Paulo Coelho recently condemned Ulysses for being all style and no content. In response, Ali Smith makes the case for style.
A Detestable Dichotomy
Out There
A half-century ago, Thomas Berger published Little Big Man, a satire of Westerns that helped increase the stature of the Western genre as a whole. To mark the book’s 50th anniversary, Allen Barra reflects on its legacy, suggesting that it’s as good a candidate as any for the title of Great American Novel. Related: Daniel Kalder on the odd phenomenon of the Euro-Western.
Sometimes You Feel
Can’t wait for Haruki Murakami’s new novel? You’re in luck: Slate just published an exclusive excerpt from the book. Sample quote: “No matter how quiet and conformist a person’s life seems, there’s always a time in the past when they reached an impasse. A time when they went a little crazy. I guess people need that sort of stage in their lives.” (You could also read Ben Dooley’s review of 1Q84.)
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What Do Celebs Read?
Books from their own imprint we hope. "In the last decade, in fact, the celebrity imprint has become something of a cottage industry, an endeavor mutually beneficial to publishing houses in pursuit of stars and their lucrative fanbases and celebrities looking for another feather in their cap." Some of the celebrities on this list might surprise you, read on to learn about which ones have a publishing imprint.
On The Notebook
"The notebook is where our interior world makes contact with our exterior world; where our instinct for creation is first made material. Our notebooks are our first messy attempts at self-expression, and the ways in which we express ourselves are changing every day." Sarah Gerard explores the life of the notebook in an essay for Hazlitt. Pair with our own Hannah Gersen's look at other methods writers use to keep their ideas straight, from calendars to collages.