The New York Review of Books

‘The premier literary-intellectual magazine in the English language.’

December 3rd 2012

8 notes |#

“Rushdie has said that one of his aims in writing Joseph Anton was to be ‘tougher’ on himself ‘than on anybody else.’ This is a steep ambition for any memoirist and quite possibly an unrealistic one for a man as tenacious in his grudges as Rushdie. When faced with a choice between exercising magnanimity and exacting long-awaited revenge, the author of Joseph Anton almost invariably opts for the latter.

“Some of his most egregiously uncharitable moments occur when writing about his four marriages. Rushdie has a habit of excusing his own fairly frequent infidelities and betrayals with reference to the imperative nature of his own desires. The various failings of the wives—their money-grubbing and nagging, their jealousy of his talent, and so on—are not so readily excused.”

Zoë Heller on Salman Rushdie’s memoir

Photo: Salman Rushdie, Brick Lane, London, 1988 (Gilles Peress/Magnum Photos)

Posted at 5:38pm and tagged with: The New York Review of Books, Lit, Zoe Heller, Salam Rushdie, memoir, hatchet job,.

“Rushdie has said that one of his aims in writing Joseph Anton was to be ‘tougher’ on himself ‘than on anybody else.’ This is a steep ambition for any memoirist and quite possibly an unrealistic one for a man as tenacious in his grudges as Rushdie. When faced with a choice between exercising magnanimity and exacting long-awaited revenge, the author of Joseph Anton almost invariably opts for the latter. “Some of his most egregiously uncharitable moments occur when writing about his four marriages. Rushdie has a habit of excusing his own fairly frequent infidelities and betrayals with reference to the imperative nature of his own desires. The various failings of the wives—their money-grubbing and nagging, their jealousy of his talent, and so on—are not so readily excused.” Zoë Heller on Salman Rushdie’s memoir Photo: Salman Rushdie, Brick Lane, London, 1988 (Gilles Peress/Magnum Photos)

June 22nd 2011

9 notes |#

Perry Link, My Disillusionment: China, 1973

The first time I tried to go to China was in 1967, the year after I graduated from college. My father was a radical leftist professor who admired Mao Zedong. And that influence, along with the Vietnam War protests—a movement in which I was not only a participant but an activist—led me to look at socialist China with very high hopes.

Posted at 10:00am and tagged with: China, Perry Link, Mao, memoir,.

Perry Link, My Disillusionment: China, 1973 The first time I tried to go to China was in 1967, the year after I graduated from college. My father was a radical leftist professor who admired Mao Zedong. And that influence, along with the Vietnam War protests—a movement in which I was not only a participant but an activist—led me to look at socialist China with very high hopes.

June 6th 2011

14 notes |#

Bill Hayes, AIDS at 30: A Time Capsule

In the late eighties, coworkers and I at the San Francisco AIDS Foundation came up with an idea to get people—gay men, in particular—thinking about the future. We decided to create a time capsule. But it would not contain kitschy souvenirs—gadgets and record albums and the like. Instead, the AIDS Time Capsule would house answers to a simple question:

What message would you send to people 50 years from now about your experiences during the epidemic?

In June of 1990, we set up a booth at the San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Pride Parade. Crowds cheered marchers nearby on Market Street, yet the mood was somber within our humid vinyl tent. Whenever I looked up from our table, arrayed with pencils and paper, I saw a steady flow of men waiting patiently in a line that did not shorten until the parade ended and the fog rolled in. Single men, couples, and groups of friends, pumped-up, sun-burned, half-undressed, young men propped on canes and leather-daddies in wheelchairs: all waiting to send a note to the future.

I left the AIDS Foundation well over a dozen years ago, and I moved from San Francisco to New York two years back. I have no idea whether the AIDS Time Capsule has survived safely someplace; our idea of a “capsule” was a taped-up cardboard box. Fortunately, however, before we packed up the more than 500 messages, I made Xerox copies of a number of them. On the occasion of the 30th anniversary of AIDS on June 5, I pulled them out for the first time in two decades and took a look at them.

Photo: Hospice of Marin County, 1982 (Paul Fusco/Magnum Photos)

Posted at 3:15pm and tagged with: AIDS, memoir, long reads,.

Bill Hayes, AIDS at 30: A Time Capsule In the late eighties, coworkers and I at the San Francisco AIDS Foundation came up with an idea to get people—gay men, in particular—thinking about the future. We decided to create a time capsule. But it would not contain kitschy souvenirs—gadgets and record albums and the like. Instead, the AIDS Time Capsule would house answers to a simple question: What message would you send to people 50 years from now about your experiences during the epidemic? In June of 1990, we set up a booth at the San Francisco Gay and Lesbian Pride Parade. Crowds cheered marchers nearby on Market Street, yet the mood was somber within our humid vinyl tent. Whenever I looked up from our table, arrayed with pencils and paper, I saw a steady flow of men waiting patiently in a line that did not shorten until the parade ended and the fog rolled in. Single men, couples, and groups of friends, pumped-up, sun-burned, half-undressed, young men propped on canes and leather-daddies in wheelchairs: all waiting to send a note to the future. I left the AIDS Foundation well over a dozen years ago, and I moved from San Francisco to New York two years back. I have no idea whether the AIDS Time Capsule has survived safely someplace; our idea of a “capsule” was a taped-up cardboard box. Fortunately, however, before we packed up the more than 500 messages, I made Xerox copies of a number of them. On the occasion of the 30th anniversary of AIDS on June 5, I pulled them out for the first time in two decades and took a look at them. Photo: Hospice of Marin County, 1982 (Paul Fusco/Magnum Photos)