Maupin was born in Washington DC and graduated from Needham Broughton High School before attending the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His first foray into writing was as a journalist for The Daily Tar Heel.
In 1974 he began what would become Tales of the City as a colum in the Pacific Sun newspaper, moving to the San Francisco Chronicle after the Sun’s San Francisco edition folded. Read More
French loved both acting and writing from an early age and her debut novel, In the Woods, published in 2007 won the Edgar, Anthony, Macavity and Barry awards for best first novel. Today we’re looking at the author through some of her quotes, and the books they appeared in.
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Here are 12 book dedications almost guaranteed to raise a chuckle or two, and the books they come from.
Enjoy!
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Born in April 1931 to two academic and professional parents, Barthelme began writing as a teen for newspapers. He and his father had many arguments about what area of writing Donald was interested in, with particular disdain for Donald’s love for postmodern literature.
Aged 30, Barthelme had his first short story published while working as director of the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston. Eventually the writer went on to publish over 100 short stories. His strict postmodern style, spattered with non-sequiturs and playful use of language has created waves among both traditional and postmodern writers and critics.
Barthelme’s influences include Samuel Beckett, Franz Kafka, and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. He was described in Time magazine as an author with “Kafka’s purity of language and some of Beckett’s grim humour.”
To date, Caryl Phillips has written more than a dozen novels, historical fiction and plays. Today we’re going to bring attention to some of those works with some quotes and the books they come from.
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Born in Bromley South London to a Pakistani father and an English mother, His father harboured dreams of writing but his ambitions were never realised. In contrast, his son Hanif is considered to be one of the greatest British writers and actually made the Times list of “The 50 greatest British writers since 1945”. Read More
Last year’s winner was Christopher Bollen, an American novelist whose passage describing the protagonist’s love interest is both weird and utterly unsexy:
“She covers her breasts with her swimsuit. The rest of her remains so delectably exposed. The skin along her arms and shoulders are different shades of tan like water stains in a bathtub. Her face and vagina are competing for my attention, so I glance down at the billiard rack of my penis and testicles.”
The original questions were a Victorian version of the personality quizzes from Buzzfeed of Playbuzz where we find out which Spice Girl we are most like or what fruit we could have been in a past life… Sort of. The answers given are supposed to offer an insight into the personality of whoever is answering.
Originally given to Marcel Proust by his female friend Antoinette, the manuscript was not seen by the public until after Proust’s death. This unfortunately meant that Proust was given all the credit for the questionnaire when in part it should have gone to Antoinette. Such is the life of a woman- to be basically ignored while a man takes credit. Anyway, I digress… The pop legend David Bowie answered these back in the 70s, and the book of the best star answers was published in 2009- available now to purchase!
Tracy is well known for her 2000 novel The Girl With The Pearl Earring that was adapted for the big screen and starred Scarlett Johansson. Her other novels include Remarkable Creatures; The Lady and The Unicorn; and The Virgin Blue.