From the NY Times:

Early this month, Gibson Square publishers [in London] announced that it would publish The Jewel of Medina, a novel about the early life of A’isha, one of the wives of the Prophet Muhammad. It was a bold decision: the book’s United States publisher, Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, had canceled its publication in August amid fears that it would offend and inflame Muslim extremists. . . .

For his part, Martin Rynja, Gibson Square’s publisher, said that it was “imperative” that the book be published. . . .

Early Saturday morning, Mr. Rynja’s house in North London, which doubles as Gibson Square’s headquarters, was set on fire. Three men were arrested on suspicion “of the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism,” the police said.

Don’t people tire of promoting self-debasing stereotypes?

I’m done writing about politics. I’ve wasted too much time on malevolent, pathetic politicians.

Rest assured, however, my views, like the song, will remain the same.

The LA Times Jacket Copy excerpts an unpublished interview with Matthew Eck (congratulated here yesterday).

My actual experiences in war, and Joshua Stantz’s experience in war, started to morph. I started to feel like I owned his experience as much as he did. That poor guy!

Once again, I highly recommend Eck’s The Farther Shore. One hell of a début.

An absolutely brilliant op-ed piece from Harvey Silvergate, “Parody flunks out,” unearthed courtesy of the NY Times Paper Cuts.

I remember quite well (though I wish I could disremember quite well) when the editor of the Daily Campus brought in new guidelines for “politically correct” speech (seriously, where the hell did these insidious rules come from?) that were to be enforced immediately unless the ol’ DC were to appear embarrassingly cretinous. (Even my dumbass brainwashed college-kid brain knew something was plainly wrong with these regulations, but I followed orders just like a good Nazi).

By [the late 1980s], the strictures of political correctness had seeped into all levels of American higher education and had utterly destroyed the sense of humor of so many college and university students. At the very least, this atmosphere stifled them from admitting (to anyone but their friends) that they even got a joke involving matters of gender, race, sexual orientation, religion, or any other hot-button issue at the center of the nation’s culture wars. And, as was predictable, the intellectual rot that began to infect the academy in the mid 1980s spread to the “real world” within a single generation.

Oh, and how that infection has become an epidemic.

Racist and sexist language — so-called hate speech — may not be pleasant, but it is nonetheless legally protected in public places governed by the Bill of Rights. Private campuses, however, are allowed to make up their own rules as to what speech is and is not acceptable. . . . For academic freedom to offer less protection for speech is a breathtaking departure from long-standing assumptions about the nature and purpose of the academy. As the cynics now note in Cambridge, one may not safely say in Harvard Yard what is constitutionally protected in Harvard Square. The same may be said for just about every campus where there once was a hallowed hall of learning, now converted to a humorless hall of conformity.

Thank you Mr Silvergate for speaking the truth. This column should be required reading for all.

Congratulations to Matthew Eck for making the National Book Foundation’s “5 Under 35” list.

I read Eck’s The Farther Shore at the end of last year and can’t recommend this haunting novella of a young man at war highly enough.

It appears Heroes was a one-season wonder . . . I stopped watching last night’s two-episode season three premiere with about 25 minutes remaining.

What’ll fill the sci-fi gap once Battlestar Galactica and Lost end their runs?

Robert Olen Butler on writing:

We create characters—virtual souls—and ask our readers to see them as true reflections of some aspect of the human condition. And we place those characters in situations where they must make choices that inescapably imply a universe of values and standards. In essence, we writers act out the role of God. And if we’re going to do that, then it is incumbent on us to be a loving God.

No wonder I didn’t become a scientist . . .