Requests For Interviews Research Articles

Hemingway’s Cuban Son, Reflections on the Writer by His Longtime Majordomo (review)

Reviewed by: Hemingway’s Cuban Son, Reflections on the Writer by His Longtime Majordomo Martin L. Peterson Hemingway’s Cuban Son, Reflections on the Writer by His Longtime Majordomo. By René Villarreal and Raul Villarreal. Kent, OH: Kent State University Press, 2009. 168 pp. Cloth $24.95. Ernest Hemingway has been dead nearly fifty years. After all of this time, one would think that all of the memoirs by family and friends had been written and there would be little new to be said. But then comes the memoir from the person, excluding his wives, who perhaps knew him best during the last twenty years of his life. In 1939, René Villarreal was a ten-year-old boy living in San Francisco de Paula, Cuba, playing baseball outside of a walled estate when Ernest Hemingway drove up to visit the estate with the intention of possibly buying it. Villarreal began running errands and feeding the dogs and cats at the Finca in 1940 and, in 1947, at age seventeen, he was promoted by Hemingway to the position of estate manager. After Hemingway’s death, when his widow Mary Hemingway gave the estate to the Cuban people, Fidel Castro insisted that Villareal remain to manage the estate as the Museo Hemingway. In the mid-1960s, while still in Cuba and serving as administrator of the Museo Hemingway, René Villarreal wrote a memoir. When he left Cuba in 1972, he entrusted his manuscript and numerous photographs, letters, and other Hemingway memorabilia to others who either stole the items or lost them. For the next 25 years he declined all requests for interviews and, in fact, there were conflicting rumors about where he was actually living. Then, in 1996, his son Raul began a series of interviews with him about his life working for Ernest Hemingway. Those interviews occurred over the course of two years and are the basis for this book. René Villarreal’s first person account of life at the Finca is an important addition to Hemingway scholarship. There have been a number of other books, both fiction and non-fiction, written about Hemingway’s years in Cuba. Hemingway in Cuba by Norberto Fuentes and Ernest Hemingway in the Romano Archipelago by Enrique Cirules both provide valuable insights into Hemingway’s Cuban years, but neither is in the first person. Mary Hemingway’s How It Was is a fine chronicle of life in Cuba with Hemingway, but she didn’t arrive in Cuba until 1946. Villarreal provides a detailed picture of life at the Finca. With the eye of an historian interested in providing [End Page 156] a documented record, he takes the reader on a tour that details the paintings and furnishings of the Finca. Many of the items are still there. Some are not. He also describes daily life with Hemingway, his likes and dislikes, and the comings and goings of the author, his last two wives, and their close friends. Many of the stories, such as the formation of Gigi’s All Stars, have been told before. But to have one of the All Stars who was there at the beginning tell the story is to hear it as we have not heard it before. Many of the stories and anecdotes provide new information that will eventually show up in future books about Hemingway’s Cuban experience. As both a member of the Hemingway household and a resident of the small town in which the Finca is located, Villareal provides insights into a personal side of Hemingway that is too often overlooked. On the first day that Villarreal and boyhood friends meet Hemingway, the author opens the Finca gates to them so that they can pick fruit from the trees and play baseball on the grounds. Hemingway also promises to buy them baseball gear so that they no longer have to use sticks for bats or balls made of rags. Hemingway is soon called “Mr.Way” by the adults in the community and “Papa” by the children. Villarreal tells about a Hemingway who is the benefactor of individuals, families and causes. He also shows us a Hemingway with a strong emotional attachment to people, cats, dogs, and trees...

Reforming the US health-care system

Reforming the US health-care system

Interview with D. Ray Heisey

Professor Heisey, thank you very much for accepting our interview request and making this exchange of ideas possible. Here are the questions we would like to pose that shall be of great interest to...

The Balanced Boredom Campaign

IN THE FALL OF 2007 I WAS WOEFULLY UNPREPARED for the deluge Of media calls I was due to receive--requests for interviews from journalists seeking commentary on the role of the Internet in the Ontario provincial election. Having spent most of my academic life in the United States, I had found it highly unusual for media to call academics, especially to those of us working from a humanities or critical/cultural perspective. Nonetheless, there I was, Blackberry pressed to ear for much of the month of September, serving as an educator of sorts to a range of journalists from a number of media outlets--national, provincial, television, radio, print, and Internet based. As a media studies scholar, the experience served as a fantastic crash course in contemporary journalism. The month was both exhilarating and exhausting, though ultimately a welcome change from the confines of typical university life. Thus when the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) news invited me to work exclusively for the National and their many other news platforms in a similar capacity for the fall 2008 federal election campaign, I jumped at the opportunity--our collaborative research on new mediated politics (conducted with a number of my graduates students) would go on to receive substantial national attention. I was also keen on the CBC's request for exclusive use of our research and priority for commentary during the election as I figured it might cut down on the endless calls and long interviews I'd conducted with freelance reporters during the previous provincial election. I was right. Once I began the partnership with CBC news, far fewer news outlets, particularly private news outlets, called to seek out my commentary, even though the election by many accounts was dominated by a string of web-based scandals and events. While some reporters figured that I was too busy collaborating with CBC, others were surprisingly upfront about their political antipathy toward anything, or anyone, associated with Canada's public broadcaster. For instance, I was abruptly disinvited from participating on a radio call-in show once the host caught wind of my collaborative project with CBC news. We'd never have anyone on who works with the CBC;' I was told point blank. That such partisanship (and it was politically motivated, to be sure) exists in Canada's broadcasting system, and in particular newsrooms across the country, is hardly news itself. It was, however, the brash expression of such partisanship that struck me, particularly in retrospect, as the campaign wore on and our project received more attention from conservative voices across the country. But it was not the typical claims of liberal bias that conservative supporters started communicating to me about during the campaign with respect to our collaborative Ormiston Online project (named for the CBC reporter assigned to cover the internet during the campaign). (1) Rather, conservatives were furious at the project's success. Conservatives readily complained that our web- and television-based coverage of the internet campaign was too innovative, cutting edge, ahead of the curve, and novel. I would have blushed if not for the fact that these were offered as damning critiques! Advocates of public broadcasting in Canada have often missed the point of this personal tale--conservatives are no longer content with pointing out budgetary inefficiencies at Mother Corp., in part because opinion polls continue to strongly support the CBC and other publicly mandated and (in part) funded institutions. Rather, I discovered during the election that many conservatives were in fact critical of public institutions emulating and adopting market logics. A number of conservatives, for example, suggested that Ormiston Online was trying to corner the market through the promotion of its brand on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube. …

Commenting on ‘No Comment’—Does the NCI have a Responsibility to Respond to Reportersʼ Requests for Interviews?

Commenting on ‘No Comment’—Does the NCI have a Responsibility to Respond to Reportersʼ Requests for Interviews?

Evaluating a new income source for medical oncologists: Market research

6629 Background: Recently market research has become a ‘booming business‘ serving pharmaceutical and biotechnology firms and financial institutions. From internet studies and focus groups to consultations with Wall Street analysts, medical oncologists are getting increasing involved in providing their expertise in non-patient matters. Payment is usually of a greater amount that what one would earn from direct patient care. Potentially, this may be the source of significant income. Methods: 47 private practice-based medical oncologists agreed to anonymously complete questionaires on this subject. 32 were returned (68% response rate). 17 academic hematologists and oncologists were approached. 7 returned completed questionaires (41% response rate). While group comparisons could not be made, some interesting points were found. Results: Each week an average of 6 Internet and 1 phone-based invitations week were received by the private practitioners. Most physicians received 2–3’ ‘focus group’ or ‘in-person’ invitations/month and attended the majority of them. Like in- person interviews, Internet-based marketing participation was based on the amount of money being offered and not on ‘interesting topic.‘ The majority of studies with an honorarium averaging $150/hour were completed. Academicians were much less likely to participate in Internet research. 4 of the 7 responded that they did not even open them. All participated in interviews, particularly if invited as a ‘key opinion leader‘ (KOL). With respect to interviews, the 3 major differences between the private practitioners and academicians were: in the number of requests received (1 vs 3/week); type and timing of interview requests (KOL received the majority of their interview requests from financial analyists and were inundated at or just around major oncology meetings); and the amount of reimbursement for an hour of interview time (Individual interviews for privates were in the $200–300 range. KOL interviews were reimbursed in the $500 to $5,000 range with $1,000–1,500 being the norm.) Conclusion: Clearly, market research is playing an increasing important role in the financial health of many physicians. Much more planned research needs to be done to see how this interaction affects individual physicians, patient care and society. No significant financial relationships to disclose.

Va. Psychiatrists Respond to Tragedy at Tech

Va. Psychiatrists Respond to Tragedy at Tech

Questions About Mass Spectrometry Data

I am writing to express my personal concerns about Hao Xin's article “University clears Chinese biophysicist of misconduct” (News of the Week, 28 Apr., p. [511][1]). On 19 April, Hao sent me an interview request regarding an alleged misconduct case against Xiao-Qing Qiu of Sichuan University. According to Hao, Qiu had told her that the mass spectrometric analysis (MS) I did for his project verified his hypothesis that there was a “thiolactone ring” present in the protein pheromonicin. Hao asked me to explain to her in lay terms what I did and what the significance of this ring was. Hao's email brought to my attention Qiu's paper, “An engineered multidomain bactericidal peptide as a model for targeted antibiotics against specific bacteria” ([1][2]). Reading the paper, I found that data from liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry (LC-MS) analysis were used to confirm the presence of the thiolactone ring in pheromonicin (p. 1481). I told Hao that I performed an MS analysis for Qiu at his request in 2003, but the results of the analysis I performed do not support the findings of the above-referenced article. Qiu's stated interest with regard to the sample he provided to me in 2003 was, as above, in confirming the presence of the thiolactone ring in pheromonicin. On the basis of my memory and saved documents, his samples did not contain peptides at the predicted peptide masses within the mass measurement accuracy of the instrument or any masses matching the tryptic peptides of pheromonicin. I informed Qiu of this finding in early July of 2003. I do not know how Qiu obtained the MS data for his paper. However, I explained explicitly to Hao that the MS data presented in the paper have high mass measurement errors and should not have been used in the paper even if they were observed in mass spectra. The ultimate proof, of course, will be the reproducible production of the functional polypeptide based on Qiu's protocol. 1. 1.[↵][3]1. X.-Q. Qiu , Nat. Biotechnol. 21, 1480 (2003). [OpenUrl][4][CrossRef][5][PubMed][6][Web of Science][7] [1]: /lookup/doi/10.1126/science.312.5773.511a [2]: #ref-1 [3]: #xref-ref-1-1 View reference 1. in text [4]: {openurl}?query=rft.jtitle%253DNature%2Bbiotechnology%26rft.stitle%253DNat%2BBiotechnol%26rft.aulast%253DQiu%26rft.auinit1%253DX.%2BQ.%26rft.volume%253D21%26rft.issue%253D12%26rft.spage%253D1480%26rft.epage%253D1485%26rft.atitle%253DAn%2Bengineered%2Bmultidomain%2Bbactericidal%2Bpeptide%2Bas%2Ba%2Bmodel%2Bfor%2Btargeted%2Bantibiotics%2Bagainst%2Bspecific%2Bbacteria.%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Adoi%252F10.1038%252Fnbt913%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Apmid%252F14625561%26rft.genre%253Darticle%26rft_val_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Ajournal%26ctx_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ctx_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Actx [5]: /lookup/external-ref?access_num=10.1038/nbt913&link_type=DOI [6]: /lookup/external-ref?access_num=14625561&link_type=MED&atom=%2Fsci%2F313%2F5786%2F440.2.atom [7]: /lookup/external-ref?access_num=000186845200026&link_type=ISI

Michael Wilson

APPOINTMENTAlmost 13 years after retiring from politics, the unwild and uncrazy Wilson, the finance minister and then the international trade minister in the two majority governments of former conservative prime minister Brian Mulroney, was named ambassador to the United States, Canada's most important diplomatic posting.It was a critical choice by the newly appointed minority government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper in February 2006. Relations between Canada and the United States had deteriorated sharply under Harper's Liberal predecessors, Jean Chretien and Paul Martin, even though Martin had made improved relations a priority. Matters weren't helped by the fact that there hadn't been an effective, long-serving ambassador in for a number of years. Frank McKenna, the former Liberal premier of New Brunswick, resigned after only 10 months in the position after Harper won the election of 23 January. Former Deputy Prime Minister John Manley, like McKenna a Liberal leadership candidate who ultimately decided not to run, had been offered the embassy under Martin but declined.Given the offer to Manley and the appointment of McKenna, it was hardly a surprise that the embassy was offered to another politician, rather than to a diplomat. And that, according to one well-placed source, was not a bad thing: Washington is the last place you need a traditional diplomat. Canada needs a decision-maker like Wilson who understands politics in Washington.Nor was it a surprise-though a tribute to the confidence that Harper had in Wilson-that the politician chosen was from the old Progressive Conservative side of the party, and had been a senior minister under Mulroney. After all, influential figures of that era, including Marjory LeBreton, Hugh Segal, and Derek Burney-himself a former ambassador to the United States-played roles during the campaign. In fact, Burney is thought to have helped persuade Harper to appoint Wilson (in an interview, Burney praised the appointment of my old friend and colleague, but declined to discuss his role in the choice). Contributing to the appointment was the fact that the former finance minister had been co-chair of the Ontario campaign and had shared platforms with Harper, who joked that he had learned his charisma from Wilson.Whatever the politics, the appointment was widely praised in the press-The Economist called it shrewd-and by decision-makers. Every one of the 15 or so figures (including Liberals such as Roy MacLaren and Patrick Gossage) interviewed for this article had positive things to say about Wilson (a spokesperson for the embassy said that Wilson was declining interview requests).The Toronto native was variously described as highly experienced, a man of integrity and presence, dogged and determined, knowledgeable both about business and politics, exceptionally hard-working, and, most importantly, a person with direct access to the prime minister. Diplomats are paid to lie for their country, mused Hugh Segal, a former Mulroney chief of staff and now a senator. Michael is not a guy for whom lying, even in its lightest sense, is easily embraced.It's hard not to look at his resume and say, it's our lucky day, commented Pamela Wallin, consul-general in New York. Added Richard Remillard, his press secretary from 1984 to 1990, He's so formidable because behind that quiet, silent exterior, there is a real core of steel.While that core of steel will be essential in negotiating with the notoriously hard-nosed Americans, Allan Gotlieb, who was the ambassador from 1981 to 1989, points out that the real question is how tough an ambassador can be with his or her own government when it is wrong on an issue and needs to be told to back off.If you are popular in Ottawa, maybe you are not doing your job, he said. Fortunately, he continued, Michael Wilson is not worried about popularity, and he is not running for anything. …

Law Enforcement Interviews of Hospital Patients<SUBTITLE>A Conundrum for Clinicians</SUBTITLE>

LAW ENFORCEMENT INTERVIEWS OF HOSPITAL PAtients are a common but underrecognized phenomenon in US medicine. Daily in emergency departments and inpatient trauma services, and sporadically in other departments, police officers request permission to interview patients who may have experienced, witnessed, or perpetrated crimes ranging from motor vehicle crashes to homicides. These interviews are often time sensitive, and how they are conducted may have clinical consequences, alter legal outcomes for patients and physicians, and affect public safety. Yet law enforcement access to patients is not explicitly regulated by federal or state law, relevant professional guidelines are so limited as to be negligible, and medical literature on the subject is minimal. Decision making by both clinicians and police is consequently unstructured, ad hoc, and potentially susceptible to adverse outcomes that might be preventable with appropriate guidance. In this Commentary, we examine the phenomenon and risks of police interviews in hospitals, review limits to available guidance, and explore relevant ethical concerns. We conclude by suggesting 5 principles to help guide physicians responding to police interview requests.

Science in the News

An article in PLoS Biology was downloaded more than 40,000 times in the span of a single November week. It was not a cure for cancer, it was not the discovery of a new link in human evolution. It was a paper entitled “Ultrasonic Songs of Male Mice” by Tim Holy and Zhongsheng Guo, and, as the title aptly indicates, it described the songlike vocalizations of laboratory mice. The unprecedented number of downloads was no doubt driven by the widespread press attention accorded this article. We lost count of the number of outlets that covered the story, but they ranged from such venerable broadsheets as The Guardian and The New York Times to postings on slashdot.org. The paper's reviewers and editors were pleased to see it published in PLoS Biology as an important piece of work in the field, but as the lead author himself commented when inundated by requests for interviews from journalists, “[W]hile I'm proud of the work, it's certainly a disproportionate amount of attention given how many other interesting things there are in science.”

This Magnificent Accident: An Interview with Witi Ihimaera

This Magnificent Accident:An Interview with Witi Ihimaera Margaret Meklin, Andrew Meklin, and Witi Tame Ihimaera The writings of Māori novelist Witi Ihimaera, whose flamboyance matches his fame, and who, in public interviews and personal letters, frequently dubs his involvement with literature "a magnificent accident," can indeed be considered, if not magnificent, then at least magical. Born in 1944 into the Te Aitanga A Mahaki, Rongowhakaata, and Ngati Porou tribes, Ihimaera is a controversial thinker, who, despite constantly comparing "profane" English with "sacred" Māori, nevertheless wins the hearts of readers with stories written in that very same "profane" English. While some of Ihimaera's achievements owe themselves to twists of fate (for example, as we found out from our interview with him, his first collection of short stories being noticed by a prime minister), his enormous productivity can be credited mostly to hard work. Indeed, Ihimaera has tried his hand at novels, poems, plays, librettos, and children's books. It seems perfectly natural that Ihimaera, who has identified magic realism as one of the cornerstones of his writing quests, attributes his success not to himself personally but to "an accident." Perhaps by somehow overshadowing his own will in becoming a writer, he appears to tap indirectly into the cosmic, supernatural powers responsible for the prosperity of Māori arts. It is not by chance that Ihimaera sometimes refers to Māori historical hero Te Kooti and his prophecy about the future triumph of the Māori . Te Kooti is a founder of the Ringatu religion to which Ihimaera's family belongs, and Ihimaera, who encourages Māori writers to take a cooperative rather than a competitive approach to their task, sees himself as a vessel assuring this future triumph. Metaphorically, the texts of Ihimaera can be seen as a grandmother's keepsake box filled with myths, amulets, prophecies, and legends rooted in Māori tradition. The American poet Stanley Kunitz once proclaimed that [End Page 358] in his poetry he makes his life into a legend. Ihimaera does not need to create any legends; he was born into them. For instance, once he quoted his relatives as saying that an ancestor came to Aotearoa (New Zealand's native name) on the back of a whale. This episode later evolved into the story about a little girl, the heroine of the novel The Whale Rider, who proved her leadership as the would-be chief of her tribe by rescuing and riding a whale (Ihimaera has a special talent for depicting strong and driven females). Even though Ihimaera—who refers to himself as an author struggling "with the dilemma of being Māori in a postmodern world"—knows that writing is a power in itself, he takes an active part in New Zealand's cultural and political life. To say that he is only a writer is not enough; he is much more. As a member of the Te Haa Māori writing committee, he makes sure that no young talent is being overlooked; as an editor, he checks that all Māori writing is being collected in representative anthologies; as a professor at Auckland University, he instills in his students pride for belonging to the Māori tradition and assures that this tradition is being continued and passed on to the next generations. He is a true modern Māori man. Fascinated by his writing, we were inspired to interview Ihimaera, who currently is being flooded by interview requests from the United Kingdom, Japan, France, Germany, and other countries where the movie Whale Rideris being shown. The release of the movie, which has won several awards, has once again confirmed Ihimaera as a leading Māori novelist and has motivated publishers to reissue the novel on which the movie is based. This interview, conducted by e-mail in August 2002, provides a glimpse into the cultural and political context of Ihimaera's writing, covering such topics as Māori culture and language, the role of women in Māori society, Māori acceptance of gays, Māori literature, immigration, and western values. MM and AM We would like to know your opinion about the following statement by New...

Clinical Trials Controversy Spotlights Flawed System

Clinical Trials Controversy Spotlights Flawed System

Help Line Mediates Dispute Between Psychiatrist, Carveout

Help Line Mediates Dispute Between Psychiatrist, Carveout

When Europeans Complain: The Work of the European Ombudsman

The office of European Ombudsman was created by the Treaty of Maastricht. The first Ombudsman, Jacob Söderman, began work in September 1995. To judge by the number of requests for materials and interviews that the office receives, particularly from students, academic lawyers are well aware of the existence of the European Ombudsman. There is also a growing body of literature about the office. Many practising lawyers, however, remain uncertain about the scope and functions of the work of the European Ombudsman. This is partly because the concept of an ombudsman is not always well understood, even by specialists in public law. This article will explain what an ombudsman is, the relationship between the European Parliament and the European Ombudsman, and the nature of the latter’s work. The aim is to persuade colleagues working in the field of European public law that the office of the European Ombudsman is well worth monitoring.

When Europeans Complain: The Work of the European Ombudsman

The office of European Ombudsman was created by the Treaty of Maastricht. The first Ombudsman, Jacob Söderman, began work in September 1995. To judge by the number of requests for materials and interviews that the office receives, particularly from students, academic lawyers are well aware of the existence of the European Ombudsman. There is also a growing body of literature about the office. Many practising lawyers, however, remain uncertain about the scope and functions of the work of the European Ombudsman. This is partly because the concept of an ombudsman is not always well understood, even by specialists in public law. This article will explain what an ombudsman is, the relationship between the European Parliament and the European Ombudsman, and the nature of the latter’s work. The aim is to persuade colleagues working in the field of European public law that the office of the European Ombudsman is well worth monitoring.

Remembering James Joyce

Remembering James Joyce Eugene Jolas, Rainer Rumold (bio), and Andreas Kramer (bio) 1. Voyages of Discovery It is difficult today to project oneself from the tenebrous era of the univers concentrationnaire, with its accompanying esthétique of epigones, to that period of felicity and effervescence in the nineteen-twenties and thirties, when writers of the Anglo-American literary colony in Paris competed with their French contemporaries in imagining new mental landscapes, in an atmosphere of complete intellectual liberty. We seem now to have been living in a golden age of the logos. Many of us had taken refuge from the bleakness of the Volstead regime in the more friendly climate of Montparnasse and Montmartre, and we were hell-bent on discovering new continents of the mind as well. Daring experimentation with words, colors and sounds was the chief preoccupation of an intercontinental avant-garde that extended across continents and did not pause until that day in 1929 when Wall Street “laid its historic egg.” Most of the British and Americans went home then, but a few die-hards remained until the Nazis’ attempt to conquer the Occident. In the late fall of 1926, I began preparations to launch the review the following spring. I needed an editorial assistant, and had the names of several newspapermen then living in Paris under consideration. Elliot Paul seemed my best choice and I decided to invite him to join me. He gave enthusiastic acquiescence to the plan, which included a small salary that permitted him to quit newspaper work entirely and devote himself exclusively to the task. He came to our apartment in the rue Valentin-Huy every day, and we began to discuss details with growing excitement. After a few weeks, having outgrown our dining-room table, Paul and I hired a room in a modest hotel on the Place des Invalides, where we hung out the transition shingle. Our “offices,” as Paul used to call our cluttered-up ex-bedroom (complete with all French plumbing-fixtures), were eventually to become the mecca of numerous manuscript-laden “exiled” writers from every state in the Union. For some months the problem of a name troubled us, and numerous suggestions were weighed and rejected. For a time “Bridge” and “Continents” seemed to be the favorites. Then Edwin Muir’s collection of essays appeared in London, and the title struck our fancy. We finally settled upon this same title, because it seemed best to symbolize the epoch. I insisted, however, that it be printed with a lower case “t.” As an old newspaperman, I knew that the critics would give it a howling reception, and anyway it was the fashion among many continental “little magazines” of the day. Sherwood Anderson came to Paris that winter, and we were happy to see him again. I met him at the Gare du Nord, and a news story I wrote about him brought many requests for interviews from the French press. But Sherwood did not really like Paris. He knew no French and felt ill at ease in consequence, for he was essentially the Middle Western type, and it irked him that he should not be able to talk to the workers [End Page 2] of Paris in their native argot. I can still see him standing at a little bar where he had invited some workers for a drink, smiling and trying with gestures to approach their minds. He was a frequent visitor in our house, and he also saw a good deal of his old friend Gertrude Stein, concerning whose peculiarities he entertained us. “Use your head, Sherwood,” she would say to him, whenever he lazily played with some Middle Western “notion” of his. One day he arranged to bring Gertrude Stein and Alice Toklas to our home. At his insistence, Maria sang some of the American songs he had liked to hear in New Orleans. Miss Stein seemed pleased, although I doubt if her interest in music was more than platonic. With Virgil Thomson, who was also present, the conversation turned to the Gregorian chant, Antheil, Milhaud and Honegger. It was not a wholly successful evening. It constituted, however, an accurate review of our future relationship...

Life on Mars?

Life on Mars?

A Seller's (& Buyer's) Guide to the Job Market for Beginning Academic Economists

In an effort to increase the stock of information available to sellers and buyers in the academic job market for beginning Ph.D. economists, this paper presents the findings of a survey of the 1985-86 hiring process by economics departments. The findings are based on a stratified random sample of all economics departments ranked in the top 20, and 380 other economics departments. Sellers in this job market, typically graduate students in the final stages of their doctoral dissertations, will find answers to questions like: Will a phone call from a candidate or faculty advisor increase the probability of securing a job interview? How many weeks before the AEA meetings are requests for interviews sent out? How long does a typical job interview last and what criteria are applied? How soon after the meetings interview is a candidate likely to be invited to give a seminar at a school? Are elements of the job offer such as salary, teaching load, and summer research money negotiable? How long does a candidate have to accept or reject an offer? The benefits of these survey results will not, however, be limited to sellers.

OPACs in Australia: a progress report

This article reviews the extent to which OPACs have been installed or planned in Australia. The information was collected by requests for information and telephone interviews. The review indicates widespread acceptance of OPACs across most types of library in Australia. Eighteen systems are identified, showing marked penetration by vendors and some inhouse developments. Retrospective conversion is in an advanced state and reasons for this are given. OPACs are also being accessed from outside the library. Australian libraries have wholeheartedly accepted OPAC technology.