It’s famously easy to get scammed on OkCupid. Sarah Hepola (of Salon) knew as much when she joined. But when someone who claimed to be Joseph Gordon-Levitt sent her a flirty message, she figured… what could she do?
The Chance of a Lifetime
The Golden Ticket
“As a rare book collector and head of the English department at Ayer-Shirley Regional High School, Eleanor Capasso said that being sent what she believes could be a first edition of a Jane Austen novel felt a lot like winning the golden ticket to visit Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory.” Find out more about how a teacher received a two-hundred-year-old copy of Persuasion. If you’re looking for rare books, our guide has got you covered.
Semicolon Shenanigans
Need to spice up your writing? Try one of McSweeney’s punctuation marks such as the Yellow-Winged Apostrophe, which likes “to ‘peace out’ of its obligation to indicate possession or contraction,” or the Academic Ellipsis, which “is used by those who wish to demonstrate just how much more they know about how to use ellipses than you do.”
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Live Long
When your father shows you The Wrath of Khan at a young age, you develop an appreciation for the late Leonard Nimoy, whose death scene as Spock in that film is among his most famous performances. For Jen Girdish, that appreciation led to this essay, which reflects on Nimoy, her father’s own death and the onetime ubiquity of VHS tapes.
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Publishing’s Gender Gap
At Guardian, Lionel Shriver (America’s best writer?) shares her frustrations in publishing as a female novelist: “A female novelist would never enjoy a Franzen-scale frenzy of adulation in America…”
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Marion Cotillard as Lady Macbeth
The film adaptation of Macbeth being helmed by Snowtown Murders director Justin Kurzel will star Michael Fassbender and Marion Cotillard, reports Vulture. The movie will feature “Shakespeare’s original linguistic stylings” as well as “a visceral approach to the story including significant battle scenes,” and it is set to begin production this year.
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Raven Leilani on Unapologetically Writing Towards Want and Rage
Raven Leilani discusses her desire to write Black women who actively resist conforming to society's preconceptions about them.
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