Authors are known to mine material from their personal relationships for their writing, but John Updike found inspiration from his interviews. After journalist William Ecenbarger wrote a profile of Updike in 1983, he found himself the subject of an Updike short story. Pair with: Our review of Updike’s Collected Stories.
Pulling an Updike
Thank You, Scratch That
If you’ve ever been asked to write a thank-you note, you know that, paradoxically, it can be one of the hardest forms of writing to do well. In light of that, The Morning News has kindly republished their classic guide to writing thank-you notes, written by Leslie Harpold. Sample quote: “If you want to know when you get a genuine pass on writing a note, the litmus test is simple: Do I live under the same roof as the giver?”
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Ursula K. Le Guin (1929-2018)
Ursula K. Le Guin has died at the age of 88, according to the New York Times and Le Guin’s family. The prolific science fiction and fantasy writer — best known for her Earthsea series and The Left Hand of Darkness — explored themes like politics, gender, religion, and environmentalism. However, Le Guin wrote across genre and published over 20 novels, 100 short stories, 7 essay collections, 13 children’s books, 5 volumes of translation, and a writer’s guide. No stranger to awards, Le Guin most recently won the 2017 Hugo Award for Best Related Work for Words Are My Matter: Writings About Life and Books, 2000-2016. From our archives: The Millions interview with Le Guin from 2013.
Michiko Kakutani on Jonathan Franzen’s “Freedom”
At The New York Times, Michiko Kakutani gets in an early review of Jonathan Franzen’s Freedom, heralding it “his most deeply felt novel yet.”
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Pride, Prejudice, and Neopets
When YA author Jordan Ifueko was 10, she brought her two passions, Neopets and Jane Austen, together in a popular fan-fiction tale, "Pride, Prose, and Princes."
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Illness as Metaphor
Melissa Broder shares her thoughts on open marriage and illness in an excerpt from her So Sad Today. Pair with Gila Lyons’s Millions essay on writing through illness.
The Counted
“Soon, the nail-biting hours of vote-counting start. For a Turkish citizen who does not support the AKP, casting your vote is the easy part of the process. The trickier task comes after that vote is stamped (to ensure it is real and valid): trying to make sure it is actually counted.” On a new book about Erdoğan’s Turkey.
They Could Make It After All
After word got out last week that J.K. Rowling regrets bringing Ron and Hermione together, many people responded with interesting takes on the news. The hubbub missed the full context of Rowling’s quotes, however, as they leaked from an interview in Wonderland magazine that hadn’t yet been released. Now the new issue of the the magazine is out, and the context changes things a bit: Rowling actually said the two “will be alright with a bit of counseling.”