The literary treadmill

At the TLS, Geoffrey Wheatcroft has a great piece on Peter Clarke's new book about Winston Churchill's literary career (the tax details are especially fascinating!):

It was when installed in a government office that Churchill discovered the delights of dictation to a shorthand-typist, and thereafter all his work was dictated. This gave, as it happened, a kind of homogeneity to everything he produced “by tongue or pen”. His speeches were first dictated and then typed before being delivered in public, his books were dictated and set in galley proof to be endlessly amended at outlandish cost. And he also soon learned the value of enlisting the help of others: his first private secretary, at the Colonial Office, was (later Sir) Edward Marsh, who would follow Churchill from one ministry to another and then serve him with personal devotion, reading his proofs, ghostwriting his articles, and even compiling his tax returns.

Miracle on 115th St.

It was as though the gods had answered my prayers - I learned this morning that the Columbia EcoReps were accepting donations of all sorts today on College Walk (1 block from my apartment), including BOOKS! The underlying organization is Goodwill, so I was even able to get a tax receipt. I left off a bag of clothes and shoes (mostly injury-producing running shoes!), which saved me the trouble of taking it to the Cathedral, and 2 large loads of books. Now officially 124 books lighter...

Often horizontal

I love this WSJ piece about Lee Child's principles of apartment living! I am much on the same scheme - I would definitely live somewhere like that if it were financially feasible - but of course one needs a cluttered office in order to get anything done... (Link courtesy of Sarah.)

I am moving one baby step closer towards the clutter-free lifestyle myself, as my background activity for these weeks is getting my apartment ready to hand over to subletters in preparation to relocating for some months to Cayman. I have a huge box of books to get rid of - this is more of a Facebook-type question, but my local public library has now set a limit of 10 books for donation (per pop, but I cannot be going over there every day with a little bag of books!) - New Yorkers, where can I easily donate? Preferably somewhere that will come and pick them up, or else that is near to Columbia - a taxi to Housingworks is certainly an option, but I live far away from there...

(The new Jack Reacher novel is due to be published on May 18. If I were a perfectly self-disciplined person, I would pre-order it and save it to read on the flight to Cayman on the 27th - but on the other hand, a free copy may come my way before that, and it seems unlikely that I would be able to resist it for those intervening days - I would definitely have to leave it in the box, it would be all over once I actually had the naked book in my hands!)