Charles Bock traces the lineage of FX’s Archer past fellow animated shows like The Simpsons and all the way back to comics. Or, more specifically, Bock traces the lineage back to comix, “cartoons for adults — or, rather, for those above the age of consent.”
Archer as Animated Comix
Unpublished DFW
This previously unpublished David Foster Wallace story, likely an excerpt from the Pale King manuscript, circulated as samizdat a couple of years back, but its reappearance – this time on some guy’s tumblr page – is a good excuse to link to it.
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Tuesday New Release Day: Poeppel; Schwalbe; Scalzi
Out this week: Small Admissions by Amy Poeppel; Books for Living by Will Schwalbe; and Miniatures by John Scalzi. For more on these and other new titles, go read our latest fiction and nonfiction book previews.
“Full, unfettered pomp”
On Friday, I wrote about the British writer William Boyd, whose new play, Longing, debuted last week at London’s Hampstead Theatre. The play is based on two of Chekhov’s short stories, one of which (according to Boyd’s new article in The Guardian) sheds light on the great author’s love life. Apparently the young Anton had “at least two dozen” affairs.
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Chummers
I’ve written before about the First Sentence series at Granta. The magazine asks a prominent writer to explain how they came to write an opening line. Recently, they asked Bear Down, Bear North author Melinda Moustakis to talk about the beginning of her story “River So Close”: “She’s a good-for-nothing chummer.” You could also read Jonathan Russell Clark on the art of the opening sentence.
Walter White Returns
Get ready for the return of Breaking Bad by reading Michelle Kuo and Albert Wu in the LARB, and also by reading Max Rivlin-Nadler’s piece in The Nation. Or, if you want to take a walk down memory lane, check out Chuck Klosterman’s piece from last year in which he convincingly argued that Walter White’s odyssey makes for best drama on television. Lastly, here’s some good news for those among you who subscribe to DirectTV and are thus locked out of AMC: you can stream tonight’s episode on the company’s website.
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Levine Named Poet Laureate
Philip Levine has succeeded W. S. Merwin as America’s latest poet laureate. Now is as good a time as any to revisit his interview with The Paris Review. You could also watch one of his readings if that’s more up your alley.
The Transcriptionist’s Tale
“I usually let the thunderous conclusions of love scenes pass without comment, with the exception of one tussle so histrionic that to deny its participants a [JOINT CLIMAXES] seemed downright petty.” Our own Matt Seidel discusses his work as a freelancer for a captioning and transcription company at The Morning News.
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