Maxim’s long, comprehensive oral history of The Wire shouldn’t be missed. In fact, it should be supplemented with Idris Elba’s short profile in New York Magazine.
Hangovers and Strip Clubs: The Wire
Add Poems to Your Curriculum
Are you familiar with “Teach This Poem“? If not you should be. This organization just won the National Book Foundation’s 2018 Innovations in Reading Prize. Their literary social impact mission? Help teachers add poetry to their curriculum; “Each week, The Academy of American Poets emails out a poem along with interdisciplinary information — classroom discussion questions and multimedia offerings like maps, videos, photography, and related reading suggestions. Everything is curated to help teachers incorporate poetry into the classroom experience.” Find out more about the prize and the org here.
Tuesday, Big New Release Day
The big, blockbuster book this week is the final installment in the late Stieg Larsson’s trilogy, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest. Those just catching on to the Larsson phenomenon can also now get the complete set. Moving on to quirkier fare, there’s The Hour: A Cocktail Manifesto, a reprint of a 1950s treatise on drinking with a new introduction by Daniel Handler (aka Lemony Snicket). And finally, Library of America is putting out a volume of novels and stories by master of gothic fiction, Shirley Jackson.
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Twitter Fiction
“I rather like the idea of just using a few brushstrokes to create a whole world. And, of course, with Twitter you do that, you can tell a very big story in a few lines.” Books and Arts Daily talks with Alexander McCall Smith about the new art of Twitter fiction. Pair with the full text of David Mitchell‘s Twitter story “The Right Sort,” exclusively on The Millions.
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Buy Debt Without Going Into Debt
David Graeber’s Debt (which was just reviewed in the New York Review of Books) is available at a 40% discount all weekend long.
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“I have a master’s degree in poetry.”
Most actors don’t go on The Tonight Show to promote literature, but leave it to James Franco to be the first to brag about getting his poetry M.F.A. to Jimmy Fallon. He discussed his new book, Directing Herbert White, and his mentor Frank Bidart. For more on the Bidart/Franco friendship, check out our own Janet Potter’s recap of attending an event featuring the two writers.
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I Prefer Not To
Just in time for Labor Day, Electric Literature has a list of 11 lousy jobs from literature that will make you feel better about your own; or you could celebrate the long weekend by writing a novel in three days, like they do in Canada.
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