Lit Hub Weekly: March 11 - 15, 2019

• “Each in her own way set out to adapt the Question of Love to her own bold and anarchic use”: Vivian Gornick on the romantic obsessions of Colette, Simone de Beauvoir, and Marguerite Duras. | Boston Review
• “Not one syllable of what Hemingway has written can or will be missed by any literate person in the world.” The Times offers a light retraction of some of their classic book pans. | The New York Times
• “This is the kind of writer we need in desperate times: someone who can go deep into the subjects we would rather not think about, with both investigative rigor and human pathos.” Read a profile of John Lanchester. | Vulture
• “Seriously he would come to your door, William, and beat you up.” Joyce Johnson on navigating the male literary egos of 20th-century New York. | Evergreen Review
• On Emily Chester, the most famous novel by a female writer that no one remembers (and it’s probably Henry James’s fault). | Written Out
• “A line of golden sparks shoots upward into the sky and ends in a colored point: first pink, then blue, then pink again, casting its brief hypnotic light on the sand and the water.” Read a new short story by Sally Rooney. | The New Yorker
• Wish more ghosts scratched at your windows? (And have an extra $1.62m collecting dust somewhere?) The house that inspired Wuthering Heights is for sale. | Lonely Planet
• “I do not want a Nancy Drew I can relate to. I want a Nancy Drew I can aspire to.” Joanna Greenberg is on the Case of the Perfect Girl Detective. | BLARB
• “Somehow, in the midst of a horrifying ordeal, Le Guin finds an incredible sweetness.” Charlie Jane Anders reflects on The Left Hand of Darkness at 50. | The Paris Review
• “This is the joy of Prince — all of him.” Read Hanif Abdurraqib’s introduction to Prince: The Last Interview. | EW
• News that’s as unsurprising as it is terrible: Trump’s 2020 budget proposal threatens to defund libraries. | Book Riot
• Women and small presses dominate this year’s Man Booker International Prize longlist, which includes a repeat appearance by last year’s co-winner, Olga Tokarczuk. Here are the 13 finalists. | The Man Booker Prize
• Why Alexandre Dumas, author of The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers, considered his magnum opus to be a 1,150 page cookbook. | Atlas Obscura
• Phones, wikis, music, and accessibility: how the internet is changing our ability to preserve endangered languages. | The Outline
• “Each one is so uniquely unintelligible that, in the end, it doesn’t even make sense to compare them.” A dispatch from the brave masochist who read 13 campaign memoirs from 2020’s candidates. | The Baffler

Also on Lit Hub:

We are pleased to inform you that the oldest American picture book still in print is about (millions of) cats • Going scene to scene in the streets of Vienna, Before Sunrise: Stephen Kelman journeys to the cinematic 90s • How “creativity” became a capitalist buzzword • “I blame my first marriage on Jane Austen.” On fandom, folly, and the psychology of empathy • David Chariandy: A letter to my daughter upon learning the results of an ancestry test • Frans de Waal on what we know (and don’t know) about animals’ emotions • Bruce Berger on the dreamlike experience of the wilderness • How do you talk to your patients about death? • The story of a meeting with Stanley Adelman, New York’s typewriter magician • Storytelling tips from the writer of Blade Runner • When the eeriness of trauma can only be understood through fiction • The impossibility of finding a place to write in New York • On teaching the Southern canon in the New South • Britni de la Cretaz on researching the hidden history of queer women in baseball • Here are the 25 authors who’ve made the most money in the last decade • A look at Brooklyn’s earliest, secret enclaves of queer life • On H.G. Adler’s lectures from a concentration camp • Honoré de Balzac’s legendary love affair with his anonymous critic • Tracing the incredible journey of Polynesians across 10 million square miles • Summer Brennan on the age-old, unwinnable debate over high heels • Why are writers drawn to boxing? • The history of humanity, as revealed by its walls • Why do we hate the suburbs? • John Lanchester and Joseph O’Neill talk climate change, border walls, and more • Eight excellent debuts by Irish women writers • Read a previously unpublished letter from Zora Neale Hurston • Why Salt Lake City is a pretty great place for a writer to live • On crashing at Nora Ephron’s apartment • Our monthly Lit Hub Recommends

Best of Book Marks:

New on CrimeReads:

10 Irish crime films to watch this weekend • Michael Connelly on how writing the Harry Bosch series led to his latest project, a true crime podcast • Charles Cumming on the history of writers becoming spies and spies becoming writers, from Graham Greene to Le Carré •  Master of suspense Harlan Coben on ordinary heroes and everyday inspiration• K.L. Slater recommends 10 thrillers about all-consuming obsession • Carl Hiassen sure knows how to open a crime novel • Travel from the streets of Calcutta to the Calabrian countryside with these 6 new international crime novels • Tim Clayton on the Brits’ (first) failed attempt to assassinate Napoleon • Juliet Grames, editor at SoHo Press, on acquiring an epic Italian crime novel and visiting its eerie ghost town setting • Game warden noir: C.J.Box on the Rocky Mountains, Wyoming game wardens, and his Joe Pickett series • Don’t miss March’s best new thrillers • A global crime empire, forensic anthropology, and cyber espionage: your essential true crime reads for March • Fran Dorricott looks at 9 thrillers that create an intense atmosphere • Glen Erik Hamilton on exploring the ghost towns of central Oregon with his 9-year-old daughter • Brad Parks looks at 8 books that make compelling use of their prison settings