John Updike

John Updike, at the 2006 convention of the American Booksellers Association said, “The printed, bound and paid-for book was – still is, for the moment – more exacting, more demanding, of its producer and consumer both. It is the site of an encounter, in silence, of two minds, one following the other’s steps but invited to imagine, to argue, to concur on a level of reflection beyond that of personal encounter, with all its merely social conventions, its merciful padding of blather and mutual forgiveness. Book readers and writers are approaching the condition of holdouts, surly hermits who refuse to come and play in the electronic sunshine of the post-Gutenberg village.”

John Updike, “The End of Authorship,” New York Times Book Review, June 25, 2006

R.L.S.

Seen in a school in Samoa.

“Robert Louis Stevenson, who was born in Scotland, was too delicate to work; instead, he became a writer of books.”

Inkhornism

Inkhornism, apparently in common use from 1400 to 1600, or thereabouts, means a learned or pedantic word or expression. In 1553 Thomas Wilson wrote The Arte of Rhetorique, a work intended to assist budding poets. In it he made fun of exaggerated and overblown language and offered a tour-de-force gibberish example. “I cannot but celebrate and extol your magnifical dexterity above all other, for how could you have adepted such illustrate prerogative and dominical superiority if the fecundity of your engaigne had not been so fertile and wonderful pregnant.”

He sounds as though he was talking about a politician.

St. John Bosco

It seems this St John is the patron saint of editors and publishers, so perhaps we as writers should give him our respect: without editors and publishers, where would we be? No, don’t answer that.