M.L. Rio's Blog, page 14

Books Show Off 5 (Recap)

I can only speak for me, but I had a great time last night at Books Show Off 5, which was graciously hosted by the Waterstones on Tottenham Court Road. People spoke on an eclectic range of topics, including Tolkien,Harold and Maude,elegiac dog poetry, inappropriate Latin, and sculptures that look like they’re having sex with angels. Nothing I said was that nearly that interesting, but I did manage to talk aboutStar Trek,porn stars, and Ernest Hemingway all in under nine minutes. Obviously wha...

First pass proof!

This fat stack of paper arrived from the folks at Flatiron Books today. Now’s when we go through the whole MS with a fine-tooth comb, looking for every last little fix and adjusting the formatting where needed. But this is pretty much what the inside of the hardcover will look like, and that’s exciting.

I’ll be hard at work on this for the next week or so. I’ve gone through Act I already this morning and it’s a bit like an out-of-body experience, because it’s been a while since I read throug...

Books Show Off 5

Now that the dissertation is turned in, I can start doing fun things again. Today that mostly consisted of raiding bookshops and record stores, but later this month I’ll be joining some other lit freaks for Books Show Off 5 at the Waterstones on Tottenham Court Road.If you want to have some wine, hang out in a bookshop, and listen to me and a few other people talk about books and publishing in a (hopefully) entertaining way, book a ticket soon because these events sell out fast!

Buy tickets...

Radio Interview Tonight

Hello friends! If you want to hear a little more about what we’ve been up to in Elsinore, tune into CBC Radio’s ‘As It Happens’ tonight! I’ll be talking a little bit about the Airbnb contest and the castle, and also probably trying to articulate why I love Shakespeare so much. In the meantime, here’s a picture of me and Margaret with our friend Horatio on a guided tour of Kronborg:

Courtesy of Visit Nordsjaelland

“Shakespeare-entusiast fra USA vinder en nat på Kronborg”

I’m now in a Danish news article,featuring the single greatest picture I have ever been photoshopped into. Check it out here!

Kultur

The readiness is all.

A little while ago a friendposted a link on my Facebook wall for a contest to stay the night of the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death at Kronborg Castle–the castle most of us know as ‘Elsinore.’ And in a very strange twist of fate… I actually won. (Trust me, I’m as surprised as you are.) We kept it a secret for a while so we could sort out the particulars, but I’mDenmark-bound on the 21st! If you want, you can read more about it here.

Press photo by Peter Brinck.

RBM

My wonderful editor Christine Kopprasch just sent me a photo ofIf We Were Villainsin its newest incarnation as an RBM–no cover art yet, but I am beyond excited to see this. It’s starting to look like a real book!

Writer’s Toolbox

This week in a conversation with my fellow MA students about the upcoming hellmonth of term papers and preliminary dissertation workI realized that a lot of the apps and tools and Chrome extensions I use for writing, research, and productivity aren’t necessarily common knowledge. So here, for anyone who wants it, is a collection of writer tools.

Productivity

Momentum: Chrome extension that helps organize your daily goals Strict Workflow: Chrome extension based on the Pomodoro Technique; bloc...

Complicity

A bit of Shakespearean wisdom from Sir Ian McKellen at the Oxford Literary Festival today: the purpose of a soliloquy is to make you, the audience, complicit.

Green Eggs and Hamlet

(with my deepest apologies to Shakespeare and Dr. Seuss)

Can I kill my Uncle Claude?
Yes, I can, I can, by God!
I will kill my Uncle Claude!

Should I kill him in the house?
Should I kill him while he’s soused?
I could kill him here or there
I could kill him anywhere
Would I, could I, while he prays?
Kill him! Kill him! Wherefore stay?
I would not, could not, while he prays!

Not in the house, not when he’s soused,
Not with his sister, now his spouse!
Notwhile he prays, not while he feasts,
O,...