tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1771043491718141542024-02-06T21:00:31.509-08:00Richard Powers: American NovelistAn adjunct to <a href="http://www.richardpowers.net">www.richardpowers.net</a>, this blog is meant to highlight appearances by Richard Powers in various media, either as author or subject.ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.comBlogger79125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-7027846091827132912013-09-18T20:27:00.001-07:002013-09-18T20:59:03.586-07:00Orfeo. New novel, forthcoming, January 2014<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwv0DEQdZWqyL2pt-PTxih472b2Pn7T6XMIAjABZ4Uqs6AMcCfNhZofter9HVukcvYUyyROZHn71NYOMmFAIdDRfxKfXLKAl7UGN0MaTJBBNEU9GBz5nqGzRtbpKf3JkgRkYP4oVXq38o/s1600/orfeo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwv0DEQdZWqyL2pt-PTxih472b2Pn7T6XMIAjABZ4Uqs6AMcCfNhZofter9HVukcvYUyyROZHn71NYOMmFAIdDRfxKfXLKAl7UGN0MaTJBBNEU9GBz5nqGzRtbpKf3JkgRkYP4oVXq38o/s320/orfeo.jpg" /></a></div>
Richard Powers's new novel, <i>Orfeo</i>, is slated for publication in January 2014.
The publisher's blurb:
<blockquote>
<b>The National Book Award–winning author of The Echo Maker delivers his most emotionally charged novel to date, inspired by the myth of Orpheus.</b>
<p>
"If Powers were an American writer of the nineteenth century…he'd probably be the Herman Melville of <i>Moby-Dick</i>. His picture is that big," wrote Margaret Atwood (New York Review of Books). Indeed, since his debut in 1985 with <i>Three Farmers on Their Way to a Dance</i>, Richard Powers has been astonishing readers with novels that are sweeping in range, dazzling in technique, and rich in their explorations of music, art, literature, and technology.
<p>
In <i>Orfeo</i>, Powers tells the story of a man journeying into his past as he desperately flees the present. Composer Peter Els opens the door one evening to find the police on his doorstep. His home microbiology lab—the latest experiment in his lifelong attempt to find music in surprising patterns—has aroused the suspicions of Homeland Security. Panicked by the raid, Els turns fugitive. As an Internet-fueled hysteria erupts, Els—the "Bioterrorist Bach"—pays a final visit to the people he loves, those who shaped his musical journey. Through the help of his ex-wife, his daughter, and his longtime collaborator, Els hatches a plan to turn this disastrous collision with the security state into a work of art that will reawaken its audience to the sounds all around them. The result is a novel that soars in spirit and language by a writer who “may be America’s most ambitious novelist” (Kevin Berger, San Francisco Chronicle).
</blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-49134579601500410832012-12-31T10:28:00.000-08:002012-12-31T10:28:46.033-08:00Powers at Stanford in 2013!Powers will be reading at Stanford University on February 13, 2013,where he is the <a href="http://creativewriting.stanford.edu/people-list-visiting-faculty/the-mohr-and-stein-visiting-writers">Stein Visiting Writer</a>.
<a href="http://creativewriting.stanford.edu/events/richard-powers-2#more-3959">A Reading by the Stein Visiting Writer, Richard Powers</a>
Event Details:
Date: Wednesday, 2/13/13
Time: 8:00pm
Location: Cemex Auditorium, Zambrano Hall, Knight Management Centerddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-74828753896332405802012-11-08T15:39:00.000-08:002012-11-08T15:39:12.983-08:00Powers Publishes "Genie"Just out--a new novella / long short story by Powers. Available as a download via <a href="http://byliner.com/originals/genie">Byliner.com</a>.
Description from the iTunes store:
<blockquote>
"In "Genie," a short story of epic proportions, Powers goes sci-fi: he turns a failing relationship between a randy scientist and a staid statistician into a quest—not only for love and connection but for a way to connect to intelligent life in the universe.
Anca is an ambitious cellular biologist determined to be the first to diffuse the microbial time bombs inside ever more fatal viruses. Warren works in numbers and codes. He follows the rules and likes it that way. When Anca uses the opportunity of a romantic camping trip to swipe samples of ancient bacteria from one of Yellowstone National Park’s fumaroles—bubbling pools filled with life more diverse than in a rainforest—Warren sees the writing on the wall: Anca will never behave. They break up, until Anca makes a discovery that is just too mind-blowing to handle alone. Could she have found proof of intelligent design, the signature of the creator himself? Or is it a message left by an unknown—and unearthly—life form?
The race that Anca and Warren embark on together will change everything they have ever believed or felt—about life, each other, and the mysteries of the cosmos."
</blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-9466834175795932202011-10-12T13:32:00.000-07:002011-10-12T13:37:09.009-07:00Powers Galleys on abebooks.com<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://pictures.abebooks.com/KLOPEZ/md/md5512406098.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 86px; height: 130px;" src="http://pictures.abebooks.com/KLOPEZ/md/md5512406098.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />For those of you out there who might be collectors, take a look at what's on offer these days at <a href="http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?an=powers%2C+richard&bi=0&bx=on&ds=30&kn=proof+OR+advance+OR+galley&recentlyadded=all&sortby=1&x=55&y=11">abebooks</a>. Some very rare stuff--particularly the proofs of the first two novels. Maybe someday....ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-73833481613287754622011-08-09T09:40:00.000-07:002011-08-09T09:43:16.866-07:00New Powers Article: "What Does Fiction Know?"<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://places.designobserver.com/media/images/powers-fiction-525_525.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 525px; height: 350px;" src="http://places.designobserver.com/media/images/powers-fiction-525_525.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a>
<br />Powers taught a course in Berlin this past Spring, exploring the collision of fact and fiction in writing, and this is his report from the front lines.
<br /><blockquote>
<br />My students have swallowed every bastard hybrid genre I’ve thrown at them. Fictocriticism, mockumentary, staged reality, Borgesian simulated lectures, psycho-journalism, unattributed sampling, hip-hop mashup, real actors playing imaginary authors making pixelated media appearances while selling brutally frank memoirs filled with the slightly altered real-life experiences of some other, dissembling author. My sales pitch has worked so well with this group that, by the end of the semester, I’m appalled at what I’ve unleashed. James Frey, J. T. LeRoy, lonelygirl15, COPS and Survivor and America’s Next Top Model: bring it all on, my German students say. The blurrier the better. They have grown up in a world that laughs at the very distinctions that I’ve come here to challenge, and in class, they regard me with affectionate pity for my quaint belief in the existence of boundaries that a writer might still hope to exploit by transgressing.
<br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-65214778824184543552011-07-05T14:43:00.000-07:002011-07-05T14:44:56.952-07:00Amazon.com Unilaterally Dumps its California AssociatesJust FYI for readers of this blog--in the past I have been able to help support this website through amazon associate sales. As of last week, amazon dumped all of its California associates, including yours truly. Therefore I would request that you not purchase any Powers titles through this blog, but patronize your local independent bookstore instead.<br /><br />Respectfully,<br /><br />--David Doddddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-54913803890793111212011-03-28T14:25:00.000-07:002011-03-28T14:28:09.519-07:00Powers First Editions<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW9BpkrqzO57XvAOjQdiQZcEjLdaZs6RhLoPM-6sVCG5VMqG40TjMY96x5XfyWG1tyz6x4cbqZ3l9kAatAL7anO9uWM3TqbgT28o03GEPm2AvLP7WF_17NggaPESIV8dkO1PdyHaPGPQ5e/s320/IMG_1492.JPG"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 180px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW9BpkrqzO57XvAOjQdiQZcEjLdaZs6RhLoPM-6sVCG5VMqG40TjMY96x5XfyWG1tyz6x4cbqZ3l9kAatAL7anO9uWM3TqbgT28o03GEPm2AvLP7WF_17NggaPESIV8dkO1PdyHaPGPQ5e/s320/IMG_1492.JPG" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />A fun post about the writer's copies of first editions of Powers's first two books: Three Farmers On Their Way To a Dance, and Prisoner's Dilemma.ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-47402448236399458912011-03-04T15:09:00.000-08:002011-03-04T15:36:24.266-08:00Powers is Nominated for the Arthur C. Clarke Award<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2011/3/3/1299170694323/2010-FILM---1984-010.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 140px; height: 84px;" src="http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2011/3/3/1299170694323/2010-FILM---1984-010.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />Powers has been shortlisted for the 2011 Arthur C. Clarke award for the best science fiction published in the U.K. <br /><blockquote><br />...and this year's list also sees an author coming in the other direction, with a nomination for Generosity by Richard Powers. Powers, a previous winner of the US National Book Award and the WH Smith literary award, has often written about science in the past, and Generosity explores the biochemistry of happiness.<br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-38747004546353431712011-02-10T08:33:00.000-08:002011-02-10T08:38:51.949-08:00Powers Writes Epilogue for New Book<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaMCUMXqFTjL33GdW6yAzHqZ3ZzeMlZ6zHrF-DTLiXPWTnChpQe0VsliwLmZ9yKozhwa7DJGfCGAL0yuwsk48IE7JRlklpq067LhPev3ui1acTL5iU-wAQ0tAXG05pS-AElXrZp9l5TrI/s1600/switching+codes.jpeg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 134px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaMCUMXqFTjL33GdW6yAzHqZ3ZzeMlZ6zHrF-DTLiXPWTnChpQe0VsliwLmZ9yKozhwa7DJGfCGAL0yuwsk48IE7JRlklpq067LhPev3ui1acTL5iU-wAQ0tAXG05pS-AElXrZp9l5TrI/s200/switching+codes.jpeg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5572101248618208850" /></a><br /><br />Powers has contributed the epilogue for the newly-published volume, Switching Codes: Thinking Through Digital Technology in the Humanities and the Arts, from the University of Chicago Press. The volume includes essays by "leading American and European scholars, scientists, and artists—including Charles Bernstein, Ian Foster, Bruno Latour, Alan Liu, and Richard Powers—to consider how the precipitous growth of digital information and its associated technologies are transforming the ways we think and act."ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-83398908382459855052011-02-06T20:47:00.000-08:002011-02-06T20:51:44.386-08:00NY Times Op-Ed piece: "What is Artificial Intelligence?"<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/02/06/opinion/06powersimg/06powersimg-articleInline-v2.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 190px; height: 127px;" src="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2011/02/06/opinion/06powersimg/06powersimg-articleInline-v2.jpg" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />Powers has a piece in today's NY Times on the upcoming match between Watson, the computerized Jeopardy player, vs. two real-world Jeopardy champions. Echoes of Galatea 2.2!ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-81858836305618892932011-01-17T09:38:00.000-08:002011-01-17T09:41:12.304-08:00The Bell Jar in light of The Echo MakerA thoughtful essay considering Sylvia Plath's <i>The Bell Jar</i> in the context of a reading of Powers's <i>The Echo Maker</i>, on the Tasty Spoonful blog.<br /><br />An excerpt:<br /><blockquote><br />This kind of consideration becomes richer when The Bell Jar is considered in conversation with Richard Powers’s incredibly beautiful book The Echo Maker. Powers’s novel won the National Book Award in 2006, in part because of his masterful expansion of a question that I think lies at the heart of The Bell Jar. His novel offers a very contemporary picture of how mind works within the context of current neuroscience, but also forces us to determine how–in light of such advances–Esther’s description of psychological and physical life as dichotomous might continue to lend us an understanding of ourselves.<br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-82164860857253197792011-01-14T16:41:00.000-08:002011-01-14T16:44:06.265-08:00Powers mention in an odd place<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://photo.lasvegasweekly.com/img/photos/2011/01/12/01062011_CES.014_t180.jpg?6ec45598a0efd272cf6d6631efc8bbae7a2ee918"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 180px; height: 120px;" src="http://photo.lasvegasweekly.com/img/photos/2011/01/12/01062011_CES.014_t180.jpg?6ec45598a0efd272cf6d6631efc8bbae7a2ee918" border="0" alt="" /></a><br />Fun mention of Powers in an article on the big consumer electronic show:<br /><blockquote><br />For me, the convention’s best offering was somewhat of a throwback. It was Sharp Electronics’ i3 Wall, a 5-walled room filled with edge-to-edge HDTVs on every surface. It was the living incarnation of Richard Powers’ Plowing The Dark, and it was gorgeous. Walk up to the room, suspend your disbelief, and you’ll feel like you’re flying over the countryside (assuming Sharp is playing the countryside graphic).<br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-60360211483636542572010-10-12T14:01:00.000-07:002010-10-12T14:05:34.132-07:00Course Wiki on PowersA very cool thing!<br /><br />The course being taught this semester at the Rochester Institute of Technology, "Richard Powers: Literature, Philosophy, Innovation," has a wiki containing course topics, notes, and other material. Take a look--click the title link of this post to see it.ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-85577968874173007182010-10-12T10:12:00.000-07:002010-10-12T10:34:08.823-07:00Powers Selects Charles Yu for "5 Under 35"Charles Yu's novel, <cite>How To Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe</cite> is reviewed in "Scotland on Sunday." Reviewer Stuart Kelly says <br /><blockquote><br />Yu's novel is his first, and after a publishing some short stories he was chosen for the "5 Under 35" programme, where former winners of the National Book Award selected one young writer whose work impressed them (Yu was, incidentally, the choice of the underrated Richard Powers). <br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-4527211891464341662010-10-11T11:50:00.000-07:002010-10-11T11:56:01.852-07:00New Powers Story in the New Yorker<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhavZemczeQAJmxMlHRCXR71Y7X8rb8Mx6a3L-1fjkNJoIGH0ED3aOi2x1orpy1GXrRWz6ViX_mwfRhxoroQVvKqIFGhBrT75atSnoHpc83_b0MDMvDQq00j7Wms_DNipfIzA4haFUsFQw/s1600/new+yorker+powers.png"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 146px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhavZemczeQAJmxMlHRCXR71Y7X8rb8Mx6a3L-1fjkNJoIGH0ED3aOi2x1orpy1GXrRWz6ViX_mwfRhxoroQVvKqIFGhBrT75atSnoHpc83_b0MDMvDQq00j7Wms_DNipfIzA4haFUsFQw/s200/new+yorker+powers.png" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5526863894073514146" /></a><br />Powers has published a short story, "To the Measures Fall," in the October 18, 2010 issue of "The New Yorker." It's his first in the magazine since February 1988, when an excerpt from the upcoming <cite>Prisoner's Dilemma</cite> made it into the august pages.ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-77395544327878794152010-08-01T09:16:00.000-07:002010-08-01T09:34:55.418-07:00Rick Moody on Richard Powers<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9gVC11Cexg0gbPjm7ytOZyLX_i4rmCddeyGEeO2fvKzh-Um6c5mORq-8Wdpmvx89dts5j34b6jkIIDJpZ9BNdwySxBTKQWQIjK_S1dAcJrecNs1Z_2lEoxDw9jRiaaLh_e9OjmfiWB38/s1600/moody.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 149px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh9gVC11Cexg0gbPjm7ytOZyLX_i4rmCddeyGEeO2fvKzh-Um6c5mORq-8Wdpmvx89dts5j34b6jkIIDJpZ9BNdwySxBTKQWQIjK_S1dAcJrecNs1Z_2lEoxDw9jRiaaLh_e9OjmfiWB38/s200/moody.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5500480701212039410" /></a><br />Author Rick Moody's piece in today's Louisville Courier-Journal, citing his lifelong and current literary influences has this line about Powers:<br /><blockquote><br />Richard Powers, because he always tries something new, in every book, and because he is unafraid to be entirely brilliant.<br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-6231061849757883292010-07-04T09:47:00.000-07:002010-07-15T13:40:52.973-07:00"The Selves of Richard Powers" article in Illinois Alumni Mag<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu4R1M4wl1ZOk4rq5GlbD7coCYmThlQWVNt55hfOR3kbRgmgtxx3lsRp493TE-2AA1vioA5jnKK0I06yut7fbtQOPIid2Wsl_0TMMECKpzRtm5FFPu9gWwHn7Chi528ka41ZEh6EPsUWI/s1600/1107_powers.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 139px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiu4R1M4wl1ZOk4rq5GlbD7coCYmThlQWVNt55hfOR3kbRgmgtxx3lsRp493TE-2AA1vioA5jnKK0I06yut7fbtQOPIid2Wsl_0TMMECKpzRtm5FFPu9gWwHn7Chi528ka41ZEh6EPsUWI/s200/1107_powers.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5490094986221018610" /></a><br />Excellent article about Powers in the University of Illinois' Alumni Magazine, available online via the title link above. Can't find a date on the online article (Illinois folks--help! I need the exact citation for the bibliography!), but it seems to have come out last year, sometime before the appearance of <cite>Generosity</cite>.<br /><p><br /><i>Update: received email today from the article's author, Mary Timmins, who informs me that the piece was published in the November / December 2007 issue of the magazine. She will be sending me the magazine, and then I'll duly add it to the <a href="http://richardpowers.net">bibliography</a>. The piece won a won a <a href="https://case.org/Award_Programs/Circle_of_Excellence/2008_Winners/28_Best_Articles_of_the_Year_.html">gold medal in the annual competition</a> sponsored by the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education. Thanks, Mary!</i> <br /><br />An excerpt:<br /><blockquote><br />“I did live in relative isolation for the better part of 10 months,” Powers said. “Basically, my days, the ordinary days, would consist of waking up, taking a walk in the woods, writing … reading for six hours and then falling asleep and waking up and doing it all again.” Inhabiting a remote house on Long Island, the novelist went for weeks without human contact, the better to write “Plowing the Dark,” in which a character is held in solitary confinement as a hostage in Beirut. When his captors finally give him a book, Powers said, the character is filled with “this emotionally devastating sense of how lucky we are to see the workings of anybody else’s mind.”<br /><br />For those who have seen the workings of his mind, Powers is a writer like no other. Over the past 22 years he has produced nine novels that enthrall and educate, underpinning powerful tales of brave, flawed people with intense passages, improbably lyrical, devoted to understanding the world from a scientific standpoint.<br /><br />“We think we’re a solid thing, we think we’re continuous, we think memory is reliable,” he said, speaking in the resonant, measured tones that evince his lifelong love of music, “when in fact it’s all stories.”<br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-39970547842908374832010-07-01T09:00:00.000-07:002010-07-01T09:04:29.140-07:00Video Interpretation of The Echo MakerThe University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign's literary journal <cite>Ninth Letter</cite> has issued the third in a series of video interpretations of Powers novels. This one, by Deke Weaver, features <cite>The Echo Maker</cite> with a voiceover by Powers.<br /><br />From the website:<br /><blockquote><br />To celebrate both Powers' literary accomplishments and his contributions to the University of Illinois, the Provost's Office commissioned production of five short video works, each of which interprets a passage from one of Richard Powers' novels – The Goldbug Variations, Galatea 2.2, Plowing the Dark, The Time of our Singing, and The Echo Maker. The videos are a collaborative endeavor between Powers and a group of artists and designers from the School of Art + Design.<br /><br />This video interpretation, based on The Echo Maker, is the third installment to appear on ninthletter.com; the first installment, The Time of Our Singing, appeared on this website as podcast number 10, and the second, Plowing the Dark, appeared as podcast number 16. Both are available in our archives.<br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-77636050267442427482010-06-21T09:34:00.000-07:002010-06-21T09:44:12.392-07:00Program for Powers Conference in Erlangen, Germany: November 2010An upcoming conference devoted to Powers is slated for November 26-28 at the University of Erlangen‐Nuremberg. <br /><br />An impressive set of speakers will address a wide variety of topics, including Heinz Ickstadt (Free University, Berlin) presenting “ʹA‐synchronous messagingʹ: The Multiple Functions of Richard Power’s Fictions”; Sabine Sielke (University of Bonn)on “The Subject of Literature, or: (Re‐) Cognition in Richard Powers’s (Science) Fiction”; and Philipp Löffler (University of Heidelberg) addressing “’The Ability to make Worlds’: Lukácsean Aesthetics, Self‐Imagination and Richard Powers’s Plowing the Dark,” among others.ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-42591351178918165342010-06-21T09:14:00.000-07:002010-06-21T09:16:08.032-07:00Powers QuotesThis popped up today on my blog alerts--a site with some very nice quotations pulled from Powers's novels. How many more can we find?ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-51284778758633254082010-04-30T09:22:00.001-07:002010-04-30T09:25:31.460-07:00Powers short story "Modulation" included in Best of 2009 anthology<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUpSAAtrN3O6OMJYwdJCtNJQkJM3ceSHjLQO-LVKNG5R2avBskfvIdsLuJ3t_RwI17emZV68R8tJR4BtSzbrAJtZIwsePG-D3NKAp9_8a8Slh6F6EBlCYvOzvBq3XVmoXHTMkX0E44Yw4/s1600/bestamericanshortstories2009.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 107px; height: 160px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjUpSAAtrN3O6OMJYwdJCtNJQkJM3ceSHjLQO-LVKNG5R2avBskfvIdsLuJ3t_RwI17emZV68R8tJR4BtSzbrAJtZIwsePG-D3NKAp9_8a8Slh6F6EBlCYvOzvBq3XVmoXHTMkX0E44Yw4/s200/bestamericanshortstories2009.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5465967460989484914" /></a><br />Richard Powers's short story "Modulation" has been included in the 2009 edition of <cite>Best American Short Stories</cite>. Here's a comment from one reviewer:<br /><blockquote><br />There is one story which rises far above the others, due to the writer’s craftsmanship: Richard Powers’ “Modulation”. Powers mixes together a variety of dissimilar characters scattered around the globe and ties them all together with a science fiction storyline that conveys the power and importance of music in the present day. Powers has excellent command of the English language and keen observational skills, and it is hard to imagine how this story could be any better than it is.<br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-19815091149143282742010-04-14T08:30:00.000-07:002010-04-14T08:31:59.090-07:00Powers Reacts to his Induction into the AcademyI received the following note from Powers today, in response to my note of congratulations on his election into the American Academy of Arts and Letters:<br /><blockquote><br />Thanks for the good words. It really is a kick, I do admit. But when I look down the list of past and present members, it does seem as if my election might be some kind of clerical error that will be straightened up tactfully at the door when I try to show up for the induction ceremony in May.<br /></blockquote><br />Vintage Powers. Congratulations once again!ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-56315907893718255622010-04-13T09:27:00.000-07:002010-04-14T08:42:45.844-07:00Powers elected to the American Academy of Arts and LettersAlong with the somewhat better-known Meryl Streep, Richard Powers was elected into the elite (250 members) American Academy of Arts and Letters. Streep says she was stunned to be inducted into such an august body. No word yet from Powers, but then, the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/04/12/arts/AP-US-Arts-Academy.html">Associated Press</a> didn't call him for a quote. I'll try to get an exclusive!<br /><blockquote><br />Inductees into the main body include authors Marilynne Robinson, Francine Prose, Thomas McGuane and Richard Powers, composers Tania Leon and Fred Lerdahl, architect Thom Mayne and painters Thomas Nozknowski and Peter Saul. Members are elected for life (openings are created when a member dies) and encouraged to serve on committees that distribute prizes, but there is no responsibility beyond agreeing to join.<br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-22792210742687246092010-04-01T12:04:00.000-07:002010-04-01T12:08:28.797-07:00Interesting thoughts on Powers's book titlesThis post is a re-post of a review on Amazon UK. Not sure about who is doing the re-posting, but it's an interesting point of view, asking whether Powers might not be better known, or appeal to more readers, if his books had better titles. I find this interesting because my mom, who loved Powers's books, had a similar thought, in particular about "Operation Wandering Soul" as a title.<br /><br />Here's an excerpt from the review:<br /><blockquote><br />What's the problem? I've alluded to some possibilities---his titles are often clunky and over-cute. 'Operation Wandering Soul', for example. 'Operation' because the protagonist (Richard Kraft---Power in German!) is a surgeon. 'The Gold Bug Variations'--punning, mildly embarrassing. The Time of our singing'---it's about singing, and it's about time! 'Gain', which sounds like the title of a boardroom blockbuster. Etcetera.<br /></blockquote>ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-177104349171814154.post-64828159890126692482010-01-04T14:04:00.000-08:002010-01-04T14:08:20.650-08:00Review of Time of Our SingingBrian Charles Clark reviews Time of Our Singing on his <a href="http://www.briancharlesclark.com/the-time-of-our-singing/">Puck's Blog</a>. <br /><blockquote><br />In the fifth century B.C., the Greek philosopher Empedocles wrote, “Come now, hearken to my words; learning will enlarge your mind…. I shall tell of a two-fold process.” The two-fold process of Empedocles is the mind-enlarging weave of ideas that run through the novels of Richard Powers: the struggle between Love and Strife, of Aphrodite versus Thanatos, of remembering and forgetting, of music and science. Powers writes his two-fold vibrations with intense lyricism, fierce intelligence, and the improvisational pacing of a free jazz combo: masters of their instruments, the riffing interplay of sentences is always challenging the reader to keep up, pay attention, read more to fill in the gaps in learning the novels expose.<br /></blockquote><br />Clark's review includes a good summary of Powers's previous novels leading up to TOOS.ddoddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15960477269080061928noreply@blogger.com0