Do our brains determine how we write? Joyce Dyer explores the possibility that genre is influenced by how our brains are wired but wonders if that limits us. “The page may be forcing compromises that the brain, in such close relationship with the mind, must rightly refuse,” she writes.
Where Is My Mind?
Hot Amish Romance
Is it hot in here, or is that my Amish friendship bread? New York calls our attention to a new genre: the bonnet-ripper.
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From Terror to Terrific
“Crossover words are a tremendous testament to our awesome ability to shape the language as we use it. To master our fears. To take our terror and use it to build something terrific.” – Arika Okrent writes for The Week about irony, slang and the way language changes.
The Author Would Like to Say Something
Now that Louise Erdrich has won the National Book Award, it’s worth looking back on her interviews from recent years. You can read her piece in the Art of Fiction series, published in 2010 in The Paris Review; you could try her interview with the Times from back in October; or else you could take a look at her sit-down with The New Yorker in April. (This probably goes without saying, but you could also just read her new novel.)
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Elgin Marbles Return Home?
British Members of Parliament have proposed a bill to return the Elgin Marbles (of Keats fame) to Greece.
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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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