TODAY: In 1943, Steven Millhauser, who won the 1997 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for his novel Martin Dressler, is born.
- “No one story can completely explain Annie.” Jeet Heer on the complex origins of Little Orphan Annie. | Lit Hub Criticism
- From the Arctic to Appalachia Amy Brady recommends five new books that tackle the climate crisis. | Lit Hub Climate Change
- The essential Steven Millhauser: Emily Temple on how to begin your obsession with an underrated American master. | Lit Hub
- “He could be appallingly funny yet tap into a grievous loneliness and wonder.” Joy Williams remembers Brad Watson. | Lit Hub
- A taxonomy of nonfiction: Karen Babine on the peculiarities of genre, form, and more. | Lit Hub Craft
- Robin Patterson and Margaret Jull Costa trace the beginnings of Joaquim Maria Machado de Assis’s rise to the top of Brazilian literature. | Lit Hub Criticism
- Shaun Tan’s The Arrival, Daphne du Maurier’s Jamaica Inn, Angela Carter’s The Bloody Chamber, and more rapid-fire book recs from Erin Morgenstern. | Book Marks
- Yukio Mishima was a Japanese imperial apologist, a nominee for the 1968 Nobel Prize in Literature, and one of the most divisive figures in 20th-century Japan. A spate of new translations is bringing his work to the West. | Metropolis Japan
- On the pre-Stalin “Silver Age” of Russian poetry, which encompassed movements from Symbolism to Acmeism. | Russia Beyond
- Revisiting Frogs into Princes: Neuro Linguistic Programming, a book whose “framework for purportedly influencing behavior using everything from touch to tone to hand movements” influenced pickup artists, cult leaders, and at least one murderer. | Jezebel
- Lucille Clifton’s Baltimore home will become a “sanctuary for young artists.” | NEA
- Jane Austen’s House Museum, Shakespeare’s birthplace, and other literary landmarks are preparing to re-open while facing the pandemic. | The Guardian
- “I wanted to write a story about a Black woman who fails a lot and is sort of grasping for human connection and making mistakes.” Raven Leilani on writing Luster. | The New York Times
- Milan Kundera will donate his archive to his hometown library, in Brno. | Expats Cz
Also on Lit Hub: “We Will Have Wanted to Have”: A poem by Amy Woolard • On the long reinvention of the South Bronx • Read an excerpt from Stephen P. Kiernan’s new novel Universe of Two.
