Sarah Polley is the only one who can tell her story.
What is the ethical power of literature? How can you learn to read a poem if you know more about the poet than the lines on the page? I'm almost halfway on board with Russell Smith here, I worry about self-promoting writers and the meaning of the word “friend.” But I also think about Norman Mailer, or Gore Vidal—an analog troll, to borrow Virginia Heffernan's words—from time to time, and I wonder about just how new this brave world really is.
Then again, sorry, Picasso, but the world really is too new for Moleskine notebooks to keep putting your old name on all of their marketing materials. Since they're going digital, I'm thinking that they might just replace you with David Hockney.
