Elementary Writing

The world is home to many famous authors. The trouble is: How to set the selection criteria for such an ineffable and unquantifiable thing as the contemporary literature itself ?

Furthermore, the various sources for reliable all-time-best-most-top and similar lists (such as Amazon, Publishers Weekly, BookSense, Nielsen BookScan, and various newspapers) tends to list references by books rather than authors, and all have different methods for tabulating their lists.

So before we took on this challenging and seemingly impossible task, we had to do some homework first.

Selection Sources and Criteria

Let’s pretend we are browsing in a bookstore, looking for our next reading. Our choice is not attached to any particular novel. We would rather like to refer to the list of contemporary authors for whom we could recommend just about any book they’ve written. These are the popular fiction writers whose hardcovers people buy the first week they come out. So let it be our first selection criteria.

• To satisfy this criteria, we should first look at Best-Selling Authors Statistics, and the best place to go is obviously The great Amazon.com for online data.
• While still in the bookstore, we take opportunity to collect some “of-line” statistics on The Top Best-Selling Authors of All Time, focusing in particular on contemporary writers. (Did you know that, as of today, more than 2 billion copies of Agatha Christie novels were sold around the globe?)
• Let’s go now to the public library across the street. We would like to get insight in the (historical) Official Statistics on the Most Borrowed Authors from public libraries before getting any pick.
• Escalating trend in downloading online free books (literary millions per month), which may be considered as another form of “book borrowing”, make us stop by Project Gutenberg – an on line public library and the largest single collection of free electronic books, to collect their Online Statistics on Popular Authors by the number of Free Book Downloads.
• Public libraries are also great places for undertaking the Encyclopedias and Popular Magazines Research, to level up a scholar profoundness and authority of our list. To do that, we have to analyze referring data from reputable sources such as Wikipedia.org, and The New Your Times respectively.
• Back to home, our Mac/Pc and broadband Internet connection. We are looking for the General Public Opinion on the Most Famous Contemporary Authors. There are several very applicable “voted by regular people” lists on Internet that we may use (such as those at BestAndWorst.com, Best100Authors.com or FantasticFiction.co.uk.
• Good literary criticism can be one of the hardest kinds of information to find on the Internet in spite the fact that noted authors often have a body of criticism attached to their work. It is always interesting to confront a public opinion with that of The Reputable Literary Critics such as those from the Time Magazine or The leading Criticism Blog – BlogCritics.org

Finally and with special caution, we need to take care of a common conception of English-speaking authors being favored in similar best-of-the-best selections over the International writers.

For that reason we called for help several very respectable lists of Most Famous International Authors (including English-speaking contemporary authors as well), from the sources such are contemporarylit.about.com, npr.org, abebooks.com or scaruffi.com.

The Ultimate List of Best-Loved Contemporary Authors – Revealed

So – here, in all its glory, is the ultimate Top of the Top 10 list, derived from the various selections and evaluations by the literature industry leaders, overall market performance, critics and ordinary people. Read it and— well, just read it

10. | Gabriel Garcia Marquez (1927-)

Colombian-born author and journalist, winner of the 1982 Nobel Prize for Literature and a pioneer of the Latin American “Boom.” Affectionately known as “Gabo” to millions of readers, he first won international fame with his masterpiece, One Hundred Years of Solitude, a defining classic of twentieth century literature. Love in the Time of Cholera is his second greatest novel by which the film adaptation was released in 2007.

One Hundred Years of Solitude

Gabriel Garcia Marquez – The Movie

Love In The Time Of Cholera

9. | Albert Camus (1913-1960)

Algeria-born French author, philosopher, and journalist was the second-youngest recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature (after Rudyard Kipling) when he became the first Africa-born writer to receive the award, in 1957. Novelist, essayist, and playwright, best known for such novels as L’Étranger (1942; The Stranger), La Peste (1947; The plague), and La Chute (1956; The Fall) and for his work in leftist causes.

The Stranger

The Plague

The Fall

8. | Toni Morrison (1931-)

Nobel Prize-winning American author, editor, and professor. Her novels are known for their epic themes, vivid dialogue, and richly detailed black characters; among the best known are her novels The Bluest Eye, Song of Solomon, and Beloved, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1988. In 2002, scholar Molefi Kete Asante listed Toni Morrison on his list of 100 Greatest African Americans.

4-book Set; Sula; Song of Solomon; Beloved; the Blue Eye

The Collected Novels of Toni Morrison

7. | Haruki Murakami (1949-)

Japanese writer and translator from Kobe. He studied Greek drama before managing a jazz bar in Tokyo from 1974 to 1981. His third novel, A Wild Sheep Chase, earned the Noma Literary Award for New Writers and ended his career at the jazz bar. His next novel, Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World, won the prestigious Tanizaki Prize. In 1996, Murakami received the Yomiuri Literary Award for The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. He is also known as a skillful translator of Scott Fitzgerald, Raymond Carver, John Irving, Paul Theroux, and other American contemporary authors.

A Wild Sheep Chase

Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World

The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle

6. | Salman Rushdie (1947-)

British Indian novelist and essayist who was condemned to death by leading Iranian Muslim clerics in 1989 for allegedly having blasphemed Islam in his novel The Satanic Verses. He first achieved fame with his second novel, Midnight’s Children (1981), which won the Booker Prize in 1981. He was appointed a Knight Bachelor for “services to literature” in June 2007, he also holds the highest rank — Commandeur — in the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres of France. His latest novel is The Enchantress of Florence, published in June 2008. In July 2008 Midnight’s Children won a public vote to be named the Best of the Booker, the best novel to win the Booker Prize in the award’s 40-year history.

The Satanic Verses

Midnight’s Children

The Enchantress of Florence

5. | Philip Roth (1933-)

Proclaimed as America’s greatest living novelist and literature’s reigning heavyweight champion (Time Magazine), Philip Roth gained early literary fame with the 1959 collection Goodbye, Columbus (winner of 1960’s National Book Award), cemented it with his 1969 bestseller Portnoy’s Complaint. He has continued to write critically acclaimed works, many of which feature his fictional alter ego, Nathan Zuckerman. The Zuckerman novels include the Pulitzer Prize-winning American Pastoral (1997).

Goodbye, Columbus & Five Short Stories

Portnoy’s Complaint

Conversations With Philip Roth

4. | J. K. Rowling (1965-)

Ranked #9 in the 2008 Forbes The Celebrity 100 list, Joanne “Jo” Rowling (pen name J. K. Rowling) is a British author, best known as the creator of the Harry Potter fantasy series, the idea for which was conceived whilst on a train trip from Manchester to London in 1990. The Potter books have gained worldwide attention, won multiple awards, and sold more than 400 million copies. She has also written two small volumes which appear as the titles of Harry’s school books within the novels – Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and Quidditch Through the Ages, which were published in 2001 in aid of Comic Relief. Time magazine named her as a runner-up for its 2007 Person of the Year, noting the social, moral, and political inspiration she has given her fandom.

Harry Potter Paperback Box Set (Books 1-6)

J.K. Rowling (Blue Banner Biographies)

The Tales of Beedle the Bard, Collector’s Edition

3. | J.D. Salinger (1919-)

One of the world’s most famous recluses (He has not published an original work since 1965 and has not been interviewed since 1980), an American author, best known for his 1951 novel The Catcher in the Ryede, the 20th-century classic of disaffected youth. He followed Catcher with a short story collection: Nine Stories (1953), a collection of two novellas : Franny and Zooey (1961), and another collection of novellas: Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction (1963). His last published work, a novella entitled “Hapworth 16, 1924,” appeared in The New Yorker on June 19, 1965. One of Salinger’s lines, explaining his desire for privacy, is “It’s all in the book”.

The Catcher in the Ryede

J.D. Salinger (Library of Author Biographies)

A Reader’s Guide to J. D. Salinger

2. | Stephen King (1947-)

American novelist and short-story writer, whose enormously popular books revived the interest in horror fiction from the 1970s. King’s place in the modern horror fiction can be compared to that of J.R.R. Tolkien’s who created the modern genre of fantasy.

His first published novel, Carrie (filmed 1976), about a tormented teenage girl gifted with telekinetic powers, appeared in 1974 and was an immediate popular success. Carrie was the first of many novels in which King blended horror, the macabre, fantasy, and science fiction. Among such works were Salem’s Lot (1975), The Shining (1977; filmed 1980), The Stand (1978), The Dead Zone (1979; filmed 1983), Firestarter (1980; filmed 1984), Cujo (1981), Christine (1983; filmed 1983), It (1986), Misery (1987; filmed 1990), The Tommyknockers (1987), and The Dark Half (1989).

King also wrote the short stories collected in Night Shift (1978), as well as several novellas and motion-picture screenplays. Some of his novels were successfully adapted for the screen by such directors as Brian De Palma, Stanley Kubrick, and Rob Reiner.

King’s books had sold more than 350 million copies worldwide, and his name had become synonymous with the genre of horror fiction.

The Stephen King Collection (Audio CDs)

Stephen King: A Biography (Greenwood Biographies)

The Films of Stephen King: From Carrie to Secret Window

Stephen King (Bloom’s Modern Critical Views)

1. | George Orwell (1903 – 1950)

British journalist and author, who wrote two of the most famous novels of the 20th century ‘Animal Farm‘ and ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984)‘.

He published his first book, ‘Down and Out in Paris and London‘, in 1933 – he took the name George Orwell, shortly before its publication. This was followed by his first novel ‘Burmese Days‘ in 1934.

In 1936 he was commissioned to write an account of poverty among unemployed miners in northern England, which resulted in ‘The Road To Wigan Pier‘ (1937). Late in 1936, Orwell travelled to Spain to fight for the Republicans against Franco’s Nationalists.

Between 1941 and 1943, Orwell worked on propaganda for the BBC. In 1943, he became literary editor of the Tribune, a weekly left-wing magazine. By now he was a prolific journalist, writing articles, reviews and books.

In 1945, Orwell’s ‘Animal Farm‘ was published. A political fable set in a farmyard but based on Stalin’s betrayal of the Russian Revolution, it made Orwell’s name and ensured he was financially comfortable for the first time in his life. ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984)‘ was published four years later. Set in an imaginary totalitarian future, the book made a deep impression, with its title and many phrases – such as ‘Big Brother is watching you’, ‘newspeak’ and ‘doublethink’ – entering popular use. However, Orwell’s health was deteriorating and he died of tuberculosis on 21 January 1950.

The Complete Novels of George Orwell

The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell (1,2,3&4 (Boxed Set))

The Social and Political Thought of George Orwell

George Orwell: A Literary Life (Literary Lives)

Top 5 Contemporary Classics List

By definition, Contemporary Authors are those which novels are written and published during or after the World War II. The fact is – most of the best-selling and most loved contemporary authors were born in 19th century. These authors define a specific group that we call Contemporary Classics.

In this respect we are going to make a separate listing for this venerable elite, following the same set of selection criteria that we used to compose the previous list.

• 5. | Vladimir Nabokov (1899 – 1977)
• 4. | C.S. Lewis (1898 – 1963)
• 3. | J.R.R. Tolkien (1892 – 1973)
• 2. | Agatha Christie (1890-1976)
• 1. | Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961)

The Most Famous Contemporary Authors List – Bottom Line

We know the list may spark lots of discussions, but we hope it also sends you back to the authors and books you read with pleasure years ago as well as to books that you may not have heard of. Great authors, great reads, great at their craft. Let’s agree on this before launching any arguments, personal views, questions or suggestions, that are expected and, off course, are welcomed.

A  book review is a critical evaluation of the book that provides a thoughtful and in-depth analysis, and evaluation of the main idea, and purpose of the book. In a word, it presents the assessment of the quality, meaning, and significance of the book.

We’ve all heard the saying, “So many books – So little time”. In the modern society, book reviews play a vital role in helping us decide which books are worth our investment in time and money. People don’t want to waste either, reading books they won’t enjoy, so they rely on book reviews to help them go for a particular reading.

The key to writing good literature review lies in good planing. What points to include and what to omit. Spend a necessary time thinking before you even set pen to paper. To assist you in this process here is a book review template with few useful tips on how to make it right.

Steps for Writing a Good Book Review

Top Tip 1: Don’t read the book!
At least, not yet. Instead, start by looking at it.  Is it a richly manufactured item aimed at collectors? What does the cover illustration indicate the book will be about? What sort of blurbs are included? How is it categorized by the publisher? All of these will give you a clues to the nature of the book you’ll be reading and will  indicate the book’s target audience.

Top Tip 2: Read the book!
It may sounds silly, especialy in respect to the first tip, but you have to pay due care and attention to the author’s work and only then can you be confident of critiquing it.

• Introduce the subject, scope, and type of book
  Identify the book by author, title, and sometimes publishing information. Specify the genre of book and what categories does this book fall into? Help your readers to review with perspective.
  
• Put the book in context
  Sometimes you will need to include background to enable reader(s) to place the book into a specific context. Is it the first of its kind or an imitation? The author’s first book or fifteenth? Spend some time relating this book to others in its category to further explain the book and your judgment of it.
• Briefly summarize the content
  Once you’ve put some thought into the reviewer mind set, writing the review is the easy part. Briefly review the story line for readers, being careful not to give away anything that would lessen the suspense for readers. One tactic is to either summarize the key concepts or the key characters.
  
• Provide your reactions to the book
  How did the book affect you?  What caught your attention, and when were you bored? When was the book suspenseful? Which characters did you like, and why?  Here you must be cotious not to fall into a chatty style that is more about your own experiences while reading the bok than an analysis of what the author has produced.
  
• Summarize your ideas
  Close with a direct comment on the book, and tie together issues raised in the review. Let the readers know what the author was trying to get across and if he actually succeeded.
  
• Pass judgment
  If you liked or disliked the book, this is the time for you to say so. Try to present a balanced argument about the value of the book for its audience.

If you choose to read other critics who have written about the book, do so only after you have read the book and formed your own opinion to avoid being unduly influenced by others.

Negative Book Reviews

Why Books Get Negative Reviews? Book reviewers love books. They want to enjoy and recommend good readings. When a negative review is given, it is usually because the author failed to do the work necessary to receive a positive review. If you have to write a negative review about some fiction book, here are the major points that may envoke your critics wrath.

• Poorly composed basic Fiction Elements – weak story line, poor character developments, choppy writing.
• Poor editing and proofreading – apart of all issues related to the luck of professionalism, these directly distract the reader from following the plot and should be criticized in your review accordingly.
• Poor research – If a reviewer is an expert in the subject matter, he is going to notice mistakes the author made or facts he left out.
• Miss-targeting the audience – Children’s books written in confusing style or treating inappropriate subjects and topics are good example.

Why you should go for writing a negative review? Well, evene a negative review is better than no book review. In the long run, you may help some creative people out-there to become a better writers and hopefully sell more books

Book Reviews on the Run

How to write a book review is not just another of hot literature questions.

You are a bibliophile, a bookworm or a lover of the printed word, you have just read a book and are offering your opinion. As people see and read your review, they will most probably be enticed to read the book (if it’s a good review) and the message of the book is spread further and wider.

So the next time you discover one of those real life-changing books, why don’t you take a bit of time to do a review on it? It might just be a blessing to someone who really needs it.

The introduction of Internet to the global population has revolutionized the way of consuming and gaining access to the virtually unlimited variety of contents. While there is a lot of healthy and useful information on the Internet, there are some materials which may be potentially harmful to young people.

Online community consists of not only children, but readers/viewers with varying ages, backgrounds and preferences. Therefore, relevant sectors such as the Internet service providers and content providers, have a huge responsibility in carrying out appropriate Content Rating Systems , to protect the rights on adequate information for all users equally.

Background

Do you see the book ?

However, Many different rating systems exist. For example,  TV Ratings and Advisories, Star Ratings, and various rating systems used in various countries. Some rating systems are more specific than others are. While many finds existing rating systems useful, some readers find many of them to be quite vague. The kind of content-summarizing information that one reader would find useful might be considered less useful by another.  Unfortunately, these readers often have little or no ability to change or influence either existing rating systems or ratings that are associated with specified writings.

In this respect, it is very important that Content providers choose a transparent and most standardized way of labeling their site content and associating it with adequate Content Rating Guides and filters to allow or disallow access to particular items.  It also implies an objective information declared in the label and the subjective preferences of the users concerned.

What is CRS and how it works

One of those literature questions without adequate literature response.

Ratings are designed to give readers some summarized understanding of the content that they are about to read. At the same time it provides new liberty to writers to express themselves without taking a responsibility of the scope of their audience. By applying an adequate CRS filter, readers and writers may enjoy the appropriate content, and be spared of any related inconveniences.

Quality Content Rating System (CRS) implementation should accomplish three major goals:

• To protect children on the Internet
• To protect freedom of expression on the Internet
• To set up a hotline to handle complaints about obscene and indecent articles on the internet

The reasons for a rating being associated with a particular writing might not be readily apparent from the rating itself, since there may be any of a number of reasons for it like for example:

• The nature of the language used
• Graphic violence being presented in the text or associated illustrations
• Certain types of “explicit sexual content” being described

Internet is interactive tool, with a lot of content provided by users through online forms and upload procedures. Internet sites that provides interactive services bears huge responsibility of adequate content moderation. If moderators think that an item is inappropriately rated as defined by the established guidelines, they should adjust the rating accordingly. Also, documented procedures should be applied whenever CRS restrictions are being breached, with exact set of measures toward a non obeying users.

On other hand, CRS must not be a tool for censoring or influencing the public view on regularly provided content.

Make Literature Online Content Rating Guide

Bright example of good CRS implementation is Make Literature Online collaborative writing community .

Make Literature Online Content Rating System (CRS) is our own, unique system for rating online content which aims to provide a simple and conceivable rating management. It is used to rate the content of each item found on our website. Make Literature Online does not normally censor or restrict content posted to the site. However,  authors must choose a rating for an item’s content in order for it to show up on Make Literature Online public listings and we do require that content posted to our site be rated properly according to our proprietary guidelines. Our ratings are:

• Content Safe
• Adult Supervised
• Adults Only
• Extreme Content
• Private Content

Content Safe – suitable for everyone of any age. There are absolutely no references to sex (other than gender), drugs (legal/illegal), alcohol, violence, cursing (of any kind), derogatory names or any combination thereof. These titles are displayed for members who have their account preferences set to 13+ and below.

Adult Supervised – should not be viewed by minors alone, but accompanied by adult supervision (parent, guardian, teacher, etc.). The item may contain some content that is not appropriate for readers of less than 18 years of age and is recommended to be read by an adult first to be sure it is appropriate for the minor. The item may contain very mild slang curse words (dang, darn, etc.) or mild derogatory words (idiot, jerk, etc.). Horror and violence may exist at an extremely mild level, but does not exceed moderate levels. There are absolutely no references to sex (other than gender), drugs (illegal), alcohol, graphic violence, harsh or sexually derived cursing, harsh derogatory names, or any combination thereof.

Adults Only – intended for readers 18 years of age and older and may be inappropriate for any minor under the age of 18. This item may contain references to sex, drugs, alcohol, violence, harsh or sexually derived cursing, derogatory names or combination thereof.

Extreme Content – intended for those readers 18 years of age and older who are not offended by extremely material that may contain extreme or obsessive levels of sex, drugs, violence, harsh or sexually derived cursing, derogatory names or combination thereof.

Private Content – If an Author does not wish for an item to appear on our public listing, this will keep the item out of it, but will still display it from within the Author’s portfolio (unless he or she sets it to private). Authors may wish to use this option for drafts, works in progress or for any other personal reason.

Rating Hints

• When rating the content, if an item is on the borderline and you are undecided between two ratings, choose the higher one. Always lean to the higher rating when you are in doubt.
• If something is so borderline that you just cannot decide if it should be rated higher, then chances are, it should indeed be rated higher.
• If participating in collaborative writing project, be aware of the original storyline content rating, and try to stick with it as in opposite, the whole project may be adjusted to your contents rating if it is higher then the original one.
• Images on Make Literature Online must also be subjected  to our CRS guidelines. Please be aware and use discretion when using your images in signatures, in emails and writing posts.

If the Make Literature Online or Moderators feel that an item is inappropriately rated as defined by our guidelines, we will adjust the rating as we see fit. This only changes the rating and will not censor it from public view. We will not argue with an Author over his or her rating.

How and what you will read and write in the future. New trends and challenges in literature

Literature Questions

Do you see the World?

The world is changing at accelerated pace. It becomes more and more like a giant stage with numerous postmodern screenplays flashing tremendously before our eyes.

You do not share this view?  This is just a short reminder of the recent news:

Geneva, 10 September 2008. The first beam in the Large Hadron Collider at CERN was successfully steered around the full 27 kilometers of the world’s most powerful particle accelerator at 10h28 this morning.

A European court says the idea a new supercollider project could create a “celestial vacuum” (nice name for the black hole) and eventually consume the Earth is worth discussing, but the project can move forward on schedule anyway.

We wake up each morning  to a cheep 70’s SF movie. Just a mirror reflections of  the “state of the art” in human evolution. You have to admit it. We split the atom, the center of everything, and in so doing we created chaos.

The Contemporary Poets reflect this chaos. Postmodern literature does the same thing. Pick out the fragments. Out of the chaos, the modernists and the postmodernists pull fragments of life around them. They then leave it to the reader to put these fragments back together.

But do not let yourself think in traditional ways when addressing Modern and Postmodern literature questions. You have to be open to the experience and it will make sense!

The modern author intentionally leaves the work open to the readers interpretation. Endless endings, very much like the world we are living in. Are these just a signs of  new artistic tendencies or a definitive literature response to new, altered reality?

Literature Response

Do you see the book ?

It is more and more difficult to make today’s media-savvy new generations to acquire a taste in reading classic literature, given the powerful influence of movies,  the Internet, and mentioned circumstances.

You can blog, phlog, vlog and podcast, all for free, and get ready, appreciative readers too. You can write and publish your own books (e-books) at a fraction of the cost of a printed book. You may say this is a bright side of life lyrics. Everybody can be a writer and writing doesn’t look formidable anymore.

There are opinions that chatting on the Internet or messaging frequently over the mobile phones impair our children language skills.

Communication and language skills have actually improved with the arrival of the Internet. Basically as we chat more, be it through the net or email or mobile, so we write more, express more and somewhere the communication skills improve and fear of English, French, German, Serbian or any other language itself goes away.

Emerging Literature Trends and Technologies

famous literature visualization

Understanding symbolism of new literature medium may seem like a scary experience. First step to understanding is observation. So let’s observe what are the main carriers of literature response in new Millennium.

• Collaborative Writing

  Wikipedia definition of Collaborative Writing (this famous web encyclopedia is an illustrative example of collaborative writing itself): “The term collaborative writing refers to projects where written works are created by multiple people together (collaboratively) rather than individually”.

  There is a sayings “teamwork makes the dream work”. Collaborative writing can often lead to books that are richer and more complex than those produced by individuals. Having many people working on a project has added to the creative process. Also, they can be an immense support to one another.And you never know where the story is going! Endless Endings?

  Start recognizing post-modernistic symbols?

  Another analogy: Instead of sequential method of plotting in traditional writing, Collaborative Writing brings all means off interactivity in creative process. By using tools of communication like Internet, mobile phones, collaborative writing software etc. , the writing process is deconstructed and newly assembled, managed preferable by the group, community, even readers – the audience, rather then being solitude and selfishly controlled by one person.

  Literature born from the chaos. Is it another symbol of postmodernism that we have just discovered in applied literature practice?

  This is why, despite many tangible complexities related to Collaborative Writing idea, it presents respectful literature phenomenon. It is here to stay. The main challenge in the future will be how to put it in the write, “acceptable to all” context, rather than keep denying its relevance.

  Make Literature Online site is the brightest example of the Collaborative Writing community.

• Self Publishing

Because of digital technology and the distribution possibilities offered by the Internet, small publishing is more feasible today than ever before. Independent voices can be affordable made available to the general reading public, providing fresh titles, both fiction and non-fiction.

However, establishing and running a small publishing house may seem like a complicated endeavor. Acquiring International Standard Book Numbers, Purchasing a unique Internet domain name for your publishing house website, Determine a niche for your publication efforts, Locating the book printer most appropriate for your needs, Contacting small press friendly book reviewers and sending attractive press kits, Visiting small press trade shows and network with other small publishers … are just few parts in the puzzle that many independent writers are not ready or not willing to deal with.

While big publishing might claim the majority of the profit margin, small publishing remains more and more alive and well among the small, entrepreneurial set.

• Literature Visualization

This is a “hot term”, one of those that can make you look smart in the party. However, the roots of the literature visualization reach back in the first half of the last century. We all remember “The War of the Worlds”, by H. G. Wells, famous radio broadcasting, and few of you also, with nostalgia recalls the Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version with such a star like Richard Burton as the narrator-protagonist.

In its broad context, the literature visualization imply all mans of different media interpretations of literature. From recorded storytelling, popular movie stars children’s literature reading video sessions, end big budget movie project, over literature digitization and e-book publishing, to large international projects like it is project Gutenberg for instance. The industry of Book Teaser Videos is more and more prominent.

Another important aspect and interpretation of Literature Visualization term is related to new, novel writing techniques. Summarized in two words: “Show, don’t tell”. Anticipating growing aspirations of new generation of readers that attend a lot of movies and most think visually, authors tend to think of their books as of a mini-movies, with multi-dimensional characters with a definite point of view.

• Social Networks Media Broadcasting and new Copyright Models

In the age of WEB 2.0, the Social Networks create a completely new medium for distributing the message to the masses.

Music Industry was the fist to acknowledge the full potential of the Internet and on line Communities. Many popular music stars and bands published their work on Internet first. They timely understood the potential of live and proximate interaction with their audience and the benefits that it brings short-term and long-terms respectively.

The same processes are developing within the literature community. The major issue of Copyrights was successfully digested by introduction of ingenious Creative Common License that offer creators a best-of-both-worlds way to protect their works while encouraging certain uses of them.

Literature is changing inexorably, following closely the global trends. For literature scholars, authors and consumers, it is important to recognize the meaning of both contemporary literature questions and symbolism of genuine literature response to new-age challenges. This new comprehension will add quality tools to our literature arsenal letting us enjoy it in various, new, exciting ways.