Not Like Us
An Opportunity to Recant
Every book reviewer has probably, at one point or another, savaged a book a bit too savagely. But if given the opportunity, would you recant? Would you admit that you’d overstepped? Would you feel good about doing so? At an event last month, Snowball’s Chance author John Reed hosted an event at which NBCC critics did exactly that.
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Oh, you were the best of all my days.
Zadie Smith reading Frank O’Hara’s “Animals,” by way of the Chicago based ad and design agency, Coudal Partners, and their voice mail based poetry project, Verse by Voice.
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The Novel’s Topography
For at Blunderbuss Magazine, What Belongs to You author Garth Greenwell goes through his old notebooks and describes his creative process. Also check out Jameson Fitzpatrick’s review of the novel.
Antidote Man
According to Smithsonian Magazine, Buzzfeed is the mortal enemy of the highbrow Lapham’s Quarterly. Regardless of which source of media you side with in the rivalry, it’s worth reading through their profile of Lewis Lapham.
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Sasha’s Favorite Albums
Sasha Frere-Jones, who you may know from his work at The New Yorker, has listed his favorite albums of 2011, and even put together a Spotify playlist of some of his favorite singles. Isn’t that nice of him?
Tuesday New Release Day
The long-awaited follow-up to Yann Martel’s Booker-winner Life of Pi is out: Beatrice and Virgil. Also new, Elegy for April, a thriller by John Banville alter ego Benjamin Black; David Lipsky’s already much discussed interview with David Foster Wallace, Although Of Course You End Up Becoming Yourself; and, apparently hitting shelves ahead of its official release date, a book of philosophy by Marilynne Robinson, Absence of Mind.
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Staying Sharp
“There tends to be this idea that every piece and every assignment and every gig is always something speaking from the soul. We think that about great writers, that they’re incapable of doing hackwork.” The Rumpus interviewed Michelle Dean about women writers, the research process, and her forthcoming book, Sharp: The Women Who Made an Art of Having an Opinion. Pair with: Dean’s 2016 Year in Reading entry.
“The conspirators sit smoking thoughtfully”
Recommended Reading: “The Colonel’s Daughter,” new fiction from Noir author Robert Coover.
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