Thursday, July 16, 2009
Books Man Claims to Be First Tweet Novelist, Is Wrong
Posted by Jonny Diamond on Thu, Jul 16, 2009 at 10:53 AM
Matt Stewart, yawping from his online niche over at self-promoting ecosystem The Huffington Post, claimed on Tuesday to be releasing the first-ever Twitter novel. Some gems from his simultaneously defensive, self-congratulatory press release of a post, after the jump.
"I do think you might actually read a few 140-character snippets of my novel, and—based on that sampling of Junot Diaz-style wordplay meets Jonathan Franzenish multilayered plotting—consider reading more, and even sinking some money into it."Franzenish!
"Amid this information maelstrom, tweeting my novel provides the ultimate in easy sampling and information triage before purchase."Art!
"At just one tweet per day I'm moving faster than traditional publishers. I can get instant feedback from readers [...] It's an ubercool way to grow a community."Ubercool!
"I wrote this novel for lovers of literary fiction, with long and loving sentences, exploding with imaginative descriptions and inventive plot twists and characters I hope will stick with you for a while."Just, ugh.
Ok, this isn't really a Twitter-bashing post, insofar as I'm still disinclined to separate an information technology from the people who use it (you know, blaming the printing press for Protestantism), but I will say that Twitter certainly makes it easier for people to present their stupidity to the world. The best part about this Matt Stewart post, however, is how quickly he was shown to be wrong... the very first comment:
"Your novel isn't the first. I began the first original literary novel @smallplaces on Twitter on April 25, 2008. It's been written about in the U.K. Guardian, Mashable.com, NPR, Christian Science Monitor, Bohemian,com, Metroactive.com, Knock Literary Mag out of Antioch University and a lot more. Just Google "Twitter Novel." You'll find Nick Belardes and @smallplaces."
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