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Wednesday, January 19
Tom Bissell, Plagiarist? *UPDATED*
Update: Thursday, 12:31 AM: One of my favorite articles of recent years was a long dissection of the ULA in The Believer; unfortunately, I didn't remember, until reminded today by numerous emails, that the author of that article was Tom Bissell. Whille the ULA's claims against Bissell may be valid -- and I'll write more about that later tonight -- I'm upset at King Wenclas, the ULA's publicity director, for not making the ULA's relationship with Bissell explicit in his post, and I'm upset at myself for not researching the ULA's motives more thoroughly. I did, in my defense, google the ULA's claims (as opposed to motives) before posting but this incident teaches me to be much more cautious when posting about controversial/damnatory topics.
[Original posting: Jan. 18, 11:47 AM:]
The Village Voice, reviewing Tom Bissell's debut short story collection, God Lives In St. Petersburg And Other Storie, comments that, "although Bissell himself served a brief hitch in the Peace Corps, his characters are seriously altruism-challenged." Perhaps none so much as Bissell himself, who, according to King Wenclas, the ULA's Publicity Director (and God knows they need one) and numerous Amazon reviewers, robbed Murray Feshbach blind while writing his Harper's essay-turned-book, Chasing the Sea.
Among the paired passages lovingly arranged by Wenclas:
[Read Part Two]
The Village Voice, reviewing Tom Bissell's debut short story collection, God Lives In St. Petersburg And Other Storie, comments that, "although Bissell himself served a brief hitch in the Peace Corps, his characters are seriously altruism-challenged." Perhaps none so much as Bissell himself, who, according to King Wenclas, the ULA's Publicity Director (and God knows they need one) and numerous Amazon reviewers, robbed Murray Feshbach blind while writing his Harper's essay-turned-book, Chasing the Sea.
Among the paired passages lovingly arranged by Wenclas:
Feshbach, page 1: "No other great industrial civilization so systematically and so long poisoned its land, air, water and people. None so loudly proclaiming its efforts to improve public health and protect nature so degraded both."The list goes on, citing seven more, equally (and albeit, inconsistently) convincing, examples. I don't know what's more ghastly: Bissell's plagiarism, or the ULA's new sense-making abilities.
Bissell in Harper's: "No other industrial society so impartially poisoned its land, water, air, and citizens while at the same time so loudly proclaiming its efforts to improve human health and the condition of the natural world."
Feshbach 43: "Stalinist planning justified itself with a forthright slogan: 'We cannot expect charity from nature, we must tear it from her.'"
Bissell: "We cannot expect charity from nature," the Stalinists used to say. "We must tear it from her."
[Read Part Two]
Cat Wrangling & Blogger
I've been wrestling Blogger most of today, but I think I've finally got her to the floor. Hot, sweaty, smelly posts to follow. Meow.
Possession
One of the joys of reporting on the book industry is that books span every subject. Most days, I read about fiction, but some days I can also read about subjects like, say, excorcism.
Jan. 18, 2005 | In 1978, psychiatrist M. Scott Peck published "The Road Less Traveled," a book that melded his interests in psychotherapy and spirituality. A bracing snap-out-of-it call for individual responsibility, difficult decision-making and the abolishment of laziness as the keys to mental health and happiness, it sold over 7 million copies. It was also one of the building blocks of the nation's infatuation with the school of psycho-spiritual therapy commonly referred to as self-help.(On a sidenote: Deep into Salon's interview with Peck, Peck states that he has "wondered specifically about the Supreme Court in the case of Bush vs. Gore where, astonishingly, I believe that the majority -- five out of nine justices -- were engaged in an evil act. And I wonder how that could happen without Satan hanging around.")
Twenty-seven years and a dozen books later, Peck, who was baptized a nondenominational Christian at age 40, is publishing what he says will be his last book. And it's a doozy -- one that aims to scientifically examine and report on the rather radical notion that some people who appear to suffer from mental illness may in fact be possessed by demons, or by Satan himself.
The First Word On the Book Publishing Industry
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