In response to the New Yorker’s recent announcement of its “20 Under 40″ list, of notable fiction writers younger than 40, the blog Ward Six has announced its list of “Ten Over 80.” An initially funny and ultimately welcome idea, the list includes John Barth, Paula Fox, and J. P. Donleavy, whose story “The Mad Molecule” starts like this:

I woke on that terrible day and mixed the shredded apple in my raw porridge oats and poured on the cream. I know what’s good for me. I put on the shoes with the golfer’s soles, walked silently down the stairs and out into a great blue sky and along the river’s warm sweet smell.