Lit Hub Daily: May 25, 2017

TODAY: In 1949, Jamaica Kincaid, Antiguan-American novelist, short story writer, and essayist is born. 

• The best stories of the year: announcing the 2017 O. Henry Prize winners. | Literary Hub
• Jamaica Kincaid: how to write, how to live. | Literary Hub
• “You work on poultry?” “No, poetry.” Chris Forhan on the lot of the poet, and the relief of writing a memoir. | Literary Hub
• Bei Dao survives the Cultural Revolution by listening to vinyl. | Literary Hub
• On the keeper of the Watts Towers, philosopher-artist Noah Purifoy. | Literary Hub
• The City of Light needs its darkness: on loving the gritty side of Paris. | Literary Hub
• One of the true contemporary masters of an exacting genre: On the anniversary of Raymond Carver’s birth, a 1981 review of What We Talk About When We Talk About Love. | Book Marks
• Previously unread Sylvia Plath poems offering “a tantalising glimpse of how the poet worked with her then husband” were discovered on a carbon paper in the back of one of her notebooks. | The Guardian
• Richard Ford on Bruce Springsteen, stealing cars, and finding an audience. | VICE
• In which Tony Tulathimutte provides “subjective, unsolicited, and frankly sort of aggro advice” on pursuing a writing career. | Catapult
• On the difficulty of representing Richard Nixon (“always already a readymade caricature”) in fiction. | Public Books
• “Whatever someone is doing when making art. . . I’m interested in the idea that to some extent they’re pursuing or exploring or resolving or exorcising their own fantasies.” An interview with Jen George. | Full Stop
• Dorthe Nors on Scandinavian literature and its best contemporary authors, from Naja Marie Aidt to Sjón. | Five Books
•  “How do you change everything about a poem (reversing even the direction it’s read on the page) and still preserve the essence of the thing?” Poet Kaveh Akbar on translating the work of Negar Emrani. | Asymptote

Also on Lit Hub: Elissa Schappell remembers her dad through the Beatles · On the great Conrad Aiken, early American autofictionalist · From Barbara Browning’s novel, The Gift.

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