the Olsen twins' new coffee-table book

Speaking of twins, Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen will be co-authors on a new coffee-table book titled "Influence." Featuring 22 interviews with who they deemed influential actors, designers, and artists, the book features the likes of Diane von Furstenberg, John Galliano, Lauren Hutton, Karl Lagerfeld, Christian Louboutin, Margherita Missoni, and Giambattista Valli.

While I wouldn't call myself an Olsen fan, one of the things I admire most about them are their work ethics. People make fun of their "hobo" fashion styles and call them out on MK's eating disorders, or who Ashley is currently dating, but what I find most remarkable about them is that even though they rarely speak to the press, and aren't in-your-face in their need for fame, they were able to transcend all of that by just working hard in areas that interest them, which in these days are fashion for Ash and acting for MK.

They've been working since they were toddlers, have never been exploited in a way that was damaging to their reputations, and were keen enough to go to college when they obviously had little need of it, if only to expand their minds just a little more. I admire how private they are, while at the same time building an empire that seems very much to be built on love and a belief in their own products. One forgets how young they still are, but they appear to be very wise due to their life experiences. Because of that, I would be very interested in reading what they feel are "influences" that have made them strong and successful.

"Influence" - Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen - $35 (Pre-order at Amazon or Barnes & Noble - available Oct. 28th)

sad and ironic state for literature...

I read this and it was just so sad!

A German fighter ace has just learned that one of his 28 wartime 'kills' was his favourite author.

Messerschmidt pilot Horst Rippert, 88, said he would have held his fire if he had known the man flying the Lightning fighter was renowned French novelist Antoine de Saint-Exupery.

The fliers clashed in the skies over southern France in July 1944.

"He was below me," said Rippert. "I saw his markings, manoeuvred myself behind him and shot him down.

"If I had known it was Saint-Exupery, I would never have shot him down. I loved his books.

"I knew he was a French pilot, but he was probably my favourite author at the time."

Saint-Exupery published eight books before his death, including The Little Prince, which has been translated into more than 50 languages.

Rippert gunned down 28 Allied planes during the war and found out about Saint-Exupery only from a historian who is writing the author's biography.

"I am shocked and sorry," the ex-Luftwaffe pilot said yesterday. "Who knows what other great books he would have gone on to write?"

While I have to admit that I have read only snippets of "The Little Prince," this story resides in my mind as one of those universal tales that do not die with time. For a children's book, it was mature in terms of the themes in the story, where it provided so many philosophical observations that try to dissect human nature that children's stories these days just seem dumbed down.

It is tragic that one of the author's fans shot him down, but sometimes the human world works in mystical ways. Would Saint-Exupery have found humor in this story? I think he would have smiled at the irony.

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Anglophile, bibliophile, Janeite...

You can call me all of those things, as my recent purchases completely support these statements! It is no secret on this blog that I have a slight obsession with "Pride & Prejudice" (ok, maybe more than slight), as I've watched the 1995 BBC TV series more times than I can count while in high school, and after the 2005 film came out on DVD, I've watched that at least 10 times. The TV series is truer to the book, but I loved the chemistry in the film more, so I love them both equally.

Lately, I've been obsessed with trying to find a copy of the book that is lifted directly from the original 1813 text, as the current versions that are published now have been revised since sometime around the late 1800s/early 1900s. (The original also happened to have been published in three volumes, but now they are all combined into one book.) Even if it's difficult to read, I want to try, but it seems that no one has bothered to create this version, aside from a collector's miniature set, where the books measure 3"x 2". That's too small to really read from! And frankly, I don't have £7,495 to buy the original; really, a copy would suffice!

Anyhow, on a whim, I purchased an 1895 illustrated copy of the book, and I love it. This is not the first time that I've purchased antiquarian books, as I did that when I was a child at local flea markets (what I did with them, or where they are now, I have no idea), but this is the first time I really pursued a book that I loved. Although this copy isn't in any mint condition, I still love it for all the whimsical illustrations. I can't wait to re-read this book!


In addition, while I was perusing the Regency period on eBay UK, I came across this fashion plate, which is equivalent to their version of fashion magazines back in the day. I love the look of this woman, where she looks back at you with such clarity, and she looks so proper in her day dress, which is similar to what I imagined Elizabeth Bennet might have worn, minus the bonnet and purse (I see her touting a book with her hair in a loose bun, curls unfurling in the wind as she wanders through Derbyshire). I purchased this as well, and plan to frame it and hang as wall art.


Although this was not the most glamorous or romantic period in history, I must say that from both film, TV, and books, it's become romanticized, and I like the simplicity of the times, that it wasn't very gaudy, vulgar, or over-the-top in regards to the way that ppl acted or dressed. Women sewed, read, played music, danced...it was all very un-posh, which is why the human mind and connectivity were so important. It is more and more difficult to capture that feeling in this day and age.

Harry Potter mania still going strong

The Harry Potter sequel that J.K. Rowling wrote to benefit two charities sold for £25,000 yesterday. Not bad for a double-sided postcard's worth of work! In total, after the auction of all 13 author contributed cards, almost £50,000 was raised to benefit the Dyslexia Action and English PEN.

While I was very excited to read the prequel, I have to say, this wasn't as story-driven as I would've liked. Basically, this was a quick sequence that took place three years before Harry was born, and involved Harry's dad, James Potter, and his godfather, Sirius Black. And what's the deal on "Elvendork?" Can anyone explain that to me?

The one thing that this does for me is that it does put into perspective that if Rowling wanted to, she could continue the saga from the perspectives of an earlier generation, which could have a different feel. But alas, she has said she won't write anything HP-related for the next 10 years, so that's that. This is the last time we'll read anything new that has anything to do with HP!

Here is a copy of the original handwritten copy, but if you're having trouble reading it, there were ppl kind enough to type it out for all to see. Read it here.


Also, you can pre-order a postcard book that will be available in August, which will contain facsimiles of all 13 cards. I already ordered 2 copies; you should do the same!

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Harry Potter meets Harvard

J.K. Rowling was in Cambridge yesterday to give the commencement speech to the Class of 2008 at Harvard University. Why, as a local, I wasn't even aware of this until after it all happened, I'm not sure, but anyhow, here was her speech. It is quite a nice speech, some parts humble, but she speaks as she's always allowed herself to be seen publicly; with humility, understanding, and yes, humbleness. How I wish I could've been present!

The Fringe Benefits of Failure, and the Importance of Imagination
by J.K. Rowling

President Faust, members of the Harvard Corporation and the Board of Overseers, members of the faculty, proud parents, and, above all, graduates,

The first thing I would like to say is 'thank you.' Not only has Harvard given me an extraordinary honor, but the weeks of fear and nausea I've experienced at the thought of giving this commencement address have made me lose weight. A win-win situation! Now all I have to do is take deep breaths, squint at the red banners and fool myself into believing I am at the world's best-educated Harry Potter convention.

Delivering a commencement address is a great responsibility; or so I thought until I cast my mind back to my own graduation. The commencement speaker that day was the distinguished British philosopher Baroness Mary Warnock. Reflecting on her speech has helped me enormously in writing this one, because it turns out that I can't remember a single word she said. This liberating discovery enables me to proceed without any fear that I might inadvertently influence you to abandon promising careers in business, law or politics for the giddy delights of becoming a gay wizard.

You see? If all you remember in years to come is the 'gay wizard' joke, I've still come out ahead of Baroness Mary Warnock. Achievable goals: the first step towards personal improvement.

Actually, I have wracked my mind and heart for what I ought to say to you today. I have asked myself what I wish I had known at my own graduation, and what important lessons I have learned in the 21 years that has expired between that day and this.

I have come up with two answers. On this wonderful day when we are gathered together to celebrate your academic success, I have decided to talk to you about the benefits of failure. And as you stand on the threshold of what is sometimes called 'real life', I want to extol the crucial importance of imagination.

These might seem quixotic or paradoxical choices, but please bear with me.

Looking back at the 21-year-old that I was at graduation, is a slightly uncomfortable experience for the 42-year-old that she has become. Half my lifetime ago, I was striking an uneasy balance between the ambition I had for myself, and what those closest to me expected of me.

I was convinced that the only thing I wanted to do, ever, was to write novels. However, my parents, both of whom came from impoverished backgrounds and neither of whom had been to college, took the view that my overactive imagination was an amusing personal quirk that could never pay a mortgage, or secure a pension.

They had hoped that I would take a vocational degree; I wanted to study English Literature. A compromise was reached that in retrospect satisfied nobody, and I went up to study Modern Languages. Hardly had my parents' car rounded the corner at the end of the road than I ditched German and scuttled off down the Classics corridor.

I cannot remember telling my parents that I was studying Classics; they might well have found out for the first time on graduation day. Of all subjects on this planet, I think they would have been hard put to name one less useful than Greek mythology when it came to securing the keys to an executive bathroom.

I would like to make it clear, in parenthesis, that I do not blame my parents for their point of view. There is an expiry date on blaming your parents for steering you in the wrong direction; the moment you are old enough to take the wheel, responsibility lies with you. What is more, I cannot criticize my parents for hoping that I would never experience poverty. They had been poor themselves, and I have since been poor, and I quite agree with them that it is not an ennobling experience. Poverty entails fear, and stress, and sometimes depression; it means a thousand petty humiliations and hardships. Climbing out of poverty by your own efforts, that is indeed something on which to pride yourself, but poverty itself is romanticized only by fools.

What I feared most for myself at your age was not poverty, but failure.

At your age, in spite of a distinct lack of motivation at university, where I had spent far too long in the coffee bar writing stories, and far too little time at lectures, I had a knack for passing examinations, and that, for years, had been the measure of success in my life and that of my peers.

I am not dull enough to suppose that because you are young, gifted and well-educated, you have never known hardship or heartbreak. Talent and intelligence never yet inoculated anyone against the caprice of the Fates, and I do not for a moment suppose that everyone here has enjoyed an existence of unruffled privilege and contentment.

However, the fact that you are graduating from Harvard suggests that you are not very well-acquainted with failure. You might be driven by a fear of failure quite as much as a desire for success. Indeed, your conception of failure might not be too far from the average person's idea of success, so high have you already flown academically.

Ultimately, we all have to decide for ourselves what constitutes failure, but the world is quite eager to give you a set of criteria if you let it. So I think it fair to say that by any conventional measure, a mere seven years after my graduation day, I had failed on an epic scale. An exceptionally short-lived marriage had imploded, and I was jobless, a lone parent, and as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain, without being homeless. The fears my parents had had for me, and that I had had for myself, had both come to pass, and by every usual standard, I was the biggest failure I knew.

Now, I am not going to stand here and tell you that failure is fun. That period of my life was a dark one, and I had no idea that there was going to be what the press has since represented as a kind of fairy tale resolution. I had no idea how far the tunnel extended, and for a long time, any light at the end of it was a hope rather than a reality.

So why do I talk about the benefits of failure? Simply because failure meant a stripping away of the inessential. I stopped pretending to myself that I was anything other than what I was, and began to direct all my energy into finishing the only work that mattered to me. Had I really succeeded at anything else, I might never have found the determination to succeed in the one arena I believed I truly belonged. I was set free, because my greatest fear had already been realized, and I was still alive, and I still had a daughter whom I adored, and I had an old typewriter and a big idea. And so rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my life.

You might never fail on the scale I did, but some failure in life is inevitable. It is impossible to live without failing at something, unless you live so cautiously that you might as well not have lived at all – in which case, you fail by default.

Failure gave me an inner security that I had never attained by passing examinations. Failure taught me things about myself that I could have learned no other way. I discovered that I had a strong will, and more discipline than I had suspected; I also found out that I had friends whose value was truly above rubies.

The knowledge that you have emerged wiser and stronger from setbacks means that you are, ever after, secure in your ability to survive. You will never truly know yourself, or the strength of your relationships, until both have been tested by adversity. Such knowledge is a true gift, for all that it is painfully won, and it has been worth more to me than any qualification I ever earned.

Given a time machine or a Time Turner, I would tell my 21-year-old self that personal happiness lies in knowing that life is not a check-list of acquisition or achievement. Your qualifications, your CV, are not your life, though you will meet many people of my age and older who confuse the two. Life is difficult, and complicated, and beyond anyone's total control, and the humility to know that will enable you to survive its vicissitudes.

You might think that I chose my second theme, the importance of imagination, because of the part it played in rebuilding my life, but that is not wholly so. Though I will defend the value of bedtime stories to my last gasp, I have learned to value imagination in a much broader sense. Imagination is not only the uniquely human capacity to envision that which is not, and therefore the fount of all invention and innovation. In its arguably most transformative and revelatory capacity, it is the power that enables us to empathize with humans whose experiences we have never shared.

One of the greatest formative experiences of my life preceded Harry Potter, though it informed much of what I subsequently wrote in those books. This revelation came in the form of one of my earliest day jobs. Though I was sloping off to write stories during my lunch hours, I paid the rent in my early 20s by working in the research department at Amnesty International's headquarters in London.

There in my little office I read hastily scribbled letters smuggled out of totalitarian regimes by men and women who were risking imprisonment to inform the outside world of what was happening to them. I saw photographs of those who had disappeared without trace, sent to Amnesty by their desperate families and friends. I read the testimony of torture victims and saw pictures of their injuries. I opened handwritten, eye-witness accounts of summary trials and executions, of kidnappings and rapes.

Many of my co-workers were ex-political prisoners, people who had been displaced from their homes, or fled into exile, because they had the temerity to think independently of their government. Visitors to our office included those who had come to give information, or to try and find out what had happened to those they had been forced to leave behind.

I shall never forget the African torture victim, a young man no older than I was at the time, who had become mentally ill after all he had endured in his homeland. He trembled uncontrollably as he spoke into a video camera about the brutality inflicted upon him. He was a foot taller than I was, and seemed as fragile as a child. I was given the job of escorting him to the Underground Station afterwards, and this man whose life had been shattered by cruelty took my hand with exquisite courtesy, and wished me future happiness.

And as long as I live I shall remember walking along an empty corridor and suddenly hearing, from behind a closed door, a scream of pain and horror such as I have never heard since. The door opened, and the researcher poked out her head and told me to run and make a hot drink for the young man sitting with her. She had just given him the news that in retaliation for his own outspokenness against his country's regime, his mother had been seized and executed.

Every day of my working week in my early 20s I was reminded how incredibly fortunate I was, to live in a country with a democratically elected government, where legal representation and a public trial were the rights of everyone.

Every day, I saw more evidence about the evils humankind will inflict on their fellow humans, to gain or maintain power. I began to have nightmares, literal nightmares, about some of the things I saw, heard and read.

And yet I also learned more about human goodness at Amnesty International than I had ever known before.

Amnesty mobilizes thousands of people who have never been tortured or imprisoned for their beliefs to act on behalf of those who have. The power of human empathy, leading to collective action, saves lives, and frees prisoners. Ordinary people, whose personal well-being and security are assured, join together in huge numbers to save people they do not know, and will never meet. My small participation in that process was one of the most humbling and inspiring experiences of my life.

Unlike any other creature on this planet, humans can learn and understand, without having experienced. They can think themselves into other people's minds, imagine themselves into other people's places.

Of course, this is a power, like my brand of fictional magic, that is morally neutral. One might use such an ability to manipulate, or control, just as much as to understand or sympathize.

And many prefer not to exercise their imaginations at all. They choose to remain comfortably within the bounds of their own experience, never troubling to wonder how it would feel to have been born other than they are. They can refuse to hear screams or to peer inside cages; they can close their minds and hearts to any suffering that does not touch them personally; they can refuse to know.

I might be tempted to envy people who can live that way, except that I do not think they have any fewer nightmares than I do. Choosing to live in narrow spaces can lead to a form of mental agoraphobia, and that brings its own terrors. I think the willfully unimaginative see more monsters. They are often more afraid.

What is more, those who choose not to empathize may enable real monsters. For without ever committing an act of outright evil ourselves, we collude with it, through our own apathy.

One of the many things I learned at the end of that Classics corridor down which I ventured at the age of 18, in search of something I could not then define, was this, written by the Greek author Plutarch: What we achieve inwardly will change outer reality.

That is an astonishing statement and yet proven a thousand times every day of our lives. It expresses, in part, our inescapable connection with the outside world, the fact that we touch other people's lives simply by existing.

But how much more are you, Harvard graduates of 2008, likely to touch other people's lives? Your intelligence, your capacity for hard work, the education you have earned and received, give you unique status, and unique responsibilities. Even your nationality sets you apart. The great majority of you belong to the world's only remaining superpower. The way you vote, the way you live, the way you protest, the pressure you bring to bear on your government, has an impact way beyond your borders. That is your privilege, and your burden.

If you choose to use your status and influence to raise your voice on behalf of those who have no voice; if you choose to identify not only with the powerful, but with the powerless; if you retain the ability to imagine yourself into the lives of those who do not have your advantages, then it will not only be your proud families who celebrate your existence, but thousands and millions of people whose reality you have helped transform for the better. We do not need magic to change the world, we carry all the power we need inside ourselves already: we have the power to imagine better.

I am nearly finished. I have one last hope for you, which is something that I already had at 21. The friends with whom I sat on graduation day have been my friends for life. They are my children's godparents, the people to whom I've been able to turn in times of trouble, friends who have been kind enough not to sue me when I've used their names for Death Eaters. At our graduation we were bound by enormous affection, by our shared experience of a time that could never come again, and, of course, by the knowledge that we held certain photographic evidence that would be exceptionally valuable if any of us ran for Prime Minister.

So today, I can wish you nothing better than similar friendships. And tomorrow, I hope that even if you remember not a single word of mine, you remember those of Seneca, another of those old Romans I met when I fled down the Classics corridor, in retreat from career ladders, in search of ancient wisdom:

As is a tale, so is life: not how long it is, but how good it is, is what matters.

I wish you all very good lives.

Thank you very much.

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I am a bookworm, unapologetically...

This is probably old news to some, but I had no idea that Amazon had won the auction of the only copy of J.K. Rowling's "The Tales of Beedle the Bard" to be available for sale. Only 7 copies of this handwritten book exist, but Rowling gave the other 6 to those whom she wanted to thank. The 7th copy was placed at auction to raise money for the Children's Voice campaign. Amazon won the auction back in December of last year.


I read a lot, and the Harry Potter books were definitely one of the highlights of my book list in the past decade. I recall being a bit of a book snob when the first book came out, and many ppl recommended it to me, but at my first reading, the book smelled faintly of Roald Dahl's influence (i.e. "James and the Giant Peach," one of my all-time faves), so I thought of her (or him; I don't think I knew the author was a woman then) as a copycat, and couldn't get through the book. A year later, I was bored and wanted to read something, ppl were still telling me that I should read it, so I picked it, and slogged through the first several chapters, hoping to get over my negative feelings. By the end of the book, I was hooked. Luckily for me, the 2nd book was already available then, so I could continue on reading, and I was charmed all over, just like the rest of the world had already been.

Last summer, when I was in London, I was there just when the last book was being released. I didn't stand in any lines at midnight or get dressed up or anything, but I did go into the Waterstone's at Trafalgar Sq. that first day, and picked up my UK copy, and read it on the plane while flying back to Boston. It was so great to be back in that world, but sad, too, because I knew it was all coming to an end.

Anyhow, even though the series is long over, J.K. Rowling continues the saga of her universe through very inventive means. I am actually very glad that it was Amazon that won this auction for "The Tales of Beedle the Bard," because they chose to share it with the world, and that is more than any fan could ask for. The book was referenced in the HP series as a book that Ron had. JKR had to go back and create all new stories to fit in with the original titles she had listed as stories contained in the book. You can Amazon's reviews here, but unfortunately, they didn't transcribe the original text! Better than nothing, huh? :P

A week from now, there is another auction that J.K. Rowling will participate in. To benefit the Dyslexia Action and English PEN, a writers' association, Waterstone's bookstore (that same one that I bought my HP book from) is holding an auction of 13 original works from 13 internationally renowned authors. Rowling's contribution will be an 800 word prequel to "Harry Potter" that she'd handwritten onto a card.


It would be silly to think that any one of us mortals would be able to afford something like this, but you can buy the entire collection of works in book form. And for your Harry Potter fans, the big tease coming from Waterstone's is this last sentence by JKR, saying, "From the prequel that I am not working on - but that was fun! JK Rowling 2008."


Waterstone's Exclusive Postcard Book: To celebrate the National Year of Reading Waterstone's asked 13 world-class authors to tell us their story. We extended this invitation to our customers, in the form of a nationwide competition to win the opportunity to be published in this limited edition postcard book, alongside the original works from JK Rowling, Doris Lessing, Neil Gaiman, Michael Rosen, Nick Hornby, Sebastian Faulks, Lauren Child, Tom Stoppard, Irvine Welsh, Axel Scheffler, Margaret Atwood, Richard Ford and Lisa Appignanesi. This collection consists of 13 story cards from the authors listed above plus story cards from the three winners of the national competition. Due to the exclusive nature of this product, we are limiting orders to two (2) per customer while stocks last. All profits from the sale of this collection will go to Dyslexia Action and English PEN. Please note that because the postcard book contains a mixture of authors, some stories are not suitable for children.

Happy Reading!!! :)

Waterstone's Exclusive Postcard Book - £5

Losing the Age of Innocence - PLEASE HELP!!!

Last spring, I was out in the Berkshires for a friend's wedding, when my honey and I decided to visit "The Mount," Edith Wharton's estate. The unique aspect of the home and gardens was that she designed the entire property herself. Wharton is best known for her novels, such as "The Age of Innocence" and "House of Mirth." However, later in her life, she actually published the first books on home decorating. She was there before Martha Stewart ever came along!


So I was sad to read that "The Mount" is in danger of being foreclosed. Can't historic landmarks be exempt from a recession? Much time and money were spent renovating the home back to its former grandeur. However, the estate has less than one month now to raise over $3M to keep it alive as both a landmark and museum to the legacy of Edith Wharton.


I don't get many readers to this site, and maybe my one little voice won't make much of a difference, but I hope that you will donate something, anything, to keep this estate alive! When I was there, while the interiors were modest, and much of the original furniture is no longer there, it really was beautifully renovated, and it would be a huge shame if this property is never public for people to see again. This is where Wharton wrote some of the most beautiful and classic American novels! England has Jane Austen, we have Edith Wharton! Keep it open, and keep it alive!


For me, seeing the home made me relive all those novels and films that were so romantic when I experienced them as a youngster, no matter if the endings were happy or not. So please, I hope you can contribute to keep her legacy alive. I have donated. Will you please do?

PLEASE DONATE HERE!!! :D

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