Stephen Greenblatt won the General Nonfiction award for  The Swerve: How the World Became Modern and John Lewis Gaddis took the Biography award for George F. Kennan: An American Life.

Tracy K. Smith won the Poetry award with Life on Mars. The Drama award went to Water by the Spoonful by Quiara Alegria Hudes. Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention by Manning Marable won the History prize.   Silent Night: Opera in Two Acts by Kevin Puts was awarded the Music prize.

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Novelist and PEN World Voices chair Salman Rushdie will deliver the Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture this year. The festival will feature Martin Amis, Margaret Atwood, Paul Auster, Graydon Carter, Michael Cunningham, Jennifer Egan, E.L. Doctorow, Tony Kushner, Herta Müller, Marjane Satrapi, Colson Whitehead and many other writers.

Rushdie had this statement in the release: “In an era of ever-expanding ‘screen-time,’ live/in-person readings, conversations and literary performances have never been more radical or more necessary … These live events break down the invisible walls that separate us into our own solitary computer pods and re-assert the importance of dialogue, activism, and community without borders.”

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Follow this link to read Mars-Jones’ scathing review of By Nightfall that earned a golden hatchet and “a year’s supply of potted shrimp.” British journalists Rachel Johnson, Suzi Feay, Sam Leith and D.J. Taylor judged the competition. At this link, you can read all the shortlisted Hatchet Job of the Year reviews.

Leith explained why they chose the review: “Mars-Jones’s review of Michael Cunningham had everything a reader could hope for in a hostile review. It was at once erudite, attentive, killingly fair-minded and viciously funny … Every one of his zingers – ‘like tin-cans tied to a tricycle;’ ‘it seems to be the prestige of the modernists he admires, rather than their stringency;’ ‘that’s not an epiphany, that’s a postcard’ – is earned by the argument it arises from. By the end of it Cunningham’s reputation is, well, prone.”

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The Vanishing New York blog posted a photo of the sign, a reproduction of the food inspection grades hand-drawn by author and illustrator Elisha Cooper.

By Nightfall author Michael Cunningham once called Three Lives & Company “one of the greatest bookstores on the face of the Earth.” How would you rate your local bookstore?

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Four potential dates volunteered; two men and two women were asked a series of funny questions to determine compatibility. The audience voted by cheering on who they felt should go on a coffee date with Homes. The winner (pictured), was asked whether or not she would make a good stalker. She answered “yes.”

At Happy Ending events, authors are required to do two things. First, they must give a 10-minute reading. Then they must perform a risk on stage–hence Homes’ choice to speed-date.

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Need holiday gift ideas?

Washington Post fiction editor Ron Charles‘ Totally Hip Book Reviewer video series introduced three literary products this week: the bookly (a literary parody of the Snuggie), Spine perfume (the scent of the Library of Congress), and the Doogk (an eReader for dogs). The video is embedded above.

In Charles’ words, the Doogk is “the handy, beef-flavored, eReader for man’s best friend. And the tough raw hide construction provides extra teething pleasure no ordinary book can match.” Julie Klam, the author of You Had Me at Woof, makes a cameo with her dog, Fiorello, to endorse the Doogk.

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During the ceremony at the Morgan Library & Museum Foundation president Dr. Robert L. Belknap told the winners not to worry about finding blockbuster audiences. “Perhaps they will become incredibly important to a readership that hasn’t even been born yet,” he explained.

Keynote speaker Peter Matthiessen reassured the nominees with tales of his own successes and failures. The great writer shared a rejection note with the recepients: “Dear Peter, James Fenimore Cooper wrote this book 150 years ago, but he wrote it better.” Matthiessen (pictured)  laughed as he recited the note from memory: “Right then, I could have used a Whiting.” Stay tuned for video coverage from the ceremony over the next few days.

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Ron Charles returned with a video review of By Nightfall by Pulitzer Prize winner, Michael Cunningham.

Charles explained:  “It’s a horny novel about the power of beauty to rouse us ennui. The publisher says By Nightfall is heart-breaking, full of shocks and after-aftershocks.” Read GalleyCat Reviews‘ take on the book here.

The video features a cameo by a Taylor Lautner poster and a Jacob Black action figure (modeled after Lautner). Charles also impersonates the novel’s art dealer protagonist by walking through an art gallery, museum displays, classical fountains, and modern art installations.

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Last night, ten authors received a $50,000 check from the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation, part of the 25th annual Whiting Writers’ Awards. Since 1985, the philanthropic foundation has given emerging creative writers these grants. Previous winners have included: “Denis Johnson, Michael Cunningham, Alice McDermott, and Colson Whitehead. The complete list of winners follows after the jump.

GalleyCat was there, shooting video interviews with the winners and finding out more about Atwood’s recent foray into the world of Twitter. “It’s been quite a lot of fun. I can send out desperate tweets and 15 people will answer my question,” she explained after the ceremony. Twitter hadn’t corrupted her writing style, she concluded: “It’s a descendant of the telegram. Telegrams required succinctness because they charged by the word. It’s a message.”

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Today the bi-monthly literary journal Electric Literature released that bloody “Single Sentence Animation” video, as animator Jonathan Ashley interpreted a short short story from novelist Michael Cunningham.

This is the second single sentence animation posted on the journal’s brand-new YouTube page. Previously, animator Luca Dipierro interpreted Lydia Millet‘s “Sir Henry” in a brief video. Earlier this year, the journal made publishing headlines for its unusual distribution model and pledge to pay $1,000 per story.

Check it out: “This is the Electric Literature YouTube channel. Here you will find all kinds of cross-over projects. Whether we are matching contemporary writers with illustrators, fine artists, live-action filmmakers, or musicians, this is the place to see the results. These days, we’re on an animation kick. Enjoy.”

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In addition, the journal can be purchased as an e-book, Kindle, or iPhone format. The opening issue features a blockbuster list with work by Jim Shepard, Lydia Millet, and Michael Cunningham.

Here’s more from the site: “Ultimately, the content of a book is information, and the methods of distributing information have changed. Electronic publishing is the greenest option: it kills no trees, requires very little energy, never goes out of print, and can reach anyone on the planet. To create the paper version of Electric Literature, we use print-on-demand, ensuring that every copy has a home.” (Via Patrick deWitt)

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Then again, almost all Hollywood sagas for novelists are complicated in some form or another, but Susan Minot found out in a special way when her book EVENING was adapted for the big screen by Pulitzer Prize winning novelist and screenwriter Michael Cunningham after a nine-year odyssey, which included her own adaptations. Now what would she tell other writers in her situation? “I would tell them ‘let it go’,” she said to the Times’s Martyn Palmer. “Just stand back and enjoy the ride.”

As for the differing screenplays, “If pressed, I think I’m going to say I like mine better but, you know, Michael’s was his. He brought a lot of people to the project and he managed to make the story more accessible.” But in truth, the “collaboration” was fairly amicable – a lot more than what journalists would make out. “I loved Susan’s book and I respect her enormously as a writer and the first thing I did was call and say ‘I don’t know what they’ll be, but I know I’m going to have to make real changes in the story,’” he recalled. “To her huge credit, Susan said: ‘Of course you’ll change it, that’s why they called you. That’s what I want to see happen.’ What works in a novel is not what works in a movie, and off we went.”

Minot is happy with the film but emphasizes that it is definitely a separate entity to the book. “The book stays where it is. The movie is another creation using the book as a base, not even inspiration because inspiration only goes so far, but as a sort of reference point.”

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In making the announcements, Harold Augenbraum, executive director of the Foundation, said, “These two women are icons in the literary world and their contributions are now legendary – Joan Didion as one of the keenest observers and finest prose stylists of our time and Terry Gross as one of the most intelligent voices on the airwaves and one of the few who devotes hundreds of hours a year to talking about books and literature. Both women are fearless in their questioning and their insights on the page and on the air have informed our understanding of America and of America’s writers for decades. Our Board of Directors is honored that they will accept these awards and grace our gala with their presence.”

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