In addition to House of Holes‘ recent coverage in the New York Review of Books and Open Letters Monthly (and on The Millions), the latest edition of The Paris Review features an interview with “mad scientist of smut” Nicholson Baker. (You can check out an excerpt here.) But for those still unsatisfied, Adam Wilson has assembled a canon of raunchy literature.
Nicholson Baker Overload
Graffiti Street
"'Tuya' means 'graffiti' in Chinese—the name is recent—and this street, three-quarters of a mile long, may be the longest stretch of public art in the world. It’s also a government-sanctioned 'art district,' centered around the Sichuan Fine Arts Institute, which was established in 1940...I noticed that every artist I spoke to referred to 2005 as the year everything changed. 2005 was the year the government became interested in art." Art in Chongqing.
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Our new fictional feminist superheroes
Recently, both Batgirl and the Norse god Thor (as conceived by Marvel) have been updated to suit the times. While DC Comics simply gave Batgirl sensible, combat-appropriate clothing, inspiring happy fan art; "female Thor" has met a mix of excitement and bewilderment. Fittingly, a new piece out at Aeon explores our conflicted desire to see male protagonists in fiction -- the Harry Potters and Bilbo Baggins' of the world -- reimagined as women. (Also, because no roundup of imaginary characters is complete without fake social media updates, here's Thor lamenting the loss of his hammer on Facebook.)
Tuesday New Release Day: Zink; Gates; Gornick; North; Perry; Dimechkie; Leipciger; Swift; Robinson; Kovite
Out this week: Mislaid by Nell Zink; A Hand Reached Down to Guide Me by David Gates; Odd Woman in the City by Vivian Gornick; The Life and Death of Sophie Stark by Anna North; The Jesus Cow by Michael Perry; Lifted by the Great Nothing by Karim Dimechkie; The Mountain Can Wait by Sarah Leipciger; England and Other Stories by Graham Swift; and War of the Encyclopaedists by Christopher Robinson and Gavin Kovite. For more on these and other new titles, check out our Great 2015 Book Preview.
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The Very Picture of Guilt
If the prospect of dealing with Frankenstorm is harshing your mellow this Halloween, you might want to look at The Paris Review Daily’s illustrated Telltale Heart.
My Way of Proceeding
New poems from Rae Armantrout are always a cause for celebration. Here are two of them from the Possession issue of Granta Magazine, along with a couple of bonus poems by Caitlin Scarano. Don’t worry, you can thank me later.