New Herring Press is a Brooklyn/Portland publisher of prose chapbooks, and they’re likely the best new chapbook press you haven’t heard of yet. Volume II of their annual series features titles by Eileen Myles, Justin Torres, Amanda Davidson, and Sara Veglahn, with cover art by illustrator Jacob Magraw-Mickelson. NHP’s ultra-short backlist includes notable authors like Lynne Tillman and Deb Olin Unferth. Volume III is in the works, with authors and artist TBA soon. Check them out at newherringpress.tumblr.com.
New Herring Press: Purveyor of Prose Chapbooks
Poetic Punishment
Following their prosecution for “hooliganism motivated by religious hatred” against the Russian Orthodox Church, Russian punk group Pussy Riot has been dispatched to correctional colony IK 14. As it happens, the colony is particularly religious. Coincidence? Judith Pallot is skeptical.
The Patriarch
This week, Richard Ford published his first novel in a while to feature Frank Bascombe, the protagonist of his Pulitzer-winning book The Sportswriter. At Salon, our own Lydia Kiesling posits a through-line from Bascombe to a certain TV gangster, arguing that The Sopranos shares its view of manhood with Ford’s novels. You could also read our own Michael Bourne on Ford’s 2012 book, Canada.
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Swedish Covers
50 watts, a blog dedicated to book-related design and illustration, takes a look at Swedish book covers.
Brickjest
Infinite Jest may have "really taken on a foothold as the 'novel of ideas' of the late 20th and early 21st centuries" but now it's also a "novel of legos," courtesy of Kevin Griffith and his 11 year old son, Sebastian.
“I am thankful for death”
It’s fun to imagine what literary titans might have thought had they witnessed modern pop culture. In that vein, here is a monologue, delivered by T.S. Eliot, on seeing the play Cats for the first time.
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More Anticipated Books
The eagle-eyed Scott Esposito spots fall publication dates for volumes I and II of Murakami's IQ84...and for Helen DeWitt's new novel (!), Lightning Rods, due out from New Directions.
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Tune in next week
Emily Nussbaum on the poetry of cliffhangers, "which makes visible the storyteller’s connection to his audience—like a bridge made out of lightning. Primal and unashamedly manipulative, cliffhangers are the signature gambit of serial storytelling."
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