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The proof is in the pudding. |
Pritchard’s Law says, in one (narrow) application, there will be an inverse relationship between the amount of plot per page in a novel and the quality of its prose. The more plot, the worse prose.
Below are passages from various novels quoted by James Wood in The New Yorker. He specifically singled out these passages as being well-written. What do they have in common? Read more
Four years ago, he decided to give writing a shot. He and his wife were living in a 750-square foot house in Boone, N.C. He was unemployed; his wife was working as a psychologist. He had an idea for a story about a young spaceship pilot who travels across the galaxy in search of her missing father. He sold the novel, “Molly Fyde and the Parsona Rescue,” to a small Indiana publisher for less than a thousand dollars. Sales were meager. Read more
Big Rock is an attribute of 140 acres two hours drive from Sydney. This has been set up next to Edward Szewczyk, an Australian designer Polska comply. That is, underestimated complicated complicated, knives home is the goal of any owner and their acquaintances rocking the city. Read more
from Down Here in the Dream Quarter, Doubleday, New York, 1976
pp. xvi-xxi
My first piece, written in 12/65
My second written three months later
My third SF piece, written in September
My fourth was written in 11/66. Campbell told my agent Read more
When I was very young, the gravity inside our house was accidentally reversed. Upon crossing the threshold a person, unless he was prepared, would immediately fall upwards, cracking his head on the ceiling. On one occasional, this effect paralyzed a mailman. Those of us who knew what to expect partially rotated our bodies so as to land on our feet. There we would find a whole living room set resting upside down—though of course it appeared right side up once you were up there—on the ceiling. My mother took this quite within stride, but my father could usually be found, after work, strapped in a harness and hoisted up to the floor, where he could pretend the house was still normal, but when his favorite television show came on, my father would usually return to the ceiling and say, “I’m not going to sit on the ceiling like some damn savage, but if the TV’s up here, I suppose I can make an exception for an hour or two.” Read more
The Mystery of the Locked Room Murder
Inspector Ford tried the knob. It didn’t budge. The heavy wooden door was locked from the inside.
“Lord Bromley always takes breakfast at half nine, sir,” the butler, Remington, pontificated. ”When he didn’t respond, that’s when we called the constabulary.”
Inspector Ford knelt and looked through the keyhole. He could just make out the motionless form of Lord Bromley under the bearskin on the four-poster bed. “And you say there’s no other way in or out?”
“No sir. The window is much too high for any ladder and the chimney flue, well, it would be impossible for any man to shimmy through that, sir.” Read more
Nepotism is much maligned among losers without famous and rich parents, but in the most exclusive clubs in America, the truth is whispered: nepotism is great! Nepotism is the lifeblood on which our society runs. If you don’t believe me, just ask its beneficiaries. I mean, who are you going to trust: a bunch of deadbeats who have mortgages and fly commercial, or subscribers to the Robb Report? The sooner that people without homes on at least two continents realize they should not have opinions of their own but should simply follow the wishes of their betters, the happier everyone will be. Read more
“I’ve always thought that I had the perfect hair to play Jim Hawkins from Treasure Island. But now that I’m too old to play him, I feel that my hair has been wasted! Keeps me awake at night, man!” — James McAvoy
Me too, James. Me too.
As if their ability to consume mounds of boiled cabbage and not get fat isn’t enviable enough, Uzbek women have yet another reason to make their American counterparts jealous: their relationships. According to Gulshanoy Nebiyeva, author of What Uzbek Women Know: About Love, Sex and Other Matters of the Heart and Mind, Uzbek women enjoy a satisfaction in romance that we in the States can only dream about. In order to give women on this side of the Atlantic a leg up in the love department, we asked Nebiyeva for her thoughts on what makes their dating practices so wildly successful — and what American women can do to capture a little of that ya nye znayo chto themselves. Read more
When I was a child, I had a balloon. I enjoyed the balloon. Whenever I met another child who also had a balloon, I would say, “This one is like me, he also has a balloon.” There was an immediate bond between us. If he asked me a favor, I would comply, reasoning that he would reciprocate in the future if I was in need, and even if no such situation ever arose, I could still feel satisfied doing the right thing. It was part of the brotherhood of those who had balloons. Read more