At The Atlantic, Caleb Crain (of Necessary Errors and n+1 fame) writes about the galvanizing effects of memorizing his favorite poem. (If you’re wondering, the poem in question is W.H. Auden’s “In Praise of Limestone.”)
“Rote lessons before the air raid drill”
On Negative Book Reviews
"An appeal for the revival of the negative book review, then, is a remonstration against forced and foppish praise, where everything is good and so nothing at all is good." In The Baffler, Rafia Zakaria writes in praise of negative book reviews and decries the "enfeebling of literary criticism." From our archives: our own Emily St. John Mandel writes about bad book reviews.
On Optimism and Despair
“In your earlier novels you sounded so optimistic, but now your books are tinged with despair. Is this fair to say?” Zadie Smith's remarks upon accepting the 2016 Welt Literature Prize on November 10th, and the question of whether "multiculturalism" is a failed experiment. Read our review of Smith's latest novel, Swing Time, here.
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Not Very Titillating
Those of you who know the joy of reading romance novels with your friends have probably wondered at some point what people who write erotica are like. Are they bankers and professionals? Housewives and mistresses? Are they some combination of all of the above? At Slate, a chaste look at the lives of unchaste writers.
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Cockroaches in Skinny Jeans
Is that an iPod Nano? And a fixed gear bike? Uh-oh: you might have hipsters (via).
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New Black Panther Comic
Year in Reading alumna Roxane Gay and Yona Harvey will be writing a comic book series for Marvel alongside Ta-Nehisi Coates. The Black Panther companion series will be titled World of Wakanda.
Your X-Man Mutation: Advanced Reading Abilities
Does stereoblindness caused by amblyopia (“lazy eye”) grant “superpowers” to avid readers? Giovanni Garcia-Fenech’s ophthalmologist seems to think so.
Thanks for Nothing, Dickens
Want to publish anonymously (and then stay that way)? Be thankful you're not friends with Charles Dickens.
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