Gone Fishing

The BloGG will be on hiatus this week, as we recover from the hurricane and get our last blast of summer in. We will be back wordier than ever after Labor Day. Until then, enjoy the sunshine.

Around the Word

Literary survival kit: As New Yorkers, we are more used to asking what to wear than how to prepare for hurricanes and earthquakes. So to help you in your disaster planning, and get you in the right mindset for Irene's arrival, the New Yorker has profiled six shorts to read during a hurricane -- a mix of essays, poems, short stories, and novels, by writers including Sylvia Plath, Joseph Conrad, and Jack Kerouac.

Now that's a moving speech: Of all the funny tweets and stories we have seen in the wake of this week's East Coast quake, our favorite was this one relayed by our friend David Murray at Vital Speeches from freelance scribe Emerson Moran. "At 1:49 p.m. client texted me from DC that her speech received a standing ovation," Moran posted on Facebook. "Earthquake hit at 1:51. You do the math... my rates are going up.'"

Winning one-liners: The Edinburgh Fringe Festival, the largest arts festival in the world, is in full swing, and one of our favorite events is the quick-fire joke competition. This year's winner was comedian Nick Helm, who came up with this enchanting nugget on the spot: "I needed a password eight characters long so I picked Snow White and the Seven Dwarves." The runner-up was previous champion, Tim Vine, for this rib-tickler: "Crime in multi-storey car parks. That is wrong on so many levels." Veteran entertainer Paul Daniels took home the honor for the worst joke of the competition with this doozy: "I said to a fella 'Is there a B&Q in Henley?' He said 'No there's an H an E an L and N and a Y.'" For a list of the Top 10 jokes, check out this write-up of the funny festivities in the Daily Mail.

Speaking of funny contests. . . . We're always eager to clue you in on upcoming literary events and competitions, but we especially like to plug one of our own. In memory of his late mother, Brad Schreiber has created the Mona Schreiber Prize for Humorous Fiction and Non-Fiction. Mona Schreiber taught creative writing for San Mateo County and published numerous humorous articles and essays in newspapers and magazines. The contest, currently in its 11th year, challenges participants to submit humorous, double-spaced works up to 750 characters in length. "Writers of comedic essays, articles, short stories, poetry, shopping lists, ransom notes, and other forms are invited to submit." There is a $500 prize for 1st place, $250 for 2nd, and $100 for 3rd. We encourage anyone with an unorthodox sense of humor to participate and help Brad keep his mother's memory alive. For more info, go to Brad's website.

A new take on old PowerPoint rules: Gotham friend Brad Phillips has a smart new post on Ragan challenging a number of shibboleths about PowerPoint use including the Holy Grail of rules: "One slide per minute." The problem with that standard, Phillips argues, is that it "says nothing about how much information should appear on a slide. . . Since [speakers] present only one slide per minute, they deceive themselves into thinking they've produced a good presentation when, in fact, they've only created a cluttered mess." Additionally, looking at 60 slides a hour can be quite tiring for audiences -- "If I wanted to be put to sleep I'd take an Ambien or watch a PBS documentary," Phillips says. So what's a presenter to do? Phillips suggests reinforcing your point with images instead of a laundry list of bullet points, checking to see whether each new slide reinforces the concept, and determining whether there's a more compelling -- less electronically dependent way -- for you to deliver your message.

Worth tweeting: The Huffington Post reports that Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, the most popular in the United States, has added dozens of entries for the first time since 2009. "Social media" and "tweet," terms whose addition is reflective of the continuous evolution in our era's communications, are just two of 150 new words gracing the pages. Additions also include "bromance," "helicopter parent," and "robocall." The standard-settings at M-W are said to pick new entries after monitoring their use for several years and tallying their prevalence in mainstream and media outlets. Peter Sokolowski, Merriam's editor at large, explains: "Even if people had no interest or possible chance of getting a twitter themselves, they now have to know what 'tweet' means, and that's why it's in the dictionary."

Sexist summer reading? President Obama recently released his summer reading list, and his gender-imbalanced selections have some critics asking why he doesn't read more women. His latest list is about 70% male and an analysis of all books he's mentioned since becoming President in 2008 is a 23-to-1 blowout in favor of men. "It is a well know fact among those of us to whom this matters that while women read books written by men, men do not tend to reciprocate," writes Salon columnist Robin Black. While Black acknowledges that Obama probably isn't trying to endorse or perpetuate this trend, she does suggest he pay a bit more attention to his behavior -- ". . . . especially as a father of daughters who might enjoy and even be inspired by seeing their father cart around a book with a woman's name writ large." What do you think? Fair game? Or overblown carping?

iContact: If you've ever wondered just how important making eye contact is while public speaking, then you might want to check out the latest post from the Eloquent Woman for the rationale behind the axiom. Turns out eye contact is all it's cracked up to be, and research shows that looking away from your audience signals avoidance while looking at them signals approach, the latter which audiences rate highly. Eye contact, though, must be used wisely and well, EW advises. For example, be sure to look at all sections of the room as well as directly at individuals. Plan ahead for cultural concerns, as certain non-western cultures in particular, can find prolonged contact provocative, and remember, video practice makes perfect. "Like any form of gesturing--and that's what moving eyes are-- you need to have intentional, rather than unintentional moves. Even the simplest video camera can help you see what others see -- before your speech."

The Obama Speech Wars, Continued

In case you missed it, last week Vital Speeches guru David Murray took to the Huffington Post to issue a fairly stern finger-wagging to the all the PR and speech pros who are second-guessing President Obama's communication skills these days -- "Knock It Off" read the headline. Murray was quick to acknowledge that Obama has made some serious mistakes. But he warned against the limits and dangers of a common corrective many critics are prescribing, a major address to re-set the story of his presidency, along the lines of Jimmy Carter's infamous "Malaise Speech."

We can argue over the drinking table about how Obama should have framed his presidency at the outset. But I'm afraid that the only way he can play once-upon-a-time at this late stage is if there's a shocking disaster -- financial, natural or ballistic -- that's profound and terrifying enough to make Americans really willing to sit like children and hear a simple story of true heroes, real villains and the proverbial but elusive "story we can all believe in."

Well, it didn't take long for the piling on to resume -- most notably with a piece by former Clinton speechwriter and current West Wing Writers principal Jeff Shesol that ran earlier this week on the Daily Beast, under the headline Obama Needs a New Tune. Shesol's main argument is that Obama's post-partisan message, which resonated so well during the 2008 campaign and still ostensibly polls well in a vacuum, is ill-suited to this hyper-partisan moment.

. . . . Obama’s renewed campaign against partisanship serves mainly to remind us of one of our, and no doubt his, greatest disappointments: the ugly immutability of Washington, and the Republicans’ stubborn refusal to listen to reason. As an opening argument for his reelection, the president can do better than “put country ahead of party.” Not only is it a weak, vain hope, it is a fundamental misreading of what’s wrong with Washington. To paraphrase, this time, Michael Dukakis (something I do against my better judgment), this election is not about partisanship. It’s about ideology.

With that in mind, Shesol said, it's high time for Obama to choose sides -- not with a Malaise redux, but a more consistent differentiation. "[He] does not need to become a fire-breathing, populist parody of Franklin Roosevelt, as some left-leaning critics suggest. But to win a second term he has to sharpen the contrast, if not his rhetoric. He has to make it unmistakably clear that the Republican Party’s 'game' -- its endgame -- is not just to win the next election, but to undo much of the progress of the past century, and to rewrite some of our most cherished, basic assumptions about what it means to be an American. Then he needs to tell us what he plans to do about it."

Okay, speech pros: Which side do you come down on? Is there too much carping about the President's messaging? Or not enough edge/clarity/consistency to it?

Around the Word (Catch-up Edition)

Now that we are out of our earthquake crouch, we can resume our regular word-nerd programming. Here's a quick catch-up of the stories we've been following on the Word Wide Web the last few days.

You are what you read: How many times have you heard someone you know say a favorite book changed their life? Well, a new study out of Canada suggests that old chestnut may be more true than we know. According to Quill and Quire, Canada's premiere literary news magazine, a group of researchers at the University of Toronto found that reading fiction can alter people's personalities -- and arm them with better social skills than non-readers. The study randomly assigned participants 1 of 2 versions of a short story; one full and the other merely containing abbreviated plot points. "We found the people who read the [whole] story changed a bit in their personality," said lead researcher Keith Oatley. "What we found interesting was that they all changed in different ways." Does this ring true with you?

Pronunciation for Dummies: If you are like most wordsmiths, and spending more time writing than reciting, your pronunciation skills can get a little rusty. The New Yorker's Book Bench turned us onto a great way to flex those atrophied verbal muscles -- the Pronunciation Book on You Tube. This channel features a male speaker with a clear, easy-listening voice breaking down and sounding out a range of tricky words. For example: "When a conversation about poetry moves from Romanticism to Modernism, you'd hate to be the one who draws a distinction between Keats and Yeats, but mistakes them for a rhyming pair." Do you have any pro pronunciation tips to help avoid spoken faux pas?

Please, watch your pronouns: We're all taught to mind our manners, but according to psychologist James Pennebaker, we should be focusing on our pronouns too -- for they reveal the most about us. Our friend the Eloquent Woman recently posted a summary of Pennebaker's most interesting findings on the most personal of usages, some of which challenged conventional assumptions. "Most people assume that men use I-words and cognitive words more than women, and that women use we-words, emotions and social words more then men," EW wrote. "Bad news. You were right if you guessed that women use social words more. However, women use I-words and cognitive words at far higher rates than men." We're also offered some insight on how pronouns are used by those in power. Turns out that leaders tend to use them less, but underlings can't get enough of "I," "me," and "mine." If you want to learn more about the hidden messages your pronouns are sending, you can pick up Pennebaker's book, The Secret Life of Pronouns: What Our Words Say About Us.

How to turn PDFs into PDQs: Are you having trouble tracking and reading all the varied PDFs -- manuscripts, articles, editorial letters -- littering your desktop? We came across a neat tool, courtesy of eBookNewser, that can offer you some iRelief. This simple tutorial will show you how to cleanly convert your abundance of documents from different platforms into streamlined Kindle or epub files. "Our tutorial also includes a simple introduction to coding so you can scrub out frustrating headers, page numbers, or other stray bits of code that make your converted PDF hard to read." Try it out and let us know how it works.

Financials of the trade: If you are curious about what different literary jobs pay, you may want to consult Glassdoor, the anonymous job site, to get a sense of the landscape. Our friends at GalleyCat did a quick survey this week, and found that New York area book designers make about $58,924 on average, editors around $53,500 and publicists trail below at $37,093 a year. Do these numbers track with your experience?

One small step for authorkind: Also from GalleyCat, we learned of a rather novel partnership between NASA and Tor/Forge publishers. Now that the space program has gone on hiatus, NASA's scientists have agreed to assist Tor/Forge authors at a two day workshop at GFSC in November, where they will provide access to the agency's data and design elements. The program's immediate goal is to aid in the development of more "scientifically accurate and entertaining novels," though ultimately NASA hopes the program will encourage more students to follow science, math, and technology tracks in school.

Trim the fat off your kids' reading: The Los Angeles Times this week keyed us into a raging debate about a soon-to-be-released diet book targeted at girls between the ages of 6 and 12. The picture book, Maggie Goes on a Diet, by author and self-publisher Paul M. Kramer, is written in rhyme and chronicles Maggie's decision to lose weight after kids at school called her "fatty" and "chubby." Though Maggie loses weight the healthy way, cutting back on junk food and allowing herself one "normal-sized treat a week," critics contend that the book sends the disturbing message that being thin will make you happy.  One blogger commented, "Little girls shouldn't even know what a diet is, much less be encouraged to lose weight." In an interview Kramer commented that he wasn't advocating any little girl go on a diet, though he quickly rescinded the statement, acknowledging just seconds later that ..." Maggie did indeed go on a diet, as the title of the book clearly indicates." Despite the controversy Amazon still plans to offer the book, which should be available in October.

Around the Word

Decoding hipster speak: Like the Beatniks and punks before them, the hipsters who haunt urban culture these days have developed their very own exclusive lingo. If you'd like to get keyed into what those indie kids in Williamsburg and West Hollywood are saying, or harness some of that hipster cool for your own use, check out Hipster Ipsum, a cheeky new translation website. Particularly useful for those who'd like to write about hipster culture but don't speak the language, Hipster Ipsum will automatically generate content -- or as HI says, "artisinal filler text for your site or project." Take, for example, a small excerpt from the jargon it created for GalleyCat: "Beard lo-fi cred, yr scenester art party vinyl put a bird on it. Farm-to-table 3 wolf moon locavore, wayfarers portland carles high life leggings tumblr." Feel younger yet?

Freelancer legal loss: If times weren't tough enough for freelance writers. . . . A federal appeals court in New York this week overturned a major judgment that a group of freelancers won against The New York Times, Reed Elsevier, and others for copyright infringement. The writers -- who claimed that publishers violated their copyright by electronically reproducing and posting their work -- were originally awarded a settlement of up to $18 million. But according to Bloomberg News, the Second Circuit rejected that ruling on similar standing grounds as the recent discrimination case brought against Walmart. "We conclude that the district court abused its discretion in certifying the class and approving the settlement, because the named plaintiffs failed to adequately represent the interests of all class members,” the opinion said.

All the snooze that's fit to print: For all you speech junkies who just can't get enough of Bernie Sanders' infamous 8-1/2 hour stemwinder on the Senate floor last year, we have good news. The Independent from Vermont is publishing a book with the full text of the speech -- a fillibuster decrying Obama's deal with Republicans to preserve the Bush-era tax cuts -- along with an original introduction. If the book (economically entitled The Speech) seems a little too daunting, you can watch Sanders talk about his protest rant and respond to questions in a segment from C-SPAN Book TV -- a cool one hour in itself.

Give your prose a voice-over: You can't swing a live speech coach these days without getting some tips for gearing your writing for the spoken word. But ever wonder what benefits flow in the other direction? In a meaty piece this week, Ragan's Russell Working illustrates a number of ways that stepping up to the podium can held improve the wordsmithing of even the most seasoned writers. Toastmaster International members graciously shared some of their takeaways from public speaking group events -- such as, read your work aloud, solicit criticism, be concise, and count your "uhs" and "ums." You'd be surprised how many awkward sentences and typos you can find by running your writing through your vocal chords and reading aloud is also a cost-effective way to beta test new material. Be sure to check out the full list of tips and let us know if there's anything you think they missed.

Around the Word

Pandora's books: Surfing the web for a good book recommendation? A new site is attempting to do for books what Pandora did for music, giving specific recommendations based on books you already like. BookLamp uses your favorite book's "DNA" to make suggestions for other reads. It measures characteristics and themes (for example: history, travel, secrets) as well as writing style (like pacing, dialogue and density). There are only about 20,000 books on the site, according to Mashable, but BookLamp is looking to expand. Check it out and let us know what you think. Is BookLamp lighting your literary fire?

The Comedy of Borders: When Borders shuttered last month there was much hand-wringing in the publishing world about how to save brick-and-mortar bookstores. Apparently, those looking for a solution should have just asked Jon Stewart and Daily Show resident expert John Hodgman, who mocked the state of modern book selling in a segment last night. Hodgman suggested that bookstores can beat out Amazon by catering to lazy shoppers who don't even like to read. He advised nixing bookshelves and instead installing "downloading pods" to mimic the at-home shopping experience, "with the inconvenience of a twenty minute car ride." The other option: preserve a Borders as a historical relic, like colonial Williamsburg, called "Ye Olde Borders-Towne." Why didn't we think of that?

Compound controversy: When the subject of your sentence is two words joined by "and," sometimes things can get a little dicey in the singular-plural department. This week Grammar Girl comes to rescue, offering a quick refresher on whether "milk and cookies are delicious" or "peanut butter and jelly is the best sandwich." Check it out and let us know if you are in full agreement with GG's latest quick and dirty tips.

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Special agents: Literary agents are often cited as a likely casualty of the publishing e-volution. After all, if you can print, publish and market your book with just a laptop and an Internet connection, why would you need to hire someone to rep you? But Mark Coker, founder of the indie e-book publishing service Smashwords, says don't write off the agent just yet. In an eye-catching, man-bites-dog piece he recently posted on his company blog, Coker argues that these literary sherpas will actually be instrumental in shaping the digital future. The rise of indie e-books and self-publishing gives agents the opportunity to take a chance on a work they feel strongly about, Coker says, instead of only picking up authors guaranteed to score with traditional publisher. So, fellow writers, do you see an agent as part of your digital future? (h/t GalleyCat)

The first rule of Write Club is. . . .: From the first time we were asked to put pen to paper in elementary school, we've been learning the rules of writing: no passive voice, skip the adverbs, show-don't-tell. But sometimes too much focus on writing rules can stifle creativity and distract from your writing process. If you're feeling bogged down by do's and don'ts, check out our friend Rachelle Gardner's recent post on rethinking the typical typist's conventions. Her advice: "Whenever you get frustrated by the rules, or can't figure out why or if you should follow a rule or break it, go back to the reasons behind the rules and ask yourself: Does following this rule strengthen my work?"

Character-in-Chief: Though most real-life newspaper editors are no longer the chain-smoking, suspender-wearing, verbally abusive characters of yesteryear, the occasional hard-boiled editor archetype still makes an appearance in a modern play or movie. In fact, there seems to be a rash of bombastic editors in recent theater productions, including J. Jonah Jameson in "Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark." For a history of the on-stage editor, and a peek into whether any Times editors resemble their fictional counterparts, take a look at this Sunday New York Times survey of the tough editor character through the years.