Hip-Hop Men of Letters
What’s Important
The Los Angeles Review of Books looks at a new history of K Records, the influential Olympia, WA-label that gave us Beat Happening, Modest Mouse, and Kurt Cobain's arm tattoo.
Writing Heartbreak
Learn more about Hans Christian Andersen Award winner Cao Wenxuan. “China has given us so many heartbreaking stories. How can you avoid writing about them? I can’t sacrifice my life experience in order to make children happy.” Pair with Edan Lepucki’s piece on the grown-up counterparts to children’s stories.
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Polish Book Covers
An eerie collection of Polish book cover art from the 1970s and 80s.
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Carrying on García Márquez’s Torch
After the passing of Gabriel García Márquez, the team of Reed Johnson, Juan Forero, and Sara Munoz had cause to opine within the pages of the Wall Street Journal, who are the other “post-boom Spanish-language fiction writers whose works continue to redraw the map of Latin literature?” They list six suggestions, but I think one of the names on that list would've disagreed with the comparison. (Bonus: An unpublished Márquez manuscript may be on the way as well.)
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Crime and Punishment
Johnny Depp’s latest film, Black Mass, which casts the star as Whitey Bulger, hit theaters on September 18th. At Publishers Weekly, author T. J. English argues that Where the Bodies Were Buried: Whitey Bulger and the World That Made Him is necessary to the canon of literature on Bulger, even if it's the 16th book about the mobster.
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Doubtful
"I have yet to publish a book. The reason for that is, in part, life gets in the way. There’s work and love and art and art usually comes last, (especially for we women writers). But for me, part of what weighs art down and keeps it in last place is overwhelming self-doubt." In an essay for Electric Literature Lindsay Merbaum writes about writing, a crippling lack of confidence, and the connection between the two. Also included: that defining moment "when I first realized I was not The Shit."
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