TODAY: In 1946, the writer Jenny Diski is born.
- Speaking with the surviving members of the Beat Generation, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Michael McClure, Gary Snyder, Diane di Prima, and Herbert Gold. | The Washington Post
- “In England it was viewed as a jolly good yarn, but they didn’t think of Gilead as something that was going to happen to them.” Margaret Atwood and Junot Díaz discuss The Handmaid’s Tale, our current political climate, and Drake. | The Boston Review
- Jeanette Winterson, Colm Tóibín, Garth Greenwell and other writers on the books that helped them come out. | The Guardian
- “‘Make America Great Again’ means ‘Make America White Again.’” An interview with Toni Morrison. | Granta
- A provision of Edward Albee’s will apparently called for the destruction of all his incomplete manuscripts (though the estate has declined to confirm or deny following these orders). | NPR
- A recently discovered book by Maurice Sendak, Presto and Zesto in Limboland, will be published in 2018. | Publishers Weekly
- “I’m really interested in the ways that people are exploiting others in the service of what might be thought of as love.” An interview with Alissa Nutting. | Playboy
- “An elevator appears where there never was an elevator before. The doors never open.” Flash fiction by Jonathan Lethem. | The New Yorker
- On Octavio Paz’s 1974 book The Monkey Grammarian, which “best showcases the way his worldview was reshaped” by his time in India. | Los Angeles Review of Books
- “We’re meant to read the lives of important people as if they never bothered with breakfast, lunch or dinner, or took a coffee break, or stopped for a hot dog on the street, or wandered downstairs for a few spoonfuls of chocolate pudding in the middle of the night.” Emily Gould interviews culinary historian Laura Shapiro. | Eater
- Few writers have watched and captured women with such conspicuous pleasure: Parul Sehgal on the work of Daphne du Maurier. | The New York Times
- “In 2008, his Knopf deadline looming, he disappeared.” Taffy Brodesser-Akner profiles Matthew Klam upon the publication of his first book in 17 years. | Vulture
- “If there were any justice in the world, this oyster would grab hold of my tongue and choke me dead.” Short fiction by Carmen Maria Machado. | Gulf Coast
- “Every nuance, every adjustment to the ritual, alters the language that comes out of me.” On the poetry of CAConrad. | The Paris Review
- “How do I let images of violence change my life? How do I make myself responsible for and accountable to people in pain?” An interview with Draw Your Weapons author Sarah Sentilles. | Signature
Pop music, sex dolls, arson, and more: 17 books to read this July · The most anthologized short stories of all time · Jessie Chaffee recommends 10 books on ecstatically mad women · We’re going to need more than empathy: On the importance of radical otherness · Maggie Shipstead on being alone (but not lonely) in Paris · Have journalists forgotten to think like readers? · How literature helped Rebecca Stott and her father survive life in a cult · Speaking with Jason Lutes, the American artist who’s been drawing interwar Berlin for 23 years · Judith Butler on the poetry of Guantánamo
This Week on Book Marks
Hari Kunzru on Naomi Klein’s guide to resisting Trump’s “shock politics,” No is Not Enough · A 1994 New York Times review of Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Sower · Jia Tolentino says Alissa Nutting’s Made for Love is “a total joyride, dizzying and surprising” · A 1981 review of the first novel in Douglas Adams’ beloved science fiction comedy series, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy · “Some of these are funny, some amusing, some flat, some nasty”: on Amateurs, Donald Barthelme’s 1976 short story collection · Negroland author Margo Jefferson on The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love, Oscar Hijuelos’ Pulitzer Prize-winning novel · Spoon benders, sharks, and more: best-reviewed books of the week
