Natasha Trethewey will give her inaugural reading as the U.S. Poet Laureate tonight at the Library of Congress. The event is free and open to the public, and some of Trethewey’s work can be found here, here, and here.
Trethewey’s Inaugural Reading
David Foster Wallace in Coversation
In April, the University Press of Mississippi will add a volume on David Foster Wallace to its Literary Conversations Series. A taste of the interviews contained within can be found at Dalkey.
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The Story Prize 2011 Shortlist
The Story Prize has announced its nominees for the 2011 prize, We Others by Steven Millhauser, Binocular Vision by Edith Pearlman, The Angel Esmeralda by Don DeLillo. Our review of the latter was published today.
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A subject “simply too controversial for the university”
As noted on Arts & Letters Daily, Yale's decision to shutter its Initiative for the Interdisciplinary Study of Anti-Semitism raises the question, "Where does scholarship end and advocacy begin?"
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Sometimes It’s Obvious
Why They're Single is a "tribute site to excellence and failure in online dating." And what better date for it to go live than on Valentine's Day? (Related: OK Stupid: The Horrors of OK Cupid.com)
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The Better Angels of Our Nature
Steven Pinker's The Better Angels of Our Nature posits that human violence is becoming less and less common in civilized culture. If your interest was piqued by the book's review in The New York Times, you will no doubt be interested in his Edge Master Class as well.
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The Man Group Drops Sponsorship of Asian Lit Prize
The Man Asian Prize is no more. Long live the Man Asian Prize.
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Reclusive Reading
Emily Dickinson didn't get out much, so why should we have to in order to read her work? Her open access manuscripts, letters, and envelope scribbles are now available online in the Emily Dickinson Archive. But now there's controversy over who is the rightful owner of her manuscripts and who should shape the archives — Harvard or Amherst?
The Art of Villanelle Isn’t Hard to Master
The villanelle, beloved by Elizabeth Bishop, Sylvia Plath, and Dylan Thomas, might be making a comeback.