And he fits the preference for people who could actually use the money.

Anyway, whether he needs the money or not, Lethem is a dedicated, ambitious, and sincere artist. If the awarders were interested, there’s probably someone closer to poverty and complete oblivion, but they could’ve gone farther and found much much worse. I’m glad he got it instead of David Brooks, Camille Paglia, or John “Why aren’t you writing about Henry James?” Leonard, and for all we know those were the other choices.

I think someone like Samuel R. Delany, on the other hand, would produce more work with a nest egg, assuming he didn’t pull a Wittgenstein and give it all away. Kelly Link and Gavin Grant get by, but they have a solid record of doing good deeds with every bit of funding.

But I’d be most excited about the money going to a complete wildcard like David Cleary (who? exactly.), or best of all to a comics artist. When I consider the effort they expend, the pathetic rewards they receive, and the lasting rewards they provide, they seem to me America’s greatest source of cultural martyrs—yes, even more than jazz musicians or experimental pulp writers.

Steve and Henry, thanks for the daydream. Neuraesthetics! A Free Online Serial Intellectual Revolution! In Onegin Stanzas! And a Pony! Maybe Jonathan will put in a good word for me. Now, back to refactoring Java code….

I very nearly suggested him instead of Bram Cohen, actually, but I’m going to stick with my guns. He’s certainly more along the lines of what I suspect Henry was looking for—people largely known to the online community for online writing, rather than for anything else they’ve done—than Cohen, who per Seth’s taxonomy is just a smart guy with a blog somewhere.

As I recall when he died MacArthur wanted his foundation to give the money to untested but promising individuals.

Instead a board slanted towards the humanities give lots of money to the usual suspects. A real pity and a great waste.

Fafnir’s pretty good at fendin for himself, so he won’t need it. An Chris is still tied down under the rocks after drinkin too much frappucino-stuff anyway.

Anyway, per steve/#10, it would be useful to clarify “has a blog somewhere” vs “well-known blog” vs “blog evangelist”. A prominently blog-associated grant would be a very “trendy” choice, and I’m not sure if they consider that good or bad.

I recently stumbled across a neat bit of breadcraft—seems some guy remixed his leftover roast beef by putting it between to slices, then mashing it up with some salad! I wonder if they’ll serve them at Disneyland.