tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8470094.post4620294918855020117..comments2024-03-18T16:55:31.971+00:00Comments on This Space: A profound conjunctionStephen Mitchelmorehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01658772259307446873noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8470094.post-38775989236063608272009-11-18T19:49:26.112+00:002009-11-18T19:49:26.112+00:00That's a wonderful letter; thanks for reproduc...That's a wonderful letter; thanks for reproducing it, Steve. I think I am probably now where you were in 1988. Time to stop stockpiling the Handkes and Bernhards, then, and read them.<br /><br />I started subscribing to the LRB about a year ago, after spending some happy hours in its bookshop while in London. (Yes, that is a non sequitur.) In a fit of insanity, I chose the two year sub option. I won't be renewing, though I do like having subscriber access to the archive.John Selfhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05761816149593541133noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8470094.post-19074719145837637122009-11-14T20:06:18.461+00:002009-11-14T20:06:18.461+00:00Jeff, I have read Gaddis; well, 350 pages of The R...Jeff, I have read Gaddis; well, 350 pages of The Recognitions. It passed me by – in fact, I have no memory of what I read. <br /><br />I'm Catholic and wish the TLS would try to save me instead.Stephen Mitchelmorehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01658772259307446873noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8470094.post-75480515826341940542009-11-14T02:57:42.104+00:002009-11-14T02:57:42.104+00:00Steven, that's a good post, and as the lone (s...Steven, that's a good post, and as the lone (so far as I can tell) Josipovici reader where I live (a province in canada), I can sympathize with wanting to find books that go deeper.<br /><br />In 1987 I took a break from my Henry Miller thesis to read a book that a critic had fulsomely praised, with such good reasoning that I went and bought all three books then out by William Gaddis. I started with _The Recognitions_, and 600 pages in had to stop or else I never would have finished my Miller rewrite. He impressed me as someone who writes deep. You've probably read him.<br /><br />As for the _lRB_, as much as I enjoy it, it seems to hew to an unorthodox line politically in some areas, but it's orthodox in its choice of fiction (though I'm thankful for Julian Barnes' review of _Novels in Three Lines_). Maybe the _TLS_ is less noticeably so (though it's still trying to save Anglicanism from Anglicans).Jeffhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15813604798802451639noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8470094.post-68775302519116525622009-11-11T12:36:19.645+00:002009-11-11T12:36:19.645+00:00I receive the LRB and every other week when it arr...I receive the LRB and every other week when it arrives on the doorstep, my partner comments on the fact that it 'never does fiction'. It's interesting, what with all the well-placed media fanfair of their 30 years and the ed's book 20-years coming, that this fact has not, as far as I am aware, been mentioned in any of the reviews of the magazine. Certainly there has been no criticism that I've spotted, either. But I wonder, Steve, why it is that the LRB doesn't 'do' fiction? It doesn't really even do bad fiction, other than the odd review of novels written by former right-hand men of Tony Blair. The market, I suppose, is the reason for this. Is it?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com