A collection of unusual facts about past and present literary authors includes such items as Anne Rice's real first name was Howard, Ian Fleming failed espionage training, and William Faulkner was drunk when he gave his 1949 Nobel Prize acceptance speech.

Product Description: Erin Barrett and Jack Mingo are the Queen and King of trivia, relied upon by game shows including Who Wants to be a Millionaire? and game manufacturers. Millions of people read their daily newspaper column and together they've written twenty books...read more

Product Description: Did you know that Jonathan Swift once refused to speack to anyone for an entire year? That Arnold Bennett died of typhoid after drinking a glass of Paris tapwater to show that it was safe? That Dr Johnson was a big fan of bondage and flagellation? That Voltaire would get rid of boring house guests by pretending to faint? Than Moliere died while playing a hyperchondriac? Or that Raymond Chandler was always inspired to write by watching his wife do the housework in the nude? This book contains these anecdotes and more in over 300 literary lists including: authors who wrote standing up, writers who could not spell; classic literary ripostes, literary romances, marital disasters, literary recluses, discarded titles for classic novels, famous last words, writers' day jobs, writers' hobbies, unusual work habits, sexual peccadilloes, strange deaths, pen names and real names, author anagrams, bestsellers written in prison, big drinkers and laudanum lushes, authors' favourite drinking haunts, unintended "double entendres" from the classics, books banned by the Vatican, bad reviews of future classics, literary feuds, authors on critics, the all-time most boring classics...read more

In a literary anthology of essays, contributors including Maxine Kumin, Ian Frazier, D. H. Lawrence, Colette, Marina Warner, Hilton Als, Ken Druse, Jamaica Kincaid, and Katherine S. White share their thoughts on their favorite plants. 15,000 first printing. (view table of contents)

Product Description: This text provides a comprehensive story of the University of Notre Dame's Sophomore Literary Festival. With interviews, anecdotes and recollections, it focuses on literary giants, and looks at this 30-year-old phenomenon which has always been organized, coordinated and managed by students...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Collects a variety of anecdotes about authors such as James Joyce, Isaac Asimov, Lord Byron, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Judith Krantz