All Apologies
Greater and Greater
The passing of Muhammad Ali was sad for fans of both sports and greatness alike. One little known Ali fact is that he once composed a line-for-line sonnet with another one of “the greatest,” the poet Marianne Moore. Let none other than George Plimpton explain it to you.
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Love Advice from Chaucer
“Ich am Geoffrey Chaucer, and my litel poeme the Parliament of Foweles was the first to combyne the peanut buttir of Februarye the XIVth wyth the milk chocolate of wooing. And so Ich feel responsible to helpe wyth sum advyce on thys daye.” Love advice from Chaucer, via NPR.
Dear Sirs, I Do Enjoy This
Brontë-inspired short fiction courtesy of Rachel Cantor? Sure, why not. (For background, you might want to read our own Edan Lepucki’s takedown of the love interest in Jane Eyre.)
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Extreme Bookselling: Japanese Edition
Japanese booksellers are not content to handsell books these days. No, no. Instead, they’re drawing on architectural know-how and creative spirit in order to master “the avant-garde art of book stacking.” (Hopefully none of them experience the Mariko Aoki phenomenon.)
The Curious History of a Curious Account
Our own Michael Bourne takes a look at Thomas King’s Inconvenient Indian, which struggled to find a publisher in the United States despite flying off the shelves in Canada. “The curious publication history of [the book],” Bourne writes, “serves as a window into the wide differences in the way mainstream Americans and Canadians view the Native peoples in their midst.”
“Abroad, you could be anything”
Following the news that Beyoncé sampled a TED talk given by Year in Reading contributor Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie, Tin House dug up an interview with the author, who says that to this day, when she looks at the manuscript of Americanah, she feels “thrilled and amazed that [she] actually finished writing this.”
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