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Midweek Miscellany

Cartoonist and illustrator Tom Gauld chats with the Angry Robot blog:

I find [robots] almost endlessly interesting. There is tragedy in their place between sentient beings and disposable products. And … they are much easier to draw than real people.

I’m hoping to interview Tom here as well sometime soon (just as soon as I think of something smart to ask him).

Hard Scenes — Actor, writer and director John Turturro talks about his work and one of my all time favourite films Miller’s Crossing at the A.V. Club (via Biblioklept):

Sometimes you think about movies, and you say, “Well, I want to try to do something that’s not exactly in a movie.” If you’ve ever been in a very dangerous situation, you know that people will do all kinds of things to keep themselves alive. It was very well-written, but you want to imagine what it’s really like to be in that kind of situation. It depends on what you’re willing to do, and in real life you would do a lot of different things. I tried to capture a little bit of that… to do something that was almost a little difficult to watch, because people aren’t trying to be heroic at those moments.

Curiosity and Collecting — Writer and illustrator Tom Ungerer in conversation with Julie Lasky at Design Observer:

One of the most important things for one’s own development is curiosity. Once you have curiosity, you just accumulate. My interests go from botany to mineralogy, geology, anatomy, history. Sometimes I’ve been bitten like bug. I buy one object and I’m so fascinated that I start collecting. And then when I finish collecting, and the collection doesn’t inspire, I give it away, like my toy collection of 6,000 pieces that I donated to my hometown museum for children.

Learning to Write — An interview with author Zadie Smith at The Literateur:

[O]ne of the things I look for in other people’s writing is the ability to confer freedom. That’s what I want to be able to do myself. I like a writer who doesn’t have to be in total control of how their readers react. More mystery, less explanation. All I can say is I’m working on it. But it’s so hard! I really feel I’m just at the base of a huge mountain called ‘learning how to write’. I’m still only 35. Learning to write is a task that takes up your whole life.

And finally…

Rick Poynor on the unusual cover design for England Swings SF, published in 1968, also at Design Observer.