TODAY: In 1789, John Cleland, English novelist best known as the author of Fanny Hill: or, the Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure, dies.
- After Ferrante, the deluge? 10 other literary writers we’d love to see with weekly columns. | Literary Hub
- Same as it ever was: Philip Metres considers Edward Said’s Orientalism at 40, and how far we (haven’t) come. | Literary Hub
- How being a librarian makes me a better writer: Xhenet Aliu on the fine art of controlled vocabularies. | Literary Hub
- Alafair Burke on writing The Wife, a psychological suspense that feels made for the #MeToo moment. | Literary Hub
- Kathryn Schulz on the life and work of William Melvin Kelley, a lost literary great she discovered in a Maryland thrift shop (through a dedicated first edition of Langston Hughes’ Ask Your Mama). | The New Yorker
- “Tipping the Velvet was never intended to be a work of historical realism. Instead, it offers a 1990s-flavoured lesbian Victorian London, complete with its own clubs, pubs and fashions.” Sarah Waters on the 20th anniversary of her beloved debut novel. | The Guardian
- “It was as though Karl Rove had taken the knife to his and George W. Bush’s America.” On Almost Zero, the Russian literary sensation believed to be written by Putin’s then-deputy chief of staff. | NYRB
- “Now, unwillingly pregnant at age 37, I had no idea if I was capable of either option: another baby, or ridding myself of a pregnancy.” Lindsay Hunter on getting pregnant despite her IUD. | The Cut
- “They ask for very little and they return gifts of viridian, pink, lime, emerald, sage, grey, slate-blue, yellow, purple.” Rowan Hisayo Buchanan on having plants (and not having children). | Catapult
- “I think that smart writing about identity is restlessly, ruthlessly interrogative. It’s hungry, it wants to self-destabilize.” An interview with writer and critic Jia Tolentino. | Mythos
- Librarians are experts in the organization and retrieval of information: On the importance of libraries in the era of fake news. | Entropy
Also on Literary Hub: On milk, motherhood, and life in the streets of Bangalore · Five books making news this week: Stefan Merrill Block, Dara Horn, and more · Tales of the opera: From Alexander Kluge’s Temple of the Scapegoat.
