Lit Hub Daily: July 22, 2021

• An unknown genius with a trunk full of poems: Richard Zenith on the mysteries and identities of Fernando Pessoa. | Lit Hub Biography

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• “For so long, I have been trying to make sense of my body, my gender, all of this that has been dropped into my lap.” Matt Mitchell on building his own intersex canon of poetry, with the help of Freaks and Geeks. | Lit Hub Poetry

• Leigh Patels considers how “singling out tidied-up histories of individuals,” rather than grappling with complex collective efforts, misrepresents the struggle for racial justice. | Lit Hub History

• Adam Stern reflects on when therapists need therapy, too. | Lit Hub Psychology

• “When will more of us return to speaking up? And in whose interest is it that we do not?” Gail Scott on lit-crit’s underestimation of female genius. | Lit Hub

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• Lara Feigel on Rachel Yoder’s Nightbitch, Dwight Garner on Katie Kitamura’s Intimacies, and more of the Reviews You Need to Read This Week. | Book Marks

• WATCH: Natalie Diaz on criminalized resistance and writing poetry like she played basketball. | Lit Hub Virtual Book Channel

• “Just surviving is very ingrained in Zimbabwe. We seem to have lost connection with the bigger values of life.” Read a profile of Tsitsi Dangarembga. | Prospect 

• Anne Helen Petersen considers meritocracy traps, student debt, and predatory graduate programs across the country. | Culture Study

• Richard Mirabella reflects on trying to become a writer while holding down a day job. | Catapult

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• Rachel Kushner looks back on growing up in San Francisco. | SFGATE

• “What I love about novels is the way in which a web of refracted perceptions constitute meaning.” Hermione Hoby on her new book, narrative framing, and privilege. | Vol. 1 Brooklyn

• “We either invent and institute a better way, or a mass extinction will take us down with it.” Kim Stanley Robinson discusses the link between utopian fiction and climate change. | The Nation

• Nicholas Wong breaks down several instances of artists who have successfully used text in their visual art. | Poetry Foundation

Also on Lit Hub: Cedar Sigo on texts that focus on the poet, rather than the poetry • Geoffrey Hilsabeck on the dizzying dream of Vaudeville • Read from Hermione Hoby’s latest novel, Virtue