More than 80 published writers in Buenos Aires receive monthly pensions meant to strengthen to “vertebral column of society.” Sums can reach nearly $900 a month.
Writers Pensions: Should We Have Them, Too?
Definitive Proof that Everything’s Better in an Irish Accent
Here’s a recording of Colum McCann reading the opening lines of the Amazon Editors’ list of June’s “10 Best Books of the Month”
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Love Ever Write Often
“The way (Yeats) puts down a man’s head & a woman’s head side by side, or face to face, is terrifying, two irreducible singlenesses & the impassable immensity between.” The Paris Review has published a brief, fascinating letter written by Samuel Beckett to his aunt Cissie Sinclair containing an original poem and some positive criticism of the painter Jack B. Yeats. Top it off with this essay by Elizabeth Winkler about language, style, and translation–and how any of that might help to make sense of Beckett’s convoluted legacy.
Camille Laurens V. Marie Darrieussecq
Two French novelists, two books about dead babies: Literary cat fight, canny PR scheme, or “psychological plagiarism”? Read all about the literary feud that’s captivating France here.
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On “Unpacking My Library”
There’s a lot of (justified) talk about the power of reading, but simply owning a book can be meaningful. Mabel Rosenheck considers Walter Benjamin‘s perspective on book ownership – “[it] is the most intimate relationship that one can have to objects. Not that they come alive in him; it is he who lives in them.” – and her own experiences with book collecting in San Francisco in an essay for The Toast. Pair with Anne Fadiman‘s essay on relationships, books, and relationships with books, “Marrying Libraries.”
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Poetry As a Response to Sexual Violence
“Most poems are rooted in a powerful emotion. With visuals and details of violence against women being flashed every second on TV and debated by different groups, it is only natural that such incidents become themes in our writing,” says Bindya Subba, who is one of several Indian poets writing response pieces to the recent rape incidents in Delhi and Mumbai.
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Next Up, Denmark
After waking us up to their favorite Brazilian novelists, the editorial board at Granta is turning its gaze to Norway. In the first issue of Norwegian Granta, you’ll find a slew of stories by illustrious contributors (among them Jennifer Egan, Roberto Bolano and Alice Munro) alongside new stories from authors native to the country. At Granta’s website, you can read an interview with the magazine’s online editor, Ted Hodgkinson.
Disappearing Welsh
If there existed a trophy for the ugliest-looking but prettiest-sounding language, then the 721,700 living Welsh speakers would boast more championships than Alabama’s football team. Yes, the Welsh. They of the villages Llangefni and Llanfairfechan. (To say nothing of Llanfairpwllgwyngyll.) Wouldn’t it be a shame for such a language to disappear? For writing in this language to stop being published? Stanford’s Cynthia Haven thinks so.
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