Today would be the 106th birthday of Saul Bellow, Pulitzer- and Nobel-winning writer, ardent supporter of the novel form, and, as it turns out, sharp critic of today’s literary landscape. Revisiting his interviews, I was amazed to see point after Read more >
The year was 2014, and Donna Tartt’s sprawling bildungsroman, The Goldfinch, had captured the hearts of readers (and profoundly irritated James Wood, who wrote that the novel’s “tone, language, and story belong to children’s literature”). James Wood notwithstanding, it wouldn’t have Read more >
As a child, the fantasy of living in a library loomed large—the idea of being able to take as much time as needed with each book, never having to leave. Now, Lamp Light Books Hotel has made that dream a Read more >
Much has been made of Kate Winslet’s buzzy transformation into hard-boiled Philadelphia detective Mare for HBO Max’s Mare of Easttown, one of my favorite shows of the year. In The New York Times, Maureen Dowd catalogued every tool used to Read more >
It was announced today that the 59th Venice Biennale will be titled The Milk of Dreams, after the children’s book by Surrealist legend Leonora Carrington. The title and main themes were revealed by president Roberto Cicutto and Cecilia Alemani, artistic Read more >
One should never be too surprised, these days, by the sub-literate, self-interested idiots who pass for members of the US Congress, but Kentucky Representative James Comer (R) is doing his best to get famous for the wrong reasons. Yesterday, in Read more >
Like almost everyone in the history of the universe, Dave Eggers has a new novel coming out this fall. It’s called The Every, but as The New York Times reports, its rollout is going to look a little different than usual. Read more >
BREAKING NEWS: yesterday, Zooey Deschanel tweeted about Olivia Rodrigo’s hot new album, Sour. Real footage of Olivia Rodrigo crediting me for inspiring her number #1 album. (JK, but great album @Olivia_Rodrigo!) pic.twitter.com/hMDezbLjEL — zooey deschanel (@ZooeyDeschanel) June 7, 2021 She Read more >
So. Marie Heaney, Seamus Heaney’s wife, has spearheaded the construction of a new outdoor experience which allows visitors to listen to Seamus Heaney reading his poetry in the landscapes that moved him most. “Open Ground,” part of the Seamus Heaney Read more >
Today, Deadline announced that Storyboard Media and CAA Media Finance are launching sales on detective thriller Marlowe ahead of the Cannes virtual market. The 1950s-set noir will be helmed by Oscar-winning Irish director Neil Jordan (The Crying Game, Interview with the Read more >
English PEN has awarded Tsitsi Dangarembga the 2021 PEN Pinter Prize, which honors the author of a significant body of literary work who, in the words of Harold Pinter’s Nobel speech, casts an “unflinching, unswerving” gaze upon the world, and Read more >
It’s been a big year for Michelle Zauner. This spring, her much-lauded memoir Crying in H Mart was published, and last week her band Japanese Breakfast released Jubilee, another critically acclaimed album. And the excitement continues: yesterday, the Hollywood Reporter Read more >
Yes, it’s true, HOT BOOK SUMMER has arrived. * Rivka Galchen, Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch (FSG) “The comedy that runs through Everyone Knows is a magical brew of absurdity and brutality. Galchen has a Kafkaesque sense of the Read more >
On Saturday, Naomi Wolf (The Beauty Myth) joined a cohort of other users in Twitter jail. Her alleged crime? Spreading misinformation about COVID and coronavirus vaccines. Wolf, an unabashed anti-vaxxer, said that the vaccines are actually a “software platform that Read more >
Though it’s easy to contextualize her as Zadie Smith’s mother, psychotherapist and former social worker Yvonne Bailey-Smith is a writer in her own right. Her debut novel, to be published by Myriad Editions on June 10th, has been named one Read more >
I mean . . . we all know about Go Set a Watchman, right? But despite the fact that the Greatest Dad in Literary History may have turned out to be a racist (at least in the mind of his Read more >
Today, the writers, editors, producers, and editorial staff of The Atlantic announced that they have formed a union and asked Atlantic management to voluntarily recognize the union. The Atlantic Union is unionizing with the NewsGuild of New York, alongside other Read more >
Depending on who you talk to* it may or may not be a surprise that Stephen King doesn’t outline the plots of his books, and instead just jumps in and writes. As he reveals in this Wall Street Journal interview, Read more >
Prolific novelist Elin Hilderbrand, dubbed “the queen of beach reads” by New York Magazine, has created controversy with a brief Anne Frank reference in her latest book—Golden Girl, published by Little, Brown—that some readers view as anti-Semitic. In a flashback Read more >
There are many beautiful, innovative, thoughtfully designed libraries in the world, but few are as high-concept as Brooklyn-based architecture studio Bollingen’s proposal for Songdo Library in South Korea: the “Artificial Brain.” Reads Bollingen’s proposal, “Objects communicate with each other to Read more >
