It’s a classic good news/bad news scenario in The Sunday Times (with a patrician chaser). In the ‘good news’ column there’s Robert MacFarlane’s very satisfying review of Mohammed Hanif’s new book A Case of Exploding Mangoes, which MacFarlane calls “exuberant” and about which he writes: “Absurdity operates as a scalable quality in Hanif’s vision of the world: it is visible in tiny details and geopolitical shifts alike.” Open Letters’ own Steve Donoghue, writing in a much more abbreviated forum had similarly optimistic things to say about Hanif’s book.

Alas, the “bad news” side of the ledger is if anything more visible: an advertisement for Annie Dillard’s novel The Maytrees, now out in paperback. The ad takes up fully half of one page, and it contains blurb-snippets that bandy about words like “exquisite,” “elegant,” and even “brilliant.” Open Letters Poetry Editor John Cotter, writing back in July 2007, varies from these verdicts in some pretty decisive ways – be sure to click over to his review before succumbing to the lure of advertising!

And in The Sunday Times magazine, aged literary lion Gore Vidal kicks earnest interviewer Deborah Solomon in the teeth for twenty questions or so (she ends her abuse by saying “well, it was a great pleasure talking to you,” to which he responds, “I doubt that”), the first of which must surely catch the attention of any Open Letters reader:

At the age of 82, you will be publishing your new collection of essays this week, which seems likely to confirm your reputation as one of America’s last public intellectuals. Why do you think that critics have traditionally praised your essays more than your fiction, which includes “Burr,” “Myra

download Asterix Versus Caesar

Breckinridge,” and 20 other novels? That’s because they don’t know how to read. I can’t name three first-rate literary critics in the United States.

To which Open Letters earnestly responds: Mr. Vidal, we exist! In the founding editors of Open Letters Monthly, you have at last espied your sought-after three first-rate literary critics in the United States! As reward for allowing you to rest at last from your quest, we’d appreciate a modest plug for the site and an invitation to share lunch with you some day, since all three of us are unabashed Vidal enthusiasts!

…

…