LitHub Daily: April 19, 2016

TODAY: In 1927, Mae West is sentenced to ten days in jail for obscenity in her play Sex. 

• The story of one writer’s path from prison to publication: part one of Mitchell S. Jackson’s documentary, The Residue Years. | Literary Hub
• Eric Fair on practicing “enhanced interrogation techniques,” now known as torture, for the US Government. | Literary Hub
• How I write history (or, a window into my crazy). Neal Bascomb on quilt-making, research, and structuring historical narrative. | Literary Hub
• Marta Bausells on the perks of getting lost at the London Book Fair. | Literary Hub
• “Running a boatyard is like working in a dementia clinic”: from Jim Lynch’s new novel, Before the Wind. | Literary Hub
• The 2016 Pulitzer Prize winners include Viet Thanh Nguyen, T.J. Stiles, and William Finnegan. | The Pulitzer Prizes, Literary Hub
• The finalists for the Best Translated Book Award were announced; they include Elena Ferrante, translated by Ann Goldstein for fiction and Silvina Ocampo, translated by Jason Weiss for poetry. | The Millions
• “The problem is so systemic, ingrained, and complex that it’s hard to decide where to start tackling it.” More on diversity in publishing (and a suggestion that unionizing could help). | Broadly, The Nation
• “Paradox is the resting point where impossibility has to be faced as a rare kind of pleasure.” An interview with Fanny Howe. | Divedapper
• Hey, let me just be a fucking witch and curse all of these bastards: On the continued prevalence and power of the witch narrative. | Flavorwire
• “The result of this is, when you try to write about guns in America, you can’t bother to use the news peg approach. Any peg you choose goes by too quickly, replaced by another.” Alexander Chee on America’s gun culture. | Longreads
• Books by two of the earliest women writers in English, including the first English autobiography, are being displayed together for the first time. | The Guardian
• “The faceoff with the Tomato would be mental, not physical. He’d accuse her of being on the rag, a bimbo, a gold digger, a fat pig.” A Trump-inspired short story by Darcey Steinke. | Catapult
• Kevin Bacon has been cast as the beloved Dick in the television adaptation of Chris Kraus’ iconic book. | Deadline

Also on Literary Hub: Librarian Confidential: Alexander Lent on the only library with owls, snakes, and Tai Chi classes · Books making news this week: tragedy, sociology, and Knausgaard · Joan Aiken’s “The Mysterious Barricades” from The People in the Castle

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