Southpaws unite! The LA Review of Books takes on left-handedness. Now, someone use this can opener for me.
The Left Coast On Lefties
Littérature Québécois
Translator Peter McCambridge has recently launched Québec Reads, a webzine focused on reviews and excerpts of contemporary Québec fiction. (Bonus: our own Michael Bourne provides a “Beginner’s Guide to Canadian Lit.”)
How Many Books Are Out There?
Just how many books are out there? Google explains how it goes about counting all of the books in the world.
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Mind Games
“I suspect ‘chess rage’ and ‘road rage’ are neighboring neural impulses.” Tom Russell at Guernica Magazine has written a fascinating essay on a summer spent playing chess in Bryant Park and the unexpected artistic beauty of the game. Here’s a cursorily-related review of The Chess Machine, a book which features an unbeatable chess-playing automaton controlled by a dwarf.
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Iainbanks Is Hurtling Through Space
J.L. Galache wanted to honor the recently deceased Iain Banks in a way befitting the man’s memory. So of course he named an asteroid after the author. With the help of Dr. Gareth Williams of the Minor Planet Center, Galache successfully lobbied the Committee for Small Body Nomencalture of the International Astronomical Union for Asteroid 5099 to be officially dubbed Iainbanks. (Bonus: John McIntyre honors Banks’s memory by reading through some of his best work.)
Writing For Your Life
“I think essay and memoir hang together in a balance. There’s any number of ways to strike it, but from Montaigne on down that balance seems key to their design.” The Paris Review interviews the essayist Michelle Orange, author of the recent This Is Running For Your Life.
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On Optimism and Despair
“In your earlier novels you sounded so optimistic, but now your books are tinged with despair. Is this fair to say?” Zadie Smith‘s remarks upon accepting the 2016 Welt Literature Prize on November 10th, and the question of whether “multiculturalism” is a failed experiment. Read our review of Smith’s latest novel, Swing Time, here.
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