book news: magical realism & the big O; Simpsons; anti-PATRIOT Act petition

[pynchonoid]

from PW Daily for Booksellers (Tuesday, January
20,2004):

Oprah Picks: One Hundred Years of Solitude 
 
As her latest book club selection, Oprah has picked
One Hundred Years 
of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez's classic novel,
available from 
Perennial ($14). 
 
Oprah herself says, "One of the greatest books of all
times, One 
Hundred Years of Solitude takes us inside a world
where the lines of 
magic and reality are blurred. So stay with it! It's
not like anything 
you've ever read before."

[...]

ABA's Anti-Patriot Act Petition 
 
Earlier this month the American Booksellers
Association began a 
campaign encouraging bookstores to collect one million
signatures from 
customers and others for a petition to be presented to
Congress in 
support of repealing Section 215 of the USA Patriot
Act. 
 
The petition reads: 
 
"USA Patriot Act vs. Your FREADOM. Tell Congress to
Restore Reader 
Privacy Today! The USA Patriot Act threatens your
privacy in 
bookstores and libraries. It gives the FBI power to
apply to a secret 
court for an order compelling the surrender of records
of the books 
you purchase or borrow. The government does not have
to produce any 
evidence that you are a terrorist--or even that you
are suspected of a 
crime! The order also gags booksellers and librarians,
making it 
illegal to reveal that your records have been
searched. We, the 
undersigned, urge our representatives in Congress to
support 
legislation that amends Section 215 of the Patriot Act
to restore the 
privacy of our bookstore and library records." 
 
The petition was distributed in the most recent Book
Sense "White 
Box"; a copy can be easily downloaded from the ABA 
<http://www.bookweb.org/graphics/pdfs/abffe_petition.pdf>.

 

[...] 

To celebrate the publication of a (fictional) novel by
Marge Simpson, 
this Sunday's episode of The Simpsons will feature a
guest appearance 
by Thomas Pynchon--at least his voice. The cartoon
version of Pynchon 
appears with a bag over his head, as he and a cartoon
version of Tom 
Clancy praise Marge's writing. 
 
Pynchon's publicist at Picador, which recently
reissued Mason and 
Dixon in paperback, assures us that the voice is real.

 
Pynchon has been a favorite of The Simpsons: in an
earlier episode 
Lisa is impressed by a young college student she sees
reading 
Gravity's Rainbow--and is doubly impressed when the
student says she's 
re-reading the book. 
 


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