Recommended Reading: Matthew Salesses’ new story in the latest Guernica, “High Schools, or How to Be Asian American.”
Some Wednesday Reading from Mr. Salesses
Sounding Off
Shakespeare conspiracy theorists might still wonder who the real playwright was, but we do know what he would've sounded like. Linguist David Crystal and his son, actor Ben Crystal, demonstrate the original pronunciation of the Bard's best. Bonus: An interview with Ben on the research behind the pronunciation.
A Necessary Evil
Is the system rigged? Aaron Bady at The New Inquiry discusses the inherent evil of the canon and the general problem with lists. For more on why we care about literary awards in the first place, here is Mark O’Connell from The Millions.
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Fantasies of Desires
"(The Great Gatsby) is often considered the greatest American novel of the 20th century—I waver on that sometimes but I love the beauty of its writing, its tabloid immediacy, the high body count, its modernistic touches, the relentless drama put into its novella-length form." Bret Easton Ellis's top ten favorite books doesn't include many surprises, but it's worth a look.
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Something To Think About This Sunday
Black Hawk Down and Killing Pablo author Mark Bowden explains the "hardest job in football" in this Atlantic article from 2009.
Attention Alice Munro Fans
Good news: There's a new Alice Munro collection coming this fall.
Titular Oddities
The shortlist for the Diagram Prize for the Oddest Book Title of 2010 has been announced. Among the hopefuls: Managing a Dental Practice: The Genghis Khan Way.
More of the Little Prince
Unpublished pages from Antoine de Saint-Exupery’s The Little Prince have been unearthed, and they contain clues to a political reading of the children's classic.
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