Audacious Literary Criticism & Political Commentary
LiteraryGulag.com is News. It is audacious literary criticism and political commentary filtered through the social spectrum of the NOW. Essays will be posted once or twice a month, if possible. Reader commentary is welcomed.
Read my interview with Michael F. Shaughnessy, Senior Columnist at EdNews.org, published on July 29, 2008, "Did Ian McEwan Plagiarize or ?" (http://ednews.org/articles/27773/1).
My essay, "Reading in the Internet Age: The Seventeen Rules of Engagement," was published in the Spring 2008 issue of The New Mexico Journal of Reading, Vol. XXVIII, No. 3.
Read my interview with Michael F. Shaughnessy, Senior Columnist at EdNews.org, on the Great American Novel and Norman Mailer. It was published on March 13, 2008 (http://ednews.org/articles/23801/1(3/13/2008).
See "Diana E. Sheets: The demise of the great American novel," which appeared in the Pasadena Star-News on February 10, 2008 (http://www.pasadenastarnews.com/ci_8226082), as well as the Whittier Daily News (www.whittierdailynews.com/ci_8226082) and the San Gabriel Valley Tribune (www.sgvtribune.com/ci_8226082).
"If it's written, will the Great American Novel be published?" appeared in The Free Lance-Star on February 3, 2008. (www.fredericksburg.com/News/FLS/2008/022008/02032008/352283)
An edited version of my "Virtue" essay has appeared in the February, 2008 issue of The St. Croix Review. (http://www.stcroixreview.com/summary.php)
My interview with Michael F. Shaughnessy, Senior Columnist at EdNews.org, is published (1/15/2008). Read what I have to say about fiction and history and their relevance today. Archived with Shaughnessy's essays for January, 2008. (ednews.org/articles/21947/1/An-Interview-with-Diana-Sheets--The-Literary-Gulag/Page1.html).
Check out my Op-Ed "Looking for real virtue in literature" that appeared on January 9, 2008 in The Christian Science Monitor and listen to the five-minute audio interview with Opinion Editor Josh Burek as well! (http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0109/p09s02-coop.html). The Op-Ed was picked up throughout the country including The Press of Atlantic City, the Island Packet, the News Observer, Yahoo! News, Lake Wylie Pilot, EIN News.com, Enquirer-Herald, the Sacramento Bee, The Bellingham Herald, and the Tri-City Herald.
See my literarygulag.com posting at Newsweek (11/29/07) regarding the impact of Kindle, the electronic reader introduced by Amazon.com. (http://www.newsweek.com/id/70983/page/2 ) .
Below is a copy of my published online letter to the New York Times regarding their front-page story "A Success Story in India." Written on Sept. 8th, it appeared on 9/17/2007.
To the Editor:
Seldom is news just news. Today, every event is politically interpreted and morally adjudicated. Therefore, I was delightfully surprised by the nuance of your Sept. 7 front-page article about the economic circumstances of Kerala, India, where its citizens are educated and, consequently, often leave their region and homeland in search of great financial opportunities.
The Communist Party provided Kerala with critical allocations of education and health care that have improved the circumstances of its women and ignited the desires of its people. Readers take note: opportunity was brought about by the fusion of socialist policies and materialistic dreams. Education and health care (Communist policy) gave rise to aspirational goals (capitalist outcome). Therein lies the spectacular anomaly of Kerala.
Diana E. Sheets
