The appeal of larger food packaging is, apparently, linked to a hunger for socioeconomic status rather than the rumblings of the stomach.
I like big food and I cannot lie
Digital Nation
Point: “Repeated surveys show that children spend less time reading than did previous generations. They instead devote many hours of their waking lives to electronic screens of one kind or another.” Counterpoint: “Generation Y, those born between 1979 and 1989, spent the most money on books in 2011, taking over long-held book-buying leadership from baby boomers…with 43 percent of GenY’s purchases going to online channels, they are adding momentum to the industry shift to digital.” Conclusion?
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A Generation of Writers Influenced by Octavia Butler
Hillel Italie speaks to writers like N.K. Jemisin and Nnedi Okarafor about Octavia Butler's undeniable influence on a generation of thinkers and artists.
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A Swiftly Tilting Biography
“The contradictions of [Madeleine] L’Engle’s life offer the best insights into the complicated acrobatics we perform in the modern world in order to satisfy the competing claims of love, family, success, and ambition….While the person that emerges could be tiresome, didactic, and just plain weird—why is everyone always breaking into a hymn at her house?—she could also be tender and offered real insights into the difficulties of growing up.” There’s a new biography of the A Wrinkle In Time author out, and The New Republic examines her life’s many complexities and, well, wrinkles.
SF’s Thriving Libraries
Book lovers say it’s nothing to keep quiet about: San Francisco’s libraries are thriving.
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A Fine Art
“Try not to get overly attached to a hypothesis just because it’s yours. It’s only a way station in the pursuit of knowledge. Ask yourself why you like the idea. Compare it fairly with the alternatives. See if you can find reasons for rejecting it. If you don’t, others will.” It’s too bad more people haven’t had a chance to take a look at Carl Sagan’s 8-rule “Baloney Detection Kit.“
More Marginalia
Sam Anderson’s brilliant Year in Marginalia inspires MobyLives to announce the “Melville House Marginalia Contest.”