Ruby Street

Australian writer Sophie Cunningham has written a useful article on writers and blogging in this week's Age . I knew this was coming as it arose partly from a discussion about blogging which took place on the Australian literary weblog, Sarsaparilla , and regarding which yours truly made a comment. It surveys why a lot of writers blog and don't blog. F'r instance, James Bradley says: "I suspect the reason a lot of novelists and fiction writers don't blog is to do with an unease about dismantling the psychological barriers a lot of us erect to allow us to write in the first place", while Miss Boynton says, "I wonder what writers can learn from blogging? (the electric speed of playful language for one, where ideas seed)." The article won't sell the idea to bloggers, cos we're doin' it, but might get a discussion going amongst the sceptics. But, in the end, each to their own process.

Interesting discussion about online v print media , about posting as opposed to publishing , how the material conditions of reading either online or on paper yield different forms and reading experiences, about dissatisfactions with online if it's just trying to do what the printed book does. About bad poetry, maybe.

Couple of changes to the blogroll. Just added Richard Lopez's really bad movies , definitely on a roll, and Derek Motion's typing space , another Australian in the blogosphere.