Daniel Quinn gets dragged into the ugly mess of the Discovery Channel gunman. (FOXNews)

Maryann Yin recaps the finalists for the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. (GalleyCat)

Neal Stephenson releases a serialized digital novel. (seattlepi.com)

Stuart Evers goes off on authors who get too long-winded in their acknowledgments. (Guardian Books Blog)

Laura Fraser officiates over a battle between chick lit and dude lit. (The Daily Beast)

Stephen Elliot sets up an audio interview with author Steve Almond. (The Rumpus)

M.A. Orthofer links to new issues of two literary magazines. (The Literary Saloon)

R.I.P. George Hitchcock, poet and publisher of kayak. (KansasCity.com)

“On this day in 1666, the Great Fire of London began, enkindled by the King’s baker when he failed to damp his oven properly. The Diary of Samuel Pepys provides a fascinating eye-witness account, from his first horrified sighting of “an infinite great fire,” to digging a pit for his best wine and cheese, to a final walkabout “with our feet ready to burn.”" (Today in Literature)

The Seven Year Bitch author Jennifer Belle says writers should write what they want to write. (GalleyCat)

Steve Almond leads the charge in a “meditation on editors, ambition and angry dependence”. (The Rumpus)

Borders is shutting down its San Francisco operations. (San Francisco Examiner)

The Virginia Quarterly Review has temporarily closed its offices and canceled its winter issue after the suicide of Kevin Morrissey. (NYTimes)

Attention grammar police: June Casagrande gives fair warning about some changes in the new edition of the Chicago Manual of Style. (Glendale News Press)

Justin Peacock finds the that today’s great social novels are being written by crime authors. (The Daily Beast)

Matthew Pearl reports from the front lines of the “novel wars”. (Huffington Post)

M.A. Orthofer offers some commentary on the relative editing skills of traditional publishers. (The Literary Saloon)

Carolyn Kellogg explores whether a hit book means a hit movie. (Jacket Copy)

Scott Butki chats it up with Body Work author Sara Paretsky. (seattlepi.com)

What’s the best position for reading in bed? (Reading Copy Book Blog)

Alison Flood adds her perspective. (Guardian Books Blog)

Georgie Williamson writes in defense of “old-world critics”. (The Australian)

“On this day in 1939 Germany invaded Poland, starting WWII. This gave moment to W. H. Auden’s “September 1, 1939,” one of his most famous poems, and one of many attempts to figure how “the windiest militant trash” could have us all “Lost in a haunted wood.” On this day two years later, the yellow star was made obligatory for Jews in Germany; and this day three years after would be Anne Frank’s last before learning her fate: the last train bound out of Holland for Auschwitz.” (Today in Literature)

Okay. Finally, a literary mash-up that amuses me. (GalleyCat)

Regina Brett looks at the handwriting over a house where Langston Hughes once lived and wonders if it might be more important to instead preserve an appreciation for the author’s works. (cleveland.com)

The Kurt Vonnegut Memorial Library will open soon. (Official site)

John Cusack to play Edgar Allen Poe in a new thriller film. (CBC News)

Luke Sampson chats it up with author and poet Ismail Kadare. (Financial Times)

JK Rowling donates £10 million to set up a multiple sclerosis research center in the name of her mother, who died from complications of the disease. (Telegraph)

Jonathan Jones sings the praises of eReading in the dark. (Guardian Books Blog)

Pynchon’s 2006 letter defending Ian McEwan against charges of plagiarism. (Letters of Note)

Bo Emerson talks to Jonathan Franzen. (accessAtlanta)

Tom Bissell defends Virginia Quarterly Review editor Ted Genoways in the aftermath of Kevin Morrissey’s suicide. (The New York Observer)

“On this day in 1946 John Hersey’s “Hiroshima” was published in The New Yorker. The article took up almost all sixty-eight pages of text space, an unprecedented and unannounced step for the magazine, taken so “that everyone might well take time to consider.” When Hersey died in 1993, one obituary called “Hiroshima” the “most famous magazine article ever published.”" (Today in Literature)

Sari Botton chats it up with author and essayist Shalom Auslander. (The Rumpus)

Peter Stothard rounds up a new batch of the best in British literature. (The Daily Beast)

Rachel Cooke profiles Israeli author David Grossman. (The Observer)

Might eBooks be a good fit in a correctional setting? (corrections.com)

A woman has crashed her car into Stephen King’s security gate. (WMTW)

Alison Flood details some of the best modern literary book tours. (The Guardian)

Judith Rosen highlights some sleepers of the fall season. (Publishers Weekly)

Gary Dexter explains how Hugh MacDiarmid’s “A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle” got its title. (Telegraph)

Carol Rumens is back with a new poem of the week, Vona Groarke’s “Pier”. (Guardian Books Blog)

“On this day in 30 BC Cleopatra committed suicide. Death by self-inflicted asp was no whim: Cleopatra’s search for a painless exit caused more than one unfortunate to be experimentally force-fed this or that drug or snake. The dress-rehearsing done, came the final act: “Give me my robe, put on my crown; I have / Immortal longings in me. . . .”" (Today in Literature)

Peter Stanford profiles prolific historical fiction author Conn Iggulden. (The Independent)

The next edition of the Oxford English Dictionary will be the last. Thanks a lot, internet. (Telegraph)

Julie Bosman examines how Jonathan Franzen was chewed up and spit out of the pop culture machine in record time. (NYTimes)

Diane Leach looks between the covers of Monique Truong’s Bitter in the Mouth. (LATimes)

Simon Winder laments the end of Penguin’s ‘Great Ideas’ series. (The Guardian)

Mark Sanderson rounds up a new batch of interesting literary tidbits. (Telegraph)

Dean Kuipers explores the environmentalist side of US Poet Laureate WS Merwin. (LATimes)

R.I.P. Jules Edward Loh, journalist. (AP)

R.I.P. Jackson Gillis, TV drama writer. (NYTimes)

“On this day in 1833, the Mills and Factory Act was passed in England, one of a series of measures to improve the “Health and Morals” of child laborers. The Act allowed a forty-eight-hour work week for children aged nine to twelve, but it brought many changes which the younger Dickens and William Blake’s even younger “Chimney Sweeper” would have welcomed.” (Today in Literature)

Andrew Anthony profiles James Ellroy through the prism of his lastest, Blood’s a Rover. (The Observer)

Richard Lea reports on the longlist for the 2010 Guardian first book award. (The Guardian)

Blogcritics’ Scott Butki chats it up with novelist Laura Lippman. (seattlepi.com)

Kelly Zhou rounds up a week of festivities in honor of Ray Bradbury’s 90th. (Daily Bruin)

Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Weiner talk to Jason Pinter about the whole “Franzen feud”… (Huffington Post) …more here and here.

And here: Lincoln Michel asks if the Times really does favor white male authors. (Faster Times)

Bloomsbury to relaunch the entire Harry Potter series to coincide with the upcoming film and then, presumably, roll around naked in piles of money. (The Independent)

Jacket Copy looks at some “non-book literary oddities” on eBay. (LATimes)

Author Amanda Craig says the UK government should ban poor people from  having more than two children. (Telegraph)

“On this day in 430, Saint Augustine died at the age of seventy-five. He was Bishop of Hippo (now Annaba, Algeria) for thirty-four years, during which time he became the patriarch of Christian Africa and one of the most influential leaders of the Latin Church; from a literary viewpoint, his Confessions is seen as one of the first major contributions to the genre of self-disclosure.” (Today in Literature)

Bo Emerson profiles Mississippi poet Natasha Tretheway, whose new book tackles the lingering effects of Katrina. (accessAtlanta)

Greg Gerke chats it up with short story author Lydia Davis. (The Rumpus)

Michael Korda explains why he writes. (Publishers Weekly)

In celebration of Tanith Lee. (Guardian Books Blog)

Robert Richardson discusses why William James continues to matter. (The Daily Beast)

Michael Pollak traces Mark Twain’s New York footsteps. (NYTimes)

A rather hefty profile of David Mitchell. (The Independent)

6 year-old lands a 23 book deal? (Mirror)

UK authors join forces in protesting cuts to Public Lending Right, which pays authors each time one of their books is borrowed. (The Guardian)

“On this day in 1841, James Fenimore Cooper’s The Deerslayer was published. This covers the earliest phase of the Leatherstocking saga, wherein the twenty-three-year-old Natty Bumppo must pass his first tests in the wilderness, rise above the worst of paleface and redskin ethics, avoid being burned at the stake, return Chingachgook’s beloved Wah-ta!-Wah to him, and tell Judith that his heart belongs to the forest.” (Today in Literature)

Seth Godin expands on his reasons for bypassing traditional publishing. (mediabistro.com)

Ramy Habeeb chats it up with “digital innovator” Peter Collingridge of Enhanced Editions, who produces enhanced eBooks in the UK. (Publishing Perspectives)

Rachel Deahl has some new details on the Andrew Wylie / Random House truce. (Publishers Weekly)

Charlotte Higgins talks to AS Byatt about her new novel, in addition to “religion, reality, her hatred of diaries and why she is eager for someone to write a novel about the discourse of Facebook and Twitter”. (The Guardian)

Free eBooks for college students… get em while they’re hot. (GalleyCat)

Rick Gekoski muses on what it means to be good literary loser. (Guardian Books Blog)

David Pogue takes the new Kindle for a test drive. (NYTimes)

MI5 thought James Bond screenwriter Cyril Wolf Mankowitz was a spy. (Herald Scotland)

In other “weird spy” news, the author who claimed he was a CIA assassin killed himself on accident… (AP)

“On this day in 1875, the lawyer-politician-writer John Buchan was born, in Perth, Scotland. Buchan wrote prolifically and in almost all genres, but he is best known for his spy-adventure novels, particularly the first “Richard Hannay” book, The Thirty-Nine Steps. Most give Buchan credit for the kind of espionage thriller — he called them “shockers” — that would eventually arrive at James Bond.” (Today in Literature)

Random House / Andrew Wylie Saga Resolved

Random House Strikes Truce with Wylie Agency (GalleyCat)
Wylie and Random House make e-peace (The Literary Saloon)
Amazon Loses E-Book Deal (Wall Street Journal)

In other news:

Chris Power continues his “brief survey of the short story” with a look at the work of Vladimir Nabokov. (Guardian Books Blog)

Why aren’t Britons visiting libraries anymore? (Telegraph)

Poet Liz Lochhead will read at the funeral of Edwin Morgan tomorrow. (Herald Scotland)

Will Gompertz comments (briefly) on the “Franzen media roadshow”. (BBC)

Sean Di Lizio chronicles his experiences in attempting a novel in three days. (The Millions)

Joseph Berger details the woes of New York City’s sole Yiddish bookstore. (NYTimes)

Sabina Dana Plasse explores what makes US Poet Laureate WS Merwin tick. (Idaho Mountain Express)

Kayla Webley looks at what the prisoners at Guantánamo Bay are reading. (TIME)

R.I.P. Edward Kean, TV writer. (NYTimes)

R.I.P. Gerald Rosen, novelist and professor. (San Francisco Chronicle)

R.I.P. George David Weiss, songwriter. (NYTimes)

R.I.P. Satoshi Kon, anime writer and director. (Collider)

“On this day in 1949, Martin Amis was born. In any history of the last half-century of English Literature, a chapter will have to be given to the Amis family’s seventy-five books — and still counting, in Martin’s case. Two chapters might be better: one of father Kingsley’s many “failures of tolerance,” to use Martin’s phrase, was his contempt for his son’s postmodern novels, or the few he’d tried reading.” (Today in Literature)

Alec Michod chats it up with “brainy British novelist” David Mitchell. (The Rumpus)

The launch of Suzanne Collins’s Mockingjay creates high hopes among booksellers. (NYTimes)

The September 2010 issue of World Literature Online is now, well, online. (WLT)

Charlotte Higgins examines the ethics of the memoir. (The Guardian)

Jeff Rivera talks to bestselling author Phillipa Gregory (audio). (GalleyCat)

Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg muses on the effect of Seth Godin walking away from traditional publishing. (Wall Street Journal)

Daniel B. Roberts profiles the “next big thing in urban hipster lit”, Tao Lin. (Salon)

John Le Carré calls James Bond a “neo-fascist” gangster. (Telegraph)

Google shifts its stance on net neutrality. What does that mean for the book settlement? (Publishers Weekly)

“On this day in 1847 Charlotte Bronte sent her manuscript of Jane Eyre to her eventual publisher, under her pseudonym of Currer Bell. Many first reviewers thought the book outrageous; one speculated that Currer Bell was an “unsexed” woman who dared “to trample upon customs established by our forefathers, and long destined to shed glory upon our domestic circles.” (Today in Literature)

Günter Grass talks writing, politics and the Brothers Grimm in a wide-ranging interview. (Spiegel)

Prepare to laugh. (Better Book Titles)

Peruse the most anticipated fiction and non-fiction of this fall. (New York Magazine)

Jonathan Jones declares Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom “the novel of the year, and the century”. (Guardian Books Blog)

Johann Hari reminds us that Jack London was far more than a children’s adventure writer. (The Independent)

German best seller list invaded by women writing in English. (Publishers Weekly)

Kelly Zhou joins the chorus of 90th birthday wishes for Ray Bradbury. (The Daily Bruin)

Carol Rumens celebrates the life of Edwin Morgan in this week’s “poem of the week”. (Guardian Books Blog)

Peter Applebome looks back at the quirky poetry, and even quirkier behavior, of Alfred Starr Hamilton. (NYTimes)

“On this day in 1305 Scotland’s William Wallace was executed — to be accurate: hanged, disemboweled, beheaded and quartered. The William Wallace legend and the popularity of the Braveheart movie owe much to a 15th century epic poem by Blind Harry the Minstrel. Robert Burns added to Wallace literature too, though his “Scots Wha Hae” went forth behind cover.” (Today in Literature)

Sean O’Hagan spends an Irish evening with DBC Pierre. (The Observer)

Christopher Lehmann-Haupt remembers Frank Kermode as a “critic who write with style”. (NYTimes)

Craig Fehrmen looks back at the history of writers on TIME’s cover and what it says about Jonathan Franzen. (The Millions)

Amanda Katz profiles law professor Martha Minow and gets her views on how literature might be a key to resolving societal conflicts. (Boston Globe)

Territorial pissings: bookstores fight a war of attrition in Westhampton Beach. (NYTimes)

Brian Brady looks to “a radical future for book publishing”. (The Independent)

Benjamin Pimental says that next year’s first Filipino American International Book Festival is long overdue. (Inquirer.net)

Royal British Legion put in ‘no-win’ situation by Tony Blairs book donation. (Telegraph)

R.I.P. Bernard Knox, scholar of classical literature. (The Washington Post)

R.I.P. Nancy Freedman, novelist and feminist. (KansasCity.com)

“On this day in 1893 Dorothy Parker was born in Long Branch, New Jersey, to Henry and Eliza Rothschild (”My God, no, dear! We’d never even heard of those Rothschilds”). Her birth was two months premature, allowing her to say that it was the last time she was early for anything; her early writing was a “following in the exquisite footsteps of Edna St. Vincent Millay, unhappily in my own horrible sneakers.”" (Today in Literature)

Sarah Crown profiles David Almond. (The Guardian)

AS Byatt (as Dame Antonia Duffy) and John Carey take the 2010 James Tait Black Memorial Prize. (ABC)

Josh Fernandez goes after the myth that poetry is beyond the comprehension of the average reader. (Roseville Press-Tribune)

Piss off a TV writer at your peril. (Wall Street Journal)

Sugar returns with a new installment of her advice column for writers. (The Rumpus)

Simon Heffer defends his obsession with grammar. (Telegraph)

Take a moment and check this out. (E-Books for Troops)

Seth Godin vows to abandon traditional publishing. (GalleyCat)

“On this day in 1920, Christopher Robin Milne was born, an only child to A. A. Milne. Christopher also wrote, his first two books being memoirs of his growing up and out from under the shadow of the fictional Christopher Robin. The writing of the first of these was “like a session on the analyst’s couch,” and reads partly as setting-the-record-straight, partly as settling-the-score.” (Today in Literature)

Charles McNulty digs into the life of rock-poet Patti Smith. (LATimes)

Ben Myers remembers Edwin Morgan. (Guardian Books Blog)

YA authors close ranks around fellow author disinvited from a Texas book festival. (Publishers Weekly)

Jason Boog rounds up some views on advertising in digital texts. (GalleyCat)

Dirk Smilie takes a look at the 10 highest-paid authors. (Forbes)

Blake Gopnik examines the mental processes, and benefits, of reading challenging literature. (Washington Post)

Something tells me Peter Pan wouldn’t like this. (NY Daily News)

Annie Huang muses on whether eReading is a bona fide revolution or merely a passing fad. (AP)

Ceri Radford defends the imperfect manuscript as a source of wonder and insight. (Telegraph)

Boyd Tonkin recaps the week in books. (The Independent)

“On this day in 1667, John Milton’s Paradise Lost was entered in the Stationers’ Register. The fifty-eight-year-old Milton was totally blind, probably from glaucoma, throughout the decade it took to write “Paradise Lost”; his habit was to compose at night and then present himself to a scribe each morning to be, as he put it, “milked.”" (Today in Literature)

Edwin Morgan
1920-2010

Scottish national poet Edwin Morgan dies (Herald Scotland)

Scotland’s national poet Edwin Morgan dies aged 90 (STV News)

Poetry, criticism, gallery and much more. (Edwin Morgan Official Site)

Edwin Morgan biography and much more. (Contemporary Writers - The British Council)

In other news:

John Waters talks about his recently published memoir, his reading habits and more. (The Paris Review)

Jacob Silverman charts the rediscovery of two “lost masterpieces” by Hans Keilson. (The Daily Beast)

Anne Fortier makes her case for re-imagining Shakespeare’s Juliet. (Wall Street Journal)

Geraldine Brooks wins the Dayton Literary Peace Prize for lifetime achievement. (ABCNews)

David Barnett introduces the Wankh Award for “smuttiest book title”. (Guardian Books Blog)

David Martindale chats it up with Texas novelist Laurie Moore. (Dallas Morning News)

The long list has been announced for the 2010 German Book Prize. (Deutscher Buchpreis)

Jessica Francis Kane presents a thoughtful essay on that special writing space. (The Millions)

Paul Owen reports on the strict requirements for getting a book signed by Tony Blair. (The Guardian)

R.I.P. Frank Kermode, critic and academic. (Washington Post)

“On this day in 1915 Ring Lardner Jr. was born. Though Lardner’s adult fame was earned — screenplay Oscars for Woman of the Year (1942) and M*A*S*H (1970), the novel The Ecstasy of Owen Muir (1954); blacklisting as one of McCarthy’s “Hollywood Ten” — he met the public early, often and hilariously in his father’s daily column, usually as “Bill.”" (Today in Literature)

Roya Nikkhah looks at the discovery of the real-life inspiration behind Quasimodo. (Telegraph)

For a million bucks or so, JD Salinger’s toilet can be yours. (The Post Chronicle)

Rick Moody goes after author blogs. (Huffington Post)

Darragh McManus muses on the well-intentioned but doomed book recommendation. (Guardian Books Blog)

The Orbit Team continues its examination of fantasy art trends, this time taking a look at the changing fashion in urban fantasy heroines. (Orbit Books)

With the rise of self-publishing comes the rise of the crooked vanity publisher. (The Indianapolis Star)

MaryAnn Yin reports on HarperCollins’ plans for a Vampire Diaries prequel. (GalleyCat)

Jonathan Brown previews next month’s Woodstock Literary Festival. (The Independent)

Zoe Ruiz chats it up with author and satirist Neal Pollack. (The Rumpus)

Samuel Jacobs presents a list of President Obama’s recent reads. (The Daily Beast)

R.I.P. John Chase, writer and urban designer. (KansasCity.com)

R.I.P. Ludvik Kundera, poet and translator. (AP)

“On this day in 1850 Honore de Balzac died, at the age of fifty-one. Balzac’s last months were as tumultuous as all the others, and as brimming with life as anything in his seventeen-volume Human Comedy. Balzac believed that such adventures and appetites finally killed him, his finite store of vital fluid having been used up.” (Today in Literature)

Looks like yesterday’s speculation about Scarlett Johansson was wrong; Rooney Mara has captured the coveted role of “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo”. (Deadline.com)

Ray Bradbury lashes out at government, technology and eBooks — and probably wants you the hell off his lawn. (AFP)

Alan Jacobs recounts his adventures in attempting Infinite Jest in eBook form. (Text Patterns)

Imogen Russell-Williams muses on why American authors seem to be so good at coming-of-age novels. (Guardian Books Blog)

Molly Guinness profiles 15 year-old French literary sensation Carmen Bramly, along with other notable teenage authors currently making their mark France. (The Independent)

M.A. Orthofer weighs in on Christos Tsiolkas’ dig at European fiction. (The Literary Saloon)

Jason Boog reports that eBook price wars in the UK are heating up. (GalleyCat)

The Orbit Team examines the fantasy novel cover art trends of 2009. (Orbit Books)

Jessica Ferri looks back at eight classic literary love affairs. (The Daily Beast)

“On this day in 1945, George Orwell’s Animal Farm was published. The book was delayed by the WWII paper shortage and very nearly a casualty of the war itself, either at the hands of German bombs or British politics. “The enemy is the gramophone mind,” he wrote in his preface to the book, “whether or not one agrees with the record that is being played at the moment.”" (Today in Literature)

Lucas Wittman talks to author Belle Boggs as part of the Book Beast’s ‘Best New Writers’ series. (The Daily Beast)

Might Scarlett Johansson be ‘The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo’? (NY Daily News)

Australian best selling author and Booker longlister Christos Tsiolkas lashes out at European fiction, calling it “cheap” and “shit”. (Telegraph)

Dan Zak (writing as Tawny Tipples) examines the flimsy industry of the not-so-anonymous pen name. (The Washington Post)

Carol Rumes tackles Longfellow’s translation of Dante’s Divine Comedy in her latest “poem of the week”. (Guardian Books Blog)

Jan O’Hara chats it up with Absolute Write owner MacAllister Stone. (Writer Unboxed)

Yu Jie’s controversial book about Chinese premier Wen Jiabo hits the shelves in Hong Kong. (BBC)

Jill A. Tardiff rounds up the details of the book industry’s 2010 trade shows. (Publishers Weekly)

Rumors abound regarding Sony’s next eReader move. (Gadget Venue)

R.I.P. Narayan Surve, Marathi poet. (DNA India)

“On this day in 1762, Samuel Johnson and Sir Joshua Reynolds departed on their six-week trip to Devonshire, an excursion now rich in Johnsonia. It was made possible by the impoverished and very Tory Johnson having received a government pension from the ruling Whigs, to great outcry and this retort: “I wish my pension were twice as large that they might make twice as much noise.”" (Today in Literature)

Danuta Kean profiles former historian and current Romantic Novel of the Year nominee Rachel Hore. (The Independent)

Daniel Beekman ponders the fate of the writings of Chaim Grade. (New York Daily News)

William Skidelsky looks at the career of Jonathan Franzen and where he goes from here after his TIME cover story and the success of his new book. (The Observer)

Ian Rankin now baffled at the purple prose of his early novels. (Telegraph)

Lonnae O’Neal Parker profiles The Help author, Kathryn Stockett. (The Washington Post)

UC Berkeley tries out the rent-a-book concept. (San Jose Mercury News)

Hilary Mantel joins the “summer short story special” with “Comma.” (The Guardian)

Mark Sanderson returns with another installment of ‘Literary Life.’ (Telegraph)

“On this day in 1947, India and Pakistan gained independence from Britain. Salman Rushdie got the title for his 1981 Booker Prize-winner, Midnight’s Children from the speech Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru gave in the first minutes of the new day: “At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will awake to life and freedom. . . .”" (Today in Literature)

Aimee Zaring chats it up with award-winning author Neela Vaswani. (The Rumpus)

Check out an abridged version of Lev Grossman’s cover story on Jonathan Franzen… (TIME)

…and Franzen’s “take on five novels that inspired him recently.” (TIME)

Paranormal romance writers to hit the road on the Smart Chicks Kick It Tour. (Publishers Weekly)

Tom Jacobs examines the capacity of pop-up books to serve as learning tools. (Miller-McCune)

Author Lev Raphael seeks to apply the dramatic professional exit of Steven Slater to the life of a writer. (Huffington Post)

Olivia Cole talks to friends of the late Patricia Neal about the late actresses’ marriage to Roald Dahl. (The Daily Beast)

Maryann Yin reports on Alikewise, a “dating site for bookworms.” (GalleyCat)

R.I.P. Tahar Wattar, Algerian novelist. (NYTimes)

“On this day in 1834, nineteen-year-old Richard Dana boarded the merchant brig, Pilgrim for the Boston-California return voyage that would become Two Years Before the Mast. His 1840 book, written with a desire to tell in “a voice from the forecastle” of the ordinary seaman’s life, was an immediate international hit.” (Today in Literature)