Hamish Hamilton News
RSS feedOur Town 8 February 2010
This morning we met up with some literary editors to tell them out about our 2010 fiction list. The venue was the 32nd floor of London’s brutalist concrete Centrepoint tower and this was the view, just before the snow arrived. Our offices at 80 Strand are just out of shot, to the right — and our temporary home at the Truman Brewery is in the shadow of the skyscrapers in the centre distance.
Together Again For The Very First Time 5 February 2010
The Story Of My Purity 4 February 2010
We are delighted to welcome young Italian novelist and translator Francesco Pacifico to Hamish Hamilton. Alongside FSG in New York, we will be publishing the English translation of his forthcoming novel, The Story of My Purity, in Winter 2012. The story of a particularly Italian revolte du fils, it was described to us by one fellow writer as ‘the Roman Catholic answer to Portnoy’s Complaint’. We can’t wait.
Reality Hunger Live 3 February 2010
Much excitement here following delivery of finished copies of David Shields’s stupendous Reality Hunger – seen here on our publisher’s desk.
If, like us, you are finding it hard to wait until publication on the 25th, click here for a four-minute film of the book just posted to YouTube.
Guardian Tributes to JDS 1 February 2010
You can find further tributes to the late, great J.D. Salinger here.
Mourning Salinger 29 January 2010
‘Many readers were created by The Catcher in the Rye, and many writers, too. He and his characters embodied a kind of American resistance that has been sorely missed these last few years, and will now be missed even more’
– Jonathan Safran Foer
‘His work meant a lot to me when I was a young person and his writing still sings, doesn’t seem the least bit dated, and few were ever as good at dialogue as he was’
– Dave Eggers
The Shape of 2010 29 January 2010
We have just finalised our 2010 publication schedule – a process akin to assembling a rather tricky jigsaw without a pattern to follow – and can now stand back and look at the year with that combination of excitement, optimism, relief, nervousness and self-chastisement that typifies the January mood of the publisher.
A few books have moved, a few have slipped, and a few have bounced in ahead of schedule. But a definite shape has emerged, from the speculative fictions in this month’s McSweeney’s 32, all set in 2024, to the invigorating and often hilarious meditations on mortality in David Shields’s The Thing About Life Is That One Day You’ll be Dead, at the end of the year.
If, like us, you are a fan of old-fashioned calendars, you may want to add the following titles to their relevant dates:
28 January
McSweeneys 32
4 February
Arundhati Roy: The Shape of the Beast
Paul Murray: Skippy Dies
25 February
David Shields: Reality Hunger
4 March
Jonathan Safran Foer: Eating Animals
Colin Elford: A Year in the Woods
Bernardine Evaristo: Hello Mum
25 March
Noam Chomsky: Hopes and Prospects
Dave Eggers: Zeitoun
Marilyn Chin: Revenge of the Mooncake Vixen
1 April
James Kelman: If it is your life
27 May
Toby Litt: King Death
24 June
Shane Jones: Light Boxes
J.D. Salinger: the box set
29 July
Adam Phillips: On Balance
5 August
James Robertson: And The Land Lay Still
Lydia Davis: The Collected Stories
Daniel Swift: Bomber County
4 November
David Shields: The Thing About Life Is That One Day You’ll Be Dead
Luke Williams: The Echo Chamber
In Memoriam J.D. Salinger 29 January 2010
We are all mourning deeply the loss of one of our very favourite authors – and one of the greatest writers of the last century, J.D. Salinger. Although none of us ever met him and he had not published a book since 1965, his presence was very strongly felt in the Hamish Hamilton office. Indeed, we have spent the last several months plotting a relaunch of our Salinger list for this June, with new covers which the author had approved – and we were especially excited to have received word from the author himself. Even at two removes, via his UK and US agents, the words ‘JDS says…’ in an email had a special magic. And it is very sad to think that we will have no such communication again.
I am certain that J.D. Salinger’s passing will be keenly felt by many. The Catcher in the Rye must surely be close to the top of the list of favourite books of millions of readers – as it is of ours; and his other works will not be far behind – and for some, of course, ahead. He was the bestselling Hamish Hamilton author ever and we owe him an enormous debt.
Simon Prosser
The Pale Yellow Ticket 28 January 2010
HH author Toby Litt just emailed to tell us he has been given a seat at the year’s most hotly-anticipated political showdown, as Tony Blair testifies to the House of Commons select committee on Iraq.
In Toby’s words: ‘The golden ticket – in fact, it’s pale yellow – came through the door last Friday. I’d put in for the postal ballot almost without thinking. Chances were, my name wouldn’t be picked out. Chances were, like everyone else, I’d watch the highlights on TV. Instead, reading the small print on the ticket’s reverse, I saw that I was going to be – for three hours – in the most focussed-upon, most discussed location in the world…’
We look forward to hearing all about it.
Tuk Tuk Tuk Tuk Tuk Tuk 3 27 January 2010
A welcome update from intrepid HH novelist and poet Joe Dunthorne, currently taking the very slow route across India – by rickshaw:
‘Ricky is now in Cochin, having traveled 2000km down the west coast of India. He broke down only hours from Cochin, his final destination, and had to be towed 16km in the dark, with us using our head torches as headlights. Ricky has now been renamed Raul, because of his Latin temperament.’
Read more about Joe’s charitable endeavour in our two earlier posts.
← Older News