“Perhaps I can’t fully feel empathy and emotion for characters when I feel nothing but disdain for them.” Pank Magazine’s Kirsty Logan (who wrote today’s piece on the joys of unread books) debates with James Kaelan about We’re Getting On.
Reviewer and Novelist Debate!
How Should A Feminist Be?
“…its woman-centredness also hints at feminism’s dirty secret: that feminists might be feminists because they are supremely interested in themselves, even if that interest is in the shape of self-doubt. While Sheila says that it’s great to be a woman because what a female genius should be hasn’t yet been established, that is also the problem of being a woman.” The London Review of Books addresses the problems of Sheila Heti’s How Should A Person Be?. For another perspective, don’t miss our interview with Heti.
Boy Meets World, Boy Meets Girl
In a perfect mix of high and low art, Samuel L. Jackson performed a slam poem about Boy Meets World on The Tonight Show. “Daughter of hippies/Name of a gypsy/’Topanga,’ Corey cries.”
●
●
Literary Tastemaker Extraordinare
“In a new biography, The Lady with the Borzoi: Blanche Knopf, Literary Tastemaker Extraordinaire (Farrar, Straus & Giroux), Laura Claridge argues that Blanche Knopf was actually the more important and influential of the two Knopfs. That’s a stretch, but her book is still a long-overdue acknowledgment of the pioneering role Blanche played at a time when women were nearly invisible in the business world.” Find out more about Blanche Knopf at The New Yorker. Edan Lepucki’s 2011-2012 list on why not to self-publish is still relevant.
●
●
Tricks of the Trade
“Because at the end of the day, there is no magic solution, no short-cut, to writing something that hopefully will last. No matter how we search for one.” Jeff VanderMeer gives eight writing tips for aspiring writers in the Chicago Review of Books. See also: VanderMeer’s prolific 2017 Year in Reading entry.
N+2.0?
N+1 takes the brave step of making all more of its content available online, at a snazzily updated website. You might start with Mark McGurl‘s knockout piece on Zombie novels, a fitting companion to our own Emily W.’s recent work on vampires. Remember, though: subscribing “is the right thing to do.”
Flatmancrooked Reading in Brooklyn
Attention New York-based readers: This Friday evening at 7:00, The Millions staff writer Edan Lepucki will read from her novella If You’re Not Yet Like Me at Book Court bookstore in Brooklyn. Joining her will be fellow Flatmancrooked author Shya Scanlon, who will read from his novel, Forecast. Don’t miss it!