On Article About Mail Shockingly Good
Perry Anderson's Brazil article from like two issues ago is also terrific!
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On Bolt Bus v. Fung Wah: Which Cheap Bus To Boston Is Least Annoying?
This was brilliant. Thank you!
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On Amazon Ruined Every Writer's Month With Metrics
But Bookscan is extremely unreliable! It fails to account for as much as a third of sales, and even when the gap is smaller, it is always too low. And no e-books! And if you are an author whose book was published before 2000, then it is entirely useless, because it only accounts for sales after 2000. For what it's worth, etc.
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On Men Like Local Train Station
This is a wonderful, wonderful piece. Down with our regressive urban impulses!
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On "A Masterpiece"! 'NYT' Book Review Honcho Goes Big on Franzen
But the Volvo 240 was a really popular car! If I mentioned Corn Flakes or CBS in a novel, would I be winking and nudging, too?
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On The Internet: It's Pretty Much As Mean As All Of Us
Seconded. I really do not understand the rage and would love an explanation.
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On That Janet Maslin Doesn't Like Joshua Ferris' New Book Doesn't Mean Anything
I think Maslin also loses some authority with this:
"This novel opens with a section called "The Feet, Mechanical" which is suggestive of "The Syntax, Adorable," and introduces a cold winter through which Tim will begin to wander."
The syntax might be precious and adorable, but it's Emily Dickinson's and not Ferris's. But Maslin either doesn't know this (Google in quotation marks!) or just went ahead and willingly misled her readers.
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On et alS, with Cord Jefferson: Obama's Kinda Meh First Year
Future column request: Ron Rosenbaum. What's his deal? (Really, though. I appreciate any and all explanations.)
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On et alS, with Cord Jefferson: Newspapers Are Doing As Badly As You Think
Much more of this please!
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On My Cubicle In The Starchitect's Building
Very sorry to nitpick, but it was actually Kisho Kurakawa who came up with Astana's master plan. Foster designed its two most ridiculous buildings.