The French Publishers’ Association and the Société des Gens de Lettres, a French society of authors, have dropped a lawsuit protesting Google’s book-scanning efforts in that country. The New York Times reports that Google has struck an agreement with French publishers that would allow them to revive thousands of out-of-print books, and let publishers sell digital editions of those works. The search giant claims that this now makes France the only county with an “industrywide book-scanning agreement in place to cover works that are out of print but still under copyright.”
According to Ray Bradbury’s biographer, a museum for the famed sci-fi writer could be in the works in his early hometown of Waukegan, Illinois. The town already has a park, two festivals, and a library conference room named after the writer, but a nonprofit development group is now planning to convert a shuttered library into a more official pilgrimage site for Bradbury fans.
Clancy Martin continues his engaging series about his father—a schizophrenic and a onetime bodybuilder—at the Harper’s website.
A new issue of n+1—themed “the awkward age”—is out, featuring essays and reviews on the New York Public Library, ladyblogs, the “theory generation,” and a class-action lawsuit against Wal-Mart.
Sarah Leonard of the New Inquiry and Dissent talks with Mike Konczal (known on Twitter as @rortybomb) about the roles of left publications.
This week in tragically ironic situations, a man writing a memoir tentatively titled Kindness in America was shot in the face in a “seemingly random drive-by shooting.”
