Bookplanet: box yourself in to write a novel

Artists are helping novelists in an artistic experiment. Three novelists are going to be boxed in until June 4 to start and finish their novels. Kind of like a cross between a prison and an artists colony.

"The novelist Laurie Stone understood that her desire to go into the box was a symptom of something, she just didn't know of what. Ms. Stone, 58, will have a month to consider her decision from the confines of a sleek-angled structure, about 140 square feet, whose walls resemble shoji screens made not of rice paper but of translucent cellular plastic panels. Her temporary home was built just for her, in a converted factory in Queens.
On Saturday night, in front of 200 onlookers, Ms. Stone and two other novelists, ensconced in neighboring pods, embarked on a variation of the spectator sports made familiar by reality television. Ms. Stone, Ranbir Sidhu and Grant Bailie are the participants in "Novel: A Living Installation" at the Flux Factory, an artists' collective in Long Island City. The goal is for each to complete a novel by June 4. The purpose is to consider the private and public aspects of writing.
No cameras will record this voyeuristic experiment, though visitors can peep occasionally (Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m.; and Saturdays and Sundays from noon to 4 p.m). The potential for public humiliation comes not from the perils of constant surveillance, but from the more familiar writers' problem of failing to meet a deadline. Make that deadlines. They will give weekly readings of their works in progress on Saturdays at 8 p.m., and take part in a public discussion May 22." More here.

In related news, Yale Professor Craphogger has proposed locking up three Republican Senators in a busy autopsy facility for six months to come up with an affordable medical insurance policy for the nation. "They will have dead people all around them, and gruesome autopsies will be performed in front of their very eyes. We may also introduce contagious and crippling diseases as a motivating factor. The sound of mothers weeping and mourning over their dead children will be played 24/7. If need be, we will subject the senators to barrages of unnecessary medical tests and invasive, explorative surgery of intimate organs to stimulate fresh thinking. Also under consideration are hourly anal probes with cold metal instruments."