TODAY: In 1898, writer C. S. Lewis is born.
- “Why was I writing? It was not for glory; it was not for acclaim.” James Salter on becoming a writer. | Literary Hub
- From mountains to bookstore cats, 5 reasons why a writer should move to Tacoma. | Literary Hub
- Beyond lyric shame: Ben Lerner investigates the prose poetry of Claudia Rankine and Maggie Nelson. | Literary Hub
- Have we always been depressed? Yes. The answer is pretty much yes. But that doesn’t mean we can’t achieve radical happiness. | Literary Hub
- The life and times of a great American cartoonist: on John Cullen Murphy’s Rockwell childhood. | Literary Hub
- Spellbinding or silly?: Two takes on James Salter’s Light Years, written 40 years apart. | Book Marks
- “I collect pets: young girls—girls from ten to sixteen years old; girls who are pretty and sweet and naive and innocent.” On Mark Twain’s disturbing predilection for adolescent girls. | The Paris Review
- Even for a notoriously Eeyore-ish industry, 2017 was a grim year: What bestsellers reveal about the past year in publishing. | Slate
- “Writers who simply represent (rather than report on) extremists leave rhetorical spaces open for Nazi ideology to flood in.” How to write—and not to write—about Nazis. | The New Republic
- if you’re reading this then you survived: A poem by Ocean Vuong (with an introduction by Ben Lerner). | Harper’s
- Despite the impressive amount of mayhem and gore on view, Three Billboards is an unusually literary film: Francine Prose on the debt Martin McDonagh’s latest owes to Flannery O’Connor. | The New York Review of Books
- “Between your mind or your heart, which is more fluid?” Poets (naturally) Jennifer S. Cheng and Vi Khi Nao in conversation. | BLARB
- Women still do not have a room of their own: On gender inequality in literary prize culture. | VIDA
