Walter White is the new Walt Whitman. “Both are intellectual pioneers in their fields, their legacies—centuries apart—demanding risk, casting them outside of society, gliding out into the world, liberated from societal constraints,” Kera Bolonik writes about Whitman’s influence on Breaking Bad.
The Song of the Two Walts
Publishing the Torture Report
Independent publisher Melville House worked straight through December to publish the Senate Intelligence Committee Report on Torture in time for the New Year. Now co-founder Dennis Johnson talks with Vulture about why his press decided to publish the book at all, and about the varied moral and practical concerns at stake when working on such a project.
Recommended Reading: Saturday Special
Recommended Reading: “Gregory’s Year” by Gospel of Anarchy author Justin Taylor.
●
●
Gently Simmer
The Ultimate Bestseller
This week in book-related infographics: Waterstones has put together an illustrated formula for the ultimate bestseller, “a thriller tale of crime, bondage and wizardry.”
●
●
Remember to Tip Your Archivists
Thanks to the work of archivists at The Harry Ransom Center at the University of Texas, two scholars have unearthed a 1901 play by Edith Wharton called “The Shadow of a Doubt,” reports The Guardian. “After all this time, nobody thought there were long, full scale, completed, original, professional works by Wharton still out there that we didn’t know about. But evidently there are. In 2017, Edith Wharton continues to surprise.” Pair with this reflection on the role of New York City in Wharton’s novels.
The Originals Series
Farrar, Straus & Giroux will team up with GQ for something called “The Originals Series.” The series, as stated in a blog post from FSG’s digital marketing manager, will consist of “authors and musicians in conversation, hosted by David Rees (Get Your War On, Artisanal Pencil Sharpening, Kale City), in an intimate West Village loft space. We’ll film each event and edit it down to a compelling short film for broadcast online.” You can RSVP to the November 8th kick-off, which features John Jeremiah Sullivan and the Brooklyn-based band Caveman, here.
●
●