial aspect.

And so he should be. We buy and read what we want to read. Sometimes it's absolute rubbish that makes the top ten, but readers make that top ten and crime and thriller fiction is always well placed. The literay world needs the Booker for sales, IMHO. Without it, even more would flounder. Recognise the success of the crime fiction genre and the lits would have the daggers out. (Sorry for the inadvertent pun there on the Crime Writers' Association UK's own awards - the daggers).

I think it would be good to make a comparison over the last 20 years - how many Booker prize winners have been enduring when it comes to sales and reputation? How many bestselling crime fiction novels have remained enduring? How many authors in that genre have remained enduring in comarison with the lits?

Where crime creeps into the minds of the readers and stays, literary works have to be of unambivalent quality and originality to catch the memory and stay.

The Booker does not rule out crime fiction if you look at their rules for entry. So why do they stay away from the genre? It's all about submissions, which brings us back to the publishers. Why don't they submit (more) crime fiction?

If we want to have a debate, it's time to examine the root cause.

[Anne Brooke]

I must admit to being totally bored with the Booker - in the past I've always bought the shortlist and attempted to read them, but in the last few years, most have been utterly unreadable - a triumph of pseudo-style over content (aka character & plot!). The last good Booker was the year that Clare Morrall was shortlisted - when "The Good Doctor" (another on the shortlist) should definitely have won.

I'm not going to bother buying them this year. I'd say scrap it.

A
xxx