Lit Hub Weekly: January 13 - 17, 2020

• What is at stake when we write literary criticism? James Wood on deconstructing texts and understanding literature. | Lit Hub Literary Criticism
• “How to build enduring trust in one’s own community is the ultimate thrust of The Art of War.” Translator Michael Nylan on Sun Tzu’s oft misunderstood classic. | Lit Hub Translation
• A snapshot of the year in reading to come: Lit Hub’s most anticipated books of 2020, plus all the literary film and TV adaptations you’ll need to binge your way through this year. | Lit Hub
• Dwight Garner on Garth Greenwell’s scorching new novel, Lauren Oyler’s critique of Jia Tolentino’s essays, and more of the Reviews You Need to Read This Week. | Book Marks
• Katherine Ellison was a young reporter covering a murder trial. A mistake derailed her career, and the case became an obsession. | CrimeReads
• 52 books, 52 weeks: a writer is reading her way across the country to prepare for the 2020 election. (#goals) | LA Times
• “Outsiders to the genre might not appreciate the power of a romance cover, but readers do.” On the making of a Harlequin cover. | Kirkus
• An Iranian literary agency said that publishers from more than a dozen countries have requested books about Qassem Soleimani, the general assassinated by the US. | Tehran Times
• Goodnight, influential librarian whispering hush: the story of a literary taste-maker’s campaign against Goodnight Moon. | Slate
• “At the heart of the novel lies an unmistakable preoccupation with Christian conceptions of the afterlife.” On reading Marilynne Robinson’s Housekeeping as an unbeliever. | The Paris Review
• “We have a Joan Didion problem.” Or: when everyone is the Joan Didion of something, no one is the Joan Didion of anything. | The Outline
• From coziness to fika, these international books have some lessons for Americans on how to be happier. | The Washington Post
• Shakespeare’s First Folio is expected to sell for $6 million when it goes to auction at Christie’s in April. | Euronews
• “I have to do what I can to help make a place for sunrise, for there to be a sunrise.” Joy Harjo discusses her role as poet laureate. | The Washington Post
• Pakistani officials raided a publishing house in Karachi and confiscated 250 copies of Mohammed Hanif’s novel A Case of Exploding Mangos, which satirizes the country’s late dictator Gen. Muhammad Zia ul-Haq. | NPR
• There’s an Alexander Pushkin-themed theme park in the works, based on the imaginary land of “Lukomorye.” Set to open in St. Petersburg in 2023, Lukomorye will feature a funfair market, swan lake, fairy tale forest, and more. | CLAD
• “These are points on a line: the rise of potential, then the particularly feminized fall embedded in gentle, hetero domesticity”: An anonymous author on gendered jealousy and her relationship with an abusive male writer. | Longreads
• Amazon is publishing commercial fiction by famous authors—and “creating a marketplace that omits publishers altogether.” | The New Republic
• These four female authors, including Simone de Beauvoir, were nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1969. | Book Riot
• Christopher Tolkien, the Lord of the Rings author’s son, has died at 95. Christopher drew many of the original maps of Middle Earth and edited much of his father’s posthumously published work. | The Guardian

Also on Lit Hub:

Jennifer Egan on the eternal power of The House of Mirth • Merve Emre on being edited by Elena Ferrante • Martha Cooley on the decades-old mystery that inspired her novel: the T.S. Eliot-Emily Hale letters • Kiley Reid recommends five novels about caregivers • Take another trip back to Neverland with J.M. Barrie’s handwritten Peter Pan manuscript • All signs point to reading in the decade’s first Astrology Book Club • Steve Inskeep on the tumultuous rise and fall of John Frémont, American adventurer turned politician • Before beauty vlogging, there were Renaissance “Books of Secrets” • On the obscure editions of Jane Austen novels that made her internationally known • What a forgotten novel can teach us about immigration in 2020 • On John Brown and the rise of the radical Republican abolitionists • Lee Matalone on walking the thin line between truth and fiction when writing about family • Life at the end of American empire • Anthony Marra says goodbye to his favorite place on earth, Trattoria Contadina • Kristin Iversen profiles Anna Weiner • Nicholas Shaxson looks at recent books about the power of global finance, and the untaming of corporations • On Garth Greenwell’s revolutionary erotics • Indigenous forest defenders around the world are dying anonymous deaths • On Ralph Ellison’s two inviolable identities • Andrew R.M. Smith explains how LBJ’s War on Poverty changed a young George Foreman’s life • Amber Tamblyn on a woman’s right to choose • On contemporary minimalism’s maximal lies • Sarah Knight on how to just f*cking say no • The enigma of Delmore Schwartz, the luminous poet who fell from grace

Best of Book Marks:

New on CrimeReads:

Lisa Levy examines the recent rise of psychological thrillers narrated by men • Amy K. Green asks, are small town mysteries comforting, or terrifyingly relevant? • Laura Elliot recommends 10 childhood classics that will bring out your inner sleuth • Michael Gonzales investigates the strange life and untimely end of Jerome Johnson • Paul French dives into the WWII origin story of a vast collection of Victorian detective stories • M.L. Huie on the shadowy noir of the post-war thriller • Louisa Luna says, enough with the badass superheroes • Bryan Gruley interviews several authors about their creepiest creations • Vince Keenan on the ex-cons of Old Hollywood screenwriting • Tanen Jones explores how thrillers pick up where romance leaves off