Destination: Europe
Cycle Killer
by David Byrne | 09.21.09 | 10:27 AM ET
iStockPhoto In his new book, "Bicycle Diaries," David Byrne reflects on his travels on two wheels. Herewith, an excerpt.
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Yahoo! BuzzJulia Child, French Cuisine and the Empirical Method
by Eva Holland | 09.21.09 | 9:59 AM ET
There’s an interesting nugget in this New York Times story about the French cooking community’s views on Julia Child. One cookbook author, after calling Julia Child’s recipes “academic and bourgeois,” grudgingly admits that Child’s methodical American approach—she spent years carefully testing her recipes—has its advantages. “The French think that they are natural-born cooks; they prepare a dish off the top of their heads, without testing it,” she told the Times. “In France, we rush over explanations.” (Via The Book Bench)
The Triumphant Return of the Trabant
by Eva Holland | 09.18.09 | 11:41 AM ET
Yep, it’s true. The much-mocked East German vehicle of choice, which has gained a nostalgic following (or should I say ostalgic?) since the fall of the Berlin Wall, is coming back on the market—as an electric car. Wired’s Autopia bloggers, apparently immune to nostalgia, are horrified.
Photo We Love: Purple (and Green) World Heritage Windmills
by World Hum | 09.17.09 | 5:04 PM ET
REUTERS/Jerry Lampen Energy-efficient LED lighting illuminates the World Heritage-listed windmills of Kinderdijk, Netherlands.
The Swedish Novel has ‘a Passport in its Back Pocket’
by Eva Holland | 09.17.09 | 3:58 PM ET
A group of Swedish writers have published a manifesto for Swedish literature in the 2010s. “We want to write books which are read, thumbed, torn out of the hands of angry taxpayers, borrowed and distributed to the max, quoted, imitated and translated,” they wrote. “The Swedish novel has brown eyes and black hair, it’s bald, green-eyed, blind and hook-nosed. It carries a collection of poetry in its breast pocket, a passport in its back pocket, and wears high heels.” (Via The Book Bench)
Reviving Brand America
by Rick Steves | 09.17.09 | 11:57 AM ET
REUTERS/Tobias Schwarz Exploring Europe, exploring travel as a political act
Travel Movie Watch: ‘A Moveable Feast’
by Eva Holland | 09.17.09 | 10:29 AM ET
Hemingway’s classic Paris memoir looks to be getting the book-to-big-screen treatment: The author’s granddaughter, actress Mariel Hemingway, has acquired the film and TV rights and is moving ahead with the project. There are no details yet, but plenty of intriguing questions. For instance, how might the movie handle the editing controversies of the book’s two dueling print editions? And who will play Hemingway, not to mention the cast of literary all-stars—Ezra Pound, James Joyce, Gertrude Stein, F. Scott Fitzgerald and more—that surrounded him in Paris?
As always when a favorite book is being adapted, I’m nervous and skeptical. But I’m also very, very curious to see how this one plays out. (Via EW’s News Briefs Blog)
Visit Denmark! Knock Somebody Up!
by Eva Holland | 09.16.09 | 5:03 PM ET
Forget about Australia’s “Where the bloody hell are you?” campaign. There’s a new winner in the controversial tourism campaign sweepstakes, and it comes from, of all places, Denmark.
The Danish ad plays like a homemade webcam clip, featuring a young woman who claims to be looking for her baby’s father—a foreign tourist whose name she can’t remember. I’m not totally sure how it’s intended to entice visitors to the country—I don’t think accidental parenthood is on most folks’ dream itineraries—but, predictably, the spot was greeted with indignation and has been removed from VisitDenmark’s YouTube channel. The AP quotes a VisitDenmark representative as saying that it was meant to be “a nice and sweet story about a grown-up woman who lives in a free society and accepts the consequences of her actions.”
Of course, the ad didn’t get yanked before copies, parodies and responses started popping up. Here’s a re-posting of the original:
Slate Takes a Ramadan World Tour
by Eva Holland | 09.16.09 | 12:02 PM ET
Writer Jason Rezaian has spent time in five different Muslim-majority countries—Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Dubai, Iran and Turkey—during the annual month of fasting, and in a short essay he reflects on the subtle (and not-so-subtle) differences in the ways each one celebrates their shared holy month.
Greyhound Hits the Road in Britain
by Eva Holland | 09.15.09 | 12:47 PM ET
The iconic—or infamous?—U.S. bus company rolled out its first British service yesterday, and the Guardian went along for the inaugural ride. Writer Steven Morris, with visions of Route 66 and “gleaming metallic 1950s” style vehicles dancing in his head, was underwhelmed by the modern-day Greyhound reality. He writes: “The closest Peggy Sue—as this bus is rather jarringly called—got to swamps was a sewage works on the fringes of London. The Thames had to stand in for the Pacific Ocean. On a chilly morning, the desert seemed a very long way away.”
Video We Love: Gliding Down the Eiger
by Eva Holland | 09.15.09 | 10:41 AM ET
- 1:08—Sweet aerial shot of the mountain
- 1:23—The descent begins
- 3:17—End of the real action
At Least One Country Really Cared About the 400th Anniversary of Henry Hudson’s Arrival in New York
by Michael Yessis | 09.15.09 | 9:50 AM ET
And it wasn’t the U.S. OK, that might not be fair. Hillary Clinton and New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg did show up at the festivities, and New York City tourism promoted a days-long 400th anniversary celebration.
But, according to the New York Times, the Netherlands went nuts, covering the just-ended festivities by sending “about 50 reporters to New York, with a major television station running nightly half-hour updates on the proceedings during prime time. And thousands of Dutch citizens crossed the Atlantic to take part, including Crown Prince Willem-Alexander.”
All that to celebrate the achievements of a Brit. So why the hubbub? “[H]is financial backer was the Dutch East India Company. (‘Who paid for the voyage,’ the crown prince said, ‘really counts.’)”
Roald Dahl’s Childhood Candy Store Found
by Eva Holland | 09.14.09 | 11:29 AM ET
Call it Charlie and the Chinese take-out joint. A literary landmark has been rediscovered at the Great Wall of China restaurant in Llandaff, Wales—where researchers believe Mrs. Pratchett’s Sweet Shop, the store thought to be the inspiration for Roald Dahl’s “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” and “The Twits,” was originally located. A historic marker will go up this week, and I’m sure the Dahl pilgrims won’t be far behind. (Via The Book Bench)
Three Would-Be Airliner Bombers Convicted
by Eva Holland | 09.10.09 | 2:59 PM ET
Three men charged with planning to bomb several trans-Atlantic flights were found guilty of conspiracy to murder in London this week. The trio was behind the August 2006 liquid-explosives plot at Heathrow that ushered in the current restrictions on liquids and gels.
Margaret Drabble’s Favorite Literary Landscapes
by Eva Holland | 09.10.09 | 10:48 AM ET
The author picks 10 British spots that have inspired her fellow writers, from Tennyson’s Tintagel to Godrevy Lighthouse, of “To the Lighthouse” fame.