TODAY: In 1929, Paule Marshall, best known for her 1959 debut novel Brown Girl, Brownstones, is born.
- THESE TIMES: Now might be the time to read a very long novel—here are 50 great ones over 500 pages • What happens to the presidential election during coronavirus? On Sheltering, Rebecca Dinerstein Knight talks plants and poisons. | Life in a Pandemic
- “Motherloss is my diagnosis. A cure might not be possible but the abatement of symptoms is ever evolving.” Chelsea Bieker on the painful edge of grief and love. | Lit Hub
- Judith Heumann on Camp Oakhurst, and the power of spaces built for people with disabilities. | Lit Hub
- “Having ghosts in the family is powerful, even if they are benign.” How Ellen Meeropol wrote her novel from within the Rosenberg family legacy. | Lit Hub
- The West in pieces: On the reimagined grammar(s) of C. Pam Zhang’s debut novel. | Lit Hub
- Even if you’re (still) not planning to read the classics, these illustrated summaries will help you fake it. | Lit Hub
- Julie Buntin on Emily St. John Mandel’s “heartbreakingly resonant” new novel, Hermione Hoby on Mieko Kawakami’s “moving, messy aria of supremely female grief-letting,” and more of the Reviews You Need to Read This Week. | Book Marks
- A coalition of arts organizations has raised $10 million to provide emergency grants to working artists and writers across the US. | The Hub
- “You’re not just kind of stumbling around and throwing punches at random, you’re inventing a sparring partner for yourself.” Laura van den Berg on shadowboxing. | Jezebel
- “The virus reminds us: borders exist, and they’re doing just fine.” Olga Tokarczuk looks out her window. | The New Yorker
- The Believer has launched The Believer Jr., a limited run newsletter full of at-home activities for parents and kids. | The Believer
- The 17th-century poet, politician and satirist Andrew Marvell was loud about his English patriotism. But a new discovery proves he was at one point a spy for the Dutch. | TLS
- A campaign to turn Reading prison, which held Oscar Wilde for two years, into an arts center will not move forward. | The Guardian
Also on Lit Hub: Underfunding and overcrowding our national parks is a dangerous combination • How did England get its bizarro street names? • Read a story by Chan Chi Wa (trans. by Audrey Heijns) from the anthology
That We May Live.
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