- “Lorde’s view of poetry and the imagination clarified my own inclination to disappear, at times, into my own head.” Tracy K. Smith reads Audre Lorde’s Cancer Journals. | Lit Hub Biography
- “The tricky thing about hope is to not confuse it with optimism.” Rebecca Solnit on black swans, slim chances, and the 2020 presidential election. | Lit Hub Politics
- “In the farthest, most northern places, we can still make a stand against climate change.” Rick Bass on saving America’s forest arks. | Lit Hub Climate Change
- In praise of readings: Kirk S. Walsh looks back at 33 years of watching writers stand up in public to share their work, from William Trevor to Carmen Maria Machado. | Lit Hub Craft and Criticism
- From Dolly Parton to Don DeLillo, white supremacists to marauding bears, here are the five reviews you need to read this week. | Book Marks
- For the 100th anniversary of Agatha Christie’s first novel, J. Kingston Pierce looks at the many, many editions of The Mysterious Affair at Styles. | CrimeReads
- “Leaders perish but the people have a relative immortality. Therefore the first order of business for us as a people is to find our way back to equilibrium.” Marilynne Robinson on the state of the union. | The New York Times
- What is travel writing without traveling? Jason Wilson on what the pandemic has meant for his career. | The Washington Post
- At the digital Frankfurt Book Fair, David Grossman called on writers to bear witness to the results of the pandemic. “Most writers and poets I know—including myself—are embarrassingly clumsy when it comes to engaging with reality,” he said. “But we do know how to observe it.” | The Guardian
- What is the value of a written constitution? It may not be as obvious as you think. | The Atlantic
- “I pretended to act the way I thought a cute woman should act . . . but it was a horrible experience.” Read a profile of Sakaya Murata. | The Guardian
- Namwali Serpell has thought a lot about the strangeness and beauty of human faces. | The Boston Globe
- What is the “afterlife” of an author who wins the Nobel Prize in Literature? Mario Vargas Llosa has some thoughts. | Pledge Times
- “If there was a handbook for writing an erotic scene, I’m sure it would say “Don’t do that.” But that’s what I love about the scene.” Emily M. Danforth on the Very Good Sex in Patricia Highsmith’s The Price of Salt. | Vulture
- Unfortunately, now seems like the perfect time for this series of critical essays on Ling Ma’s Severance. | Post45
- “We’re crucial to the American story. There would be no America without Indigenous peoples.” Joy Harjo on creating an anthology of Indigenous poetry. | Chicago Review of Books
- New to Octavia E. Butler’s work? Here’s where to continue reading. | Los Angeles Times
- “She has taught me: Don’t get comfortable.” Dana Levin on her friendship with Louise Glück. | The Paris Review
- “Don’t think of fantasy as mere entertainment . . . but as a way to train for reality. It always has been, after all.” N.K. Jemisin introduces the 100 best fantasy books of all time. | TIME
- Why Peter Mendelsund—“a musician turned designer turned novelist turned painter”—rips the covers off his favorite books. | Inside Hook
- You know what you should do this weekend? Buy some books from your local bookstore. Otherwise it might not be there in the spring. | The New York Times
Also on Lit Hub:
Claire Messud considers what constitutes an essay, that most elusive of forms • Americans abroad, a reading list • How does Dolly Parton write a song? • Rumaan Alam talks to Lynn Steger Strong in conversation • Mariana Enriquez and an affair to remember • Julius Margolin on his life in the gulag • Young John Berryman is just like us! • How a young John Brown became the legendary militant abolitionist • Anaïs Duplan offers a brief history of the classification of Black music • Read from this year’s Cundill History Prize longlist, from the Aztec Empire to the birth of modern Greece • Forget the polls, here is every Mr. Darcy ranked • From Napoleon to Trump, Liesl Schillinger on the tyrant as troll • What happens when literary events move online? • On missing just about everything to do with the biggest bookish gathering in the world • Roger Berkowitz on Donald Trump, Joe Biden, and how might ever exist again in a shared reality • Magda Montiel Davis on the anticommunist Cuban exiles who struck terror in Miami • A letter from Dorothy Gallagher to her late husband Ben Sonnenberg • James K.A. Smith on the delight of Daniel Mendelsohn • Johanna Hedva takes an unconventional approach to putting words on paper • Stephanie Kent on what she found out interviewing booksellers from all 50 states • Barry Yourgrau on publishing a pandemic collection in Japan • Maureen N. McLane on the work of Louise Glück
Best of Book Marks:
New on CrimeReads:
Christopher Chambers gives us a brief history of nontraditional voices in crime fiction, from Poe to Himes • Stephanie Kane analyzes Edward Hopper’s iconic blonde as a noir archetype • Olivia Rutigliano on The Westing Game as ghost story • Christopher Chambers gives us a brief history of nontraditional voices in crime fiction, from Poe to Himes • Michael Puchner on Rotwelsch, the Central European language of beggars, travelers and thieves • How the 1969 murders of a labor leader and his family changed coal country forever, from Mark A. Bradley • Six true crime books you should read this October • Chloe Maveal on the quiet history of lesbian pulp fiction • Seven great heist novels, recommended by art dealer Carol Orange • Lisa Jewell celebrates the fact that in crime fiction, anyone can be a murderer
