The Financial Times profiled literary critic, new New Yorker staff writer, and Harvard professor James Wood this weekend. He's also the husband of The Emperor's Children author Claire Messud, and has an upcoming book, How Fiction Works. (One of his previous books was once criticized by Slate as being "too well written.") Some literary luminaries, like novelist/critic Cynthia Ozick, have called him "our best critic, he thinks with a sublime ferocity." We love him because he nerds out with phrases like, "Novelists should thank Flaubert the way poets thank spring: it all begins again with him. There is really a time before Flaubert and a time after him."

Last month, Emily and I had a like so totally deep conversation about who should be cast in our fantasy film version of Claire Messud's novel The Emperor's Children. We decided on Jeff Daniels as Murray Thwaite, because he'd played a very similar character in Noah Baumbach's The Squid and the Whale. And, oh ho! Would you look at that—Baumbach has just been hired to write the screenplay! But we're a little peeved that he wasn't tapped to direct. Instead, Universal chose... Ron Howard? This is all wrong. You can't have the same man responsible for Splash and Backdraft taking on what is, essentially, a comedy of manners. Well, hopefully they'll take our advice and get Liv Tyler to play Marina. IF THEY KNOW WHAT'S GOOD FOR THEM.