"Stalking the billion-footed beast" are a literary manifesto by Tom Wolfe published in Harper's Magazine in November 1989. I read it few year ago, obviously translated... A Little Book by the author to the magnificent "The Bonfire of the Vanities", novel from which a bad movie was made on purpose to tone it down. People don't read, they watch. It may sound absurd to you, but I don't care about that...