Author: The New York Times File Type: pdf Now in paperback, todays most celebrated writers explore literature and the literary life in an inspirational collection of original essays.By turns poignant, hilarious, and practical, Writers on Writing brings together more than forty of contemporary literatures finest voices. Pieces range from reflections on the daily craft of writing to the intersection of arts and lifes consequential moments. Authors discuss what impels them to write creating a sense of control in a turbulent universe bearing witness to events that would otherwise be lost in history or within the writers soul recapturing a fragment of time. Others praise mentors and lessons, whether from the classroom, daily circumstances, or the pages of a favorite writer. For anyone interested in the art and rewards of writing, Writers on Writing offers an uncommon and revealing view of a writers world.Contributors include Russell Banks, Saul Bellow, E. L. Doctorow, Richard Ford, Kent Haruf, Carl Hiaasen, Alice Hoffman, Jamaica Kincaid, Barbara Kingsolver, Sue Miller, Walter Mosley, Joyce Carol Oates, Annie Proulx, Carol Shields, Jane Smiley, Susan Sontag, John Updike, Kurt Vonnegut Jr., Alice Walker, and Elie Wiesel.Amazon.com ReviewAfter 30 years as a journalist, John Darnton decided to try his hand at writing a novel. If he wrote 1,000 words a day, he discovered, hed have a book in a matter of months. But wouldnt it be nice to learn a few tricks of the trade from other writers as well? Thus was born The New York Timess Monday-morning Writers on Writing series. In embarking on the series, says Darnton, he learned that the writers he most wanted to hear from were not necessarily the same ones who most wanted to hear from him. But there couldnt have been too many who turned him down. The 46 columns collected in Writers on Writing are by the likes of Saul Bellow, Mary Gordon, David Mamet, Annie Proulx, Carol Shields, and Paul West. Though many of them have not much more than the occupation writer in common, Darnton says that in one way he found them all to be alike They wanted to hear, right away, what you thought of their work.Here, Richard Ford explains why he finds not writing to be a terrific thing. Alice Hoffman describes the effect illness (her own and that of others) has had on her work. Barbara Kingsolver grapples with writing an unchaste novel. Louise Erdrich explores the effect a second language, Ojibwe in her case, can have on ones involvement with the first. And Russell Banks learns the hard way that when you meet a witness to your distant past, your memory tends to improve. The most hilarious piece is Carolyn Chutes How Can You Create Fiction When Reality Comes to Call? In it, she describes one day, in which X-rated stuff happens, the cuckoo clock goes off incessantly, dirty dishes beckon, political cohorts come calling, a dog has a couple of seizures, laundry needs doing, and guests constantly arrive. Once Chute finally does get down to writing, the n breaks off the daisy wheel. But at least the phone doesnt ring. Its bell is broken. It never rings. Thank heavens. --Jane SteinbergFrom Publishers WeeklyUnlike many assemblages of previously published works, this collection of 41 essays from the New York Timess Writers on Writing column is more than the sum of its parts. Just as Times culture editor Darnton hoped when he devised the series for writers to talk about their craft, the result is a thoughtful examination of writers concerns about the creative process and the place of literature in America. Appropriately for works commissioned for a major newspaper, the essays are immediately engaging and compelling all the way through. Some writers accomplish these ends through a good story, as does Russell Banks writing on the limits of memory and his lost chance at a career in crime. Or they are darkly entertaining, as is Carolyn Chute as she talks about obstacles in trying to switch from life mode to writer mode. Sara Paretsky compels with her Dickensian belief in the value of writing for people who feel powerless and voiceless in the larger world. Theres also the sheer comfort of recognizing known voices the seriousness of Mary Gordon, the combativeness of Kurt Vonnegut Jr., the sting of Joyce Carol Oates. As steeped in writing as this book is, it is not a manual advice includes only general rules to observe well and write regularly and axioms from writers like William Saroyan, who counsels, There is no how to it, no how do you write, no how do you live, how do you die. Overall, the writers pensiveness and amity make for a thought-provoking yet reassuring read a good bedside book. Fans of writers-on-writing anthologies and close readers of the New York Times who may have bypassed these essays for the immediate payoff of a front-page headline should pause to enjoy this rich collection. 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

Author: Oonagh B. Breen File Type: pdf All governments, in various ways, regulate and control nonprofit organizations. Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), while hopeful of supportive regulatory environments, are simultaneously seeking greater autonomy both to provide services and to advocate for policy change. In part to counter increasing statutory regulation, there is a global nonprofit sector movement towards greater grassroots regulation - what the authors call self-regulation - through codes of conduct and self-accreditation processes. This book drills down to the country level to study both sides of this equation, examining how state regulation and nonprofit self-regulation affect each other and investigating the causal nature of this interaction. Exploring these issues from historical, cultural, political, and environmental perspectives, and in sixteen jurisdictions (Australia, China, Brazil, Ecuador, England and Wales, Ethiopia, Ireland, Israel, Kenya, Malawi, Mexico, Tanzania, Uganda, Scotland, United States, and Vietnam), the authors analyse the interplay between state control and nonprofit self-regulation to better understand broader emerging trends. **

Author: Nathan L. Ensmenger File Type: pdf This is a book about the computer revolution of the mid-twentieth century and the people who made it possible. Unlike most histories of computing, it is not a book about machines, inventors, or entrepreneurs. Instead, it tells the story of the vast but largely anonymous legions of computer specialists--programmers, systems analysts, and other software developers--who transformed the electronic computer from a scientific curiosity into the defining technology of the modern era. As the systems that they built became increasingly powerful and ubiquitous, these specialists became the focus of a series of critiques of the social and organizational impact of electronic computing. To many of their contemporaries, it seemed the computer boys were taking over, not just in the corporate setting, but also in government, politics, and society in general. In The Computer Boys Take Over, Nathan Ensmenger traces the rise to power of the computer expert in modern American society. His rich and nuanced portrayal of the men and women (a surprising number of the computer boys were, in fact, female) who built their careers around the novel technology of electronic computing explores issues of power, identity, and expertise that have only become more significant in our increasingly computerized society.In his recasting of the drama of the computer revolution through the eyes of its principle revolutionaries, Ensmenger reminds us that the computerization of modern society was not an inevitable process driven by impersonal technological or economic imperatives, but was rather a creative, contentious, and above all, fundamentally human development.

Author: Max Brand File Type: epub An American Western Classic! Doc Byrne was too smart for his own good. His overstuffed brain strained his underdeveloped body to the brink of collapse, until the only cure for him was to leave big city life and head west. At the edge of the mountains he found problems even bigger than his. In love with the human mind, he encountered men who paid no mind at all. Jerry Strann, for instance. The people of Brownsville accepted Jerry as the wrath of God. As strong and as wild as a bear, Jerry could kill a wolf with his bare hands. Could any man defeat him? Find out why the Saturday Review called this book, nobly planned, nobly felt, nobly written the New York Times, exceptionally solid--worked out with flawless skill and the New York Herald Tribune, stirring! Brand was one of Americas most popular & prolific novelists and died a hero on the Italian front in 1944, being commended for bravery by President Roosevelt. Add this exciting American classic to your library today!