In her early days, freelancer Gloria Dickie aimed high, pitching her dream publication first, as well as offering newsier stories and short features instead of long-form. The formula worked, leading to assignments, a book project and a prestigious staff job. Freelance Files Co-Editor Christine Woodside spoke with Dickie about the lessons of a life as an independent. Plus, a
Binyavanga Wainaina attacked insulting clichés in the essay, “How to Write About Africa,” in 2005. In a posthumous collection of the same name, his range as a writer is on display.
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The problem was, like many novelists before him, Roth – all too aware of the divergent opinions – wanted to control his legacy. So he first recruited as his biographer a friend he thought pliable, Ross Miller, nephew of the playwright Arthur, but the arrangement twice came to an end after Roth criticised his research methods.
Roth even wrote a full-length book entitled
Notes for My Biographer, mostly devoted to rebutting the allegations made by Roth’s former wife Claire Bloom in her incendiary memoir
Leaving A Doll’s House. He considered publishing the book then decided to keep it as an aid for his biographer. Roth offered the vacant role to several other friends, including the respected biographers Hermione Lee and Judith Thurman, neither of whom were available. In 2012, Bailey entered the picture. He didn’t know Roth, but he’d written three highly praised literary biographies, including works on Richard Yates and John Cheever.