Brain Snacks: Tasty Tidbits of Knowledge
John Gardner's "business card" lists "banjoist" among other quirky things as one of his official accomplishments. (Source.)
Acclaimed director Julie Taymor's adaptation of Gardner's Grendel as an opera included a 48-foot long, 28-foot high rotating "wall-like platform" that weighed 45,000 pounds and cost $950,000. Too bad it didn't work for opening week in LA. (Source.)
Gardner was careful to include poetic sentences in Grendel that mimic the Anglo-Saxon alliterative line so crucial to the artistry in Beowulf. He also includes kennings (compound metaphors) to keep it real. (Source.)
Washington Post columnist David Stanton offers this paraphrase of Gardner's theory on what good fiction does: "truly good novels and stories... are those that inspire us to better behavior instead of appealing to our cynicism" (source). Hmmm.