Lit Hub Daily: October 25, 2022

TODAY: In 1976, Raymond Queneau dies.  

• “All things brain-related were hot.” When a scientific zeal for gray matter led to the theft of Albert Einstein’s brain. | Lit Hub Science

• 16 new books to support your book-buying habit. | The Hub

• Why you won’t find Lee Child or Andrew Child organizing their bookshelves—and other tidbits we learned about the writing duo. | Lit Hub Questionnaire

• Sam Roberts explores America’s first media circus around a murder case, at the dawn of the 19th century. | Lit Hub History

• “I used to think authors who spent 20 years writing a book must be sad, pathetic creatures.” Devoney Looser on writing (slowly) about sister-novelists Jane and Anna Maria Porter. | Lit Hub Craft & Advice

• A plant stem, a microscope, and a whole new cosmos: Siddhartha Mukherjee recounts how humans discovered the unseen world of cells. | Lit Hub Science

• Sara Martin reflects on the appeal—and over-simplification—of the sobriety narrative. | Lit Hub Memoir

• How the Supreme Court failed to stop the Trail of Tears. | Lit Hub History

• When modern dance meets modern art: On the shared artistic visions of Martha Graham and Wassily Kandinsky. | Lit Hub Art

• Elissa Schappell talks to Siglio Press publisher Lisa Pearson, whose publishing philosophy is “enough to make an author weep.” | Lit Hub In Conversation

• “I think we often approach poems, like the rest of our lives, with a fantasy of being able to dominate the thing—to impose our will on a thing.” Ross Gay on melody, sharing, and planting seeds. | The Rumpus

• Maggie Doherty reflects on Elizabeth Hardwick, Darryl Pinckney, and how literary life can be shared. | The New York Times

• Chloé Cooper Jones on her experience of parenting with a disability. | Cup of Jo

• “Sámi stories have survived journeys through unimaginably rough terrain, through centuries of oppression and violence.” Mathilde Magga offers an introduction to Sámi literary history. | Words Without Borders

• Haruki Murakami talks magic, music, and cold beer. | Interview

• Courtney Tanner reports on the complaints filed by Utah parents about books in schools that they claim are “indecent.” | The Salt Lake Tribune

• Ten new children’s books by Indigenous authors. | Book Riot

Also on Lit Hub: What the booksellers are reading at Elliott Bay Book Company • Manuel Muñoz on writing through uncertainty • Read from Mircea Cărtărescu’s newly translated novel, Solenoid (tr. Sean Cotter)

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