Usula K. Le Guin: "As for books themselves, the changes in book technology are cataclysmic. Yet it seems to me that rather than dying, “the book” is growing — taking on a second form and shape, the ebook." "It looks to me as if people are in fact reading and writing more than they ever did. People who used to work and talk together now work each alone in a cubicle, writing and reading all day long on screen."

"The e-book, by eliminating all variations in the appearance and weight of the material object we hold in our hand and by discouraging anything but our focus on where we are in the sequence of words (the page once read disappears, the page to come has yet to appear) would seem to bring us closer than the paper book to the essence of the literary experience. Certainly it offers a more austere, direct engagement with the words appearing before us and disappearing behind us than the traditional paper book offers, giving no fetishistic gratification as we cover our walls with famous names."

"Science fiction is almost the only way that recognition of this vast non-human reality impinges on literature and the arts. In mainstream fiction, unless the plot requires Australia, the Earth might as well be flat."

"'Mapping the Lakes' is a collaborative and explorative research project. Funded by the British Academy, the pilot project tests whether Geographic Information Systems (GIS) technology can be used to further the understanding of the literature of place and space."

"Drawing on work carried out as part of an interdisciplinary project, ‘Mapping the Lakes’, the paper focuses on the ways in which GIS can be used to explore the spatial relationships between two textual accounts of tours of the English Lake District: the proto-Picturesque journey undertaken by the poet, Thomas Gray, in the autumn of 1769; and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s self-consciously post-Picturesque ‘circumcursion’ of August 1802." Published in the Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers.

"I then took it upon myself to expand the idea that these books were all thematically connected and named the trend Barleypunk in reference to the Chris Morris and Charlie Brooker sitcom Nathan Barley" "[Barleypunk's] roots are in the low levels of SF that have been seeping out into mainstream culture since the appearance of the Star Wars and Star Trek franchises." Is it bad that I want to read a lot of these?

"These days, science can be stranger than science fiction, and mainstream literature is increasingly futuristic and speculative. So are the genre's days numbered?" Speaking of 'speculative', I do wish they hadn't let Atwood off the hook so easily, but then I do get grumpy. There's more on the web than in the magazine, and it all seems to be free (usually NS have a paywall), so that's good, at least.

"In an era of soaring fuel prices and precious boutique hotels, what about indulging in the subway as a form of tourism? Opportunity costs are minimal, adventures abound and the journey is sometimes more interesting than the destination." A good read, and thanks to Earle for mentioning it. Bonus points: calling Beck's work "the diagram".

An Iain Banks interview, touching on his passport (he's got one again), the socialism of the Culture, and whether Iraq influenced Matter, amongst other things.

As a counterpoint to my wibblings of earlier today, here's a (well written, unlike mine) piece arguing that television doesn't decrease literacy. I don't think TV makes us stupid, but I'm far from convinced it helps us be better at reading books.

A discussion on Lessing's Nobel speech. "One could respond to this in many ways, but perhaps the most fruitful would be to simply accept Lessing's premise. TV and computers and the Internet have changed the ways that people spend their time"

Doris Lessing's Nobel acceptance speech: "How will ... our way of thinking be changed by the internet, which has seduced a whole generation with its inanities"

Lovely poem about being watched over by AIs, Culture-style. I wonder if Ryman would dismiss this as an adolescent fantasy, too? It probably is. That doesn't stop it being seductive.

"All novels are collections of short stories" or somesuch. Hmm.

"Night Haunts - A nocturnal journal through 2006 by Sukhdev Sandhu. Visual design by Mind Unit, sound design by Scanner, commissioned by Artangel"

"A writing game devised by Jeff Noon and Steve Beard" to explore at home

Lots of stuff about Strange and Norrell, if I ever get time

I can't imagine too many Nobel Prizes have ended up in Hackney