A question that plagues American writers: how would the lit world be different if everybody followed the rules in The Elements of Style? The answer: it would look like this.
Style-Elements
Flowers of Evil
“Life is worth less than a line of Baudelaire’s poetry.” These two lyric essays by Chen Li over at Asymptote Journal are economical and well-worth the read. Though Chen Li is from Taiwan, he writes in Chinese; this syllabus of Chinese writing and the “New China” from Casey Walker at The Millions pairs quite nicely.
Zahar Prilepin Profile
What makes Russia's Zahar Prilepin similar to Ernest Hemingway? The Daily Beast's Owen Matthews takes a look at the nationalist writer.
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Going Against the Current
Emily Harnett writes about Elena Ferrante’s bad book covers and how it embraces “women’s fiction” as a genre. As she puts it, “In a literary marketplace where the very image of a woman is seen as antithetical to literature, Ferrante’s covers take an important stand.” Pair with Cora Currier’s essay on reading Italy through Ferrante’s books.
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2011 in Physics Books
Every year brings a fresh new crop of popular books on physics and cosmology, or so they say. 2011 was no exception, featuring books on dark matter and dark energy, the Large Hadron Collider, time, the multiverse, cosmic mortality, a bit of history, biography, and even a celebration of "fringe physics." Here is a list of top ten picks.
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Steve Jobs Biography Gets Unexpected PR Boon
Walter Isaacson's biography of Steve Jobs is slated for a November 21st release. As the Apple CEO announced his resignation last night, the timing of the book Steve Jobs really could not be better.
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I Ain’t Sayin’ Eustace Tilley is a Gold-Digger…
Apropos of our popular "Open Letter to Kanye West," may we recommend the "Shouts & Murmurs in this week's New Yorker? "I have more than a million [Facebook] fans," writes a certain unnamed narrator. "Do you know how many fans Books have? Twenty-five thousand seven hundred and sixty-four."
Wallace’s Former Student
David Foster Wallace's former student, Adam Plunkett, recounts studying with the polite, Midwestern, sometimes embarrassing professor whom he knew as Dave during the spring of his junior year at Pomona College, where Wallace worked until his death that September.