Best of the Week: June 6 – 10, 2016

TODAY: In 1912, Irish short story writer Mary Lavin is born. 

• “I think people probably miss those books that were written some time ago–the big book that was written with care.” An interview with Annie Proulx. | The Guardian
• Have the Beats aged well? Examining the legacy of Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, and others. | Signature Reads
• The writer must rescue the whispered and the regrettable: An interview with Matthew Neill Null. | The Millions
• “I’m not sure [C.E.] Morgan has been to too many Derbies.” Jonathon Sturgeon interviews his mom, a Kentuckian, about The Sport of Kings. | Flavorwire
• “I think you’re supposed to work in the dark, that the search and the writing itself is the reward.” Louise Erdrich and Rebecca Makkai in conversation. | Chicago Review of Books
• Rivka Galchen on the mock-epics of the Moomins and the difference between reading children’s books as a child and an adult. | The New Yorker
• “Originally I led with urotrauma, but my editor was like, ‘No, we are not leading with penises.’” Mary Roach on her new book, Grunt. | Wired
• The Lambda Literary Award winners were announced; winners include Chinelo Okparanta, Dawn Lundy Martin, and Hasan Namir. | Lambda Literary
• “I had the urge to keep the Maupassant stories for myself, to figure them out on my own, to let their author speak directly to me.” Sloane Crosley remembers the first time she read “The Necklace.” | The Paris Review
• Investigating the axis of hunger, sex, and death: On recent books that use the female body as a “Rorschach test for society’s deeper anxieties about women’s roles.” | Los Angeles Review of Books
• “[I]f you want to write novels, well, it’s understandable to hope you might write a good one. But why does it have to be an American one?” An interview with John Irving. | Hazlitt
• “In my mind Ruth will always be wincing in the kitchen, squeezing lemons. I will always be watching.” A short story by Anna Noyes. | Electric Literature
• Christina MacSweeney on her ongoing love affair with Latin American literature, collaborating through music as well as text, and the stereotype of “magical” fiction. | Words Without Borders
• We get to watch universal emotions manifest with extreme outward ferocity: On the dark depiction of female friendship vs. male “buddy comedies” in literature. | Elle
• Umberto Eco, Angela Carter, and other picaresque novelists for the modern reader. | Lit Reactor
• A film about Rumi is in the works, which somehow aims to challenge stereotypical portrayals of Muslim characters by casting Leonardo DiCaprio as the Persian poet and philosopher. | Vulture

And on Literary Hub:

• Lit Hub is pleased to announce the launch of Book Marks, our “Rotten Tomatoes” for books.
• Benjamin Hale on machines that defecate, and fictional characters that do not.
• In search of obscure words for even rarer feelings: on naming emotions.
• On the road with Geoff Dyer, the world’s least effusive travel writer.
• Teaching Shakespeare in a maximum security prison.
• Chuck Klosterman: we were wrong about gravity… what do we have wrong today?
• Neil Gaiman on his favorite horror movie.
• How Hemingway’s bad behavior inspired a generation.
• From back of the house to Random House: Stephanie Danler in conversation with Bethanne Patrick.
• What my parents really think about my memoir of alcoholism: Sarah Hepola interviews her mother and father.
• Alain de Botton on Voltaire, twitter, and commercial culture: part two of his conversation with Paul Holdengraber.
• The true, tragic tale of the Angola Three: a graphic history of the lives of Albert Woodfox, Robert Hillary King, and Herman Wallace.
• How rebel ex-punk Stona Fitch became Rory Flynne.
• Max Porter and Catherine Lacey discuss death, writing, and musical theater. | Literary Hub
• On the origins of Diane Arbus’s most famous photograph. | Literary Hub
• They found a meth lab in Cole Porter‘s childhood home, and other tales of those who dared leave Indiana. | Literary Hub
• A Muhammad Ali reading list featuring David Remnick, George Plimpton, Gerald Early, and more. | Literary Hub
• Whitney Terrell on five reasons why writers should move to Kansas City.
• Stephanie Danler: on talismans, the end of love, and losing something precious.
• Will anyone read Chuck Klosterman in 100 years?
• Whitney Terrell on 9/11, panic attacks, and the long road to his new novel.
• Evoking illness in fiction and nonfiction: Pulitzer prize-winners Paul Harding and David Oshinsky in conversation.

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