“Much of what passes for advanced literary scholarship these days is dreadful twaddle — incoherent, emotionally empty, deeply illiterate,” says Terry Castle in a recent interview with Salon about her new book of essays, The Professor. You can also catch Castle in the most recent issue of The New York Times Magazine.
The Great Terry Castle
Amazon: criticism you can count on
A study of the top 100 non-fiction titles between 2004 and 2007, and the major media and Amazon reviews for each title, yields some fascinating results: "experts and consumers agreed in aggregate about the quality of a book."
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Bart the Streamer
Following the news that The Simpsons will now be available for online streaming for the first time, Myles McNutt makes the case that the world needs a Simpsons Clip Database. He justifies his sentiment by pointing out that “in a world where Simpsons references are a language for a certain generation, the ability to stream this content has tremendous value, and could push use of an app that otherwise would struggle to compete with services like Netflix.”
A Peek Behind the Curtain
Want to learn more about our acclaimed, annual Year in Reading series? At Electric Literature, I talk about how it started, how we put it together, and some of my favorite entries from years past.
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TLAN:WOTFOB Excerpted
Reif Larsen's "The Crying of Page 45" appears in this month's issue of The Believer. This clever, inventive essay is excerpted from the book I co-edited The Late American Novel: Writers on the Future of Books. You can get a taste of the piece at The Believer website, but the full essay in all its illustrated glory is available in the print magazine as well as in, of course, the book.
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Strolling Story
Recommended Reading: Lydia Davis's new short story, "Old Men Around Town," in the New Statesman. "He stops to tell us that he must be up early in the morning – to get down to the factory. The factory is gone, his men are gone, but he still seems to be in charge of something." For more Davis, check out her new collection.
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