“A smiling, diverse lie of face paint and broken dreams.”
The Room Moves Without Moving
The music video for “Sweater” by Belgian indie outfit Willow relies on an impressive balance of timing, treadmill coordination, projection, and camera-work. A lot of ground is covered in a single room. It’s positively crazy. You might even say it’s virtual insanity. (Sorry I’m not sorry.)
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Great Moments in Travel Writing
The Telegraph publishes a piece by Paul Theroux in connection with his new book about travel lit, The Tao of Travel. In the piece, Theroux recounts some of the great feats of the genre.
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Who You’ve Lost
This incredible essay from Rita Gabis at Guernica examines the bizarre intersection of dreams, truth, and murder. If that subject matter piques your interest, here are a few essays from The Millions that also touch on dreams, truth, and murder, respectively.
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The Crowning
After his death, fans of David Foster Wallace canonized him as a prophet, according him a degree of benevolence shared by almost no one in American letters. In New York Magazine, Christian Lorentzen argues that Wallace himself worried about this happening, and says he’d “probably be the last person to argue for his sainthood.” His essay pairs nicely with Jonathan Russell Clark on The David Foster Wallace Reader.
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Tuesday New Release Day: Groff; Banville; DeWitt; Boyd; Tuck; Selznick; Bell; Luiselli
Out this week: Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff; The Blue Guitar by John Banville; Undermajordomo Minor by Patrick DeWitt; Sweet Caress by William Boyd; The Double Life of Liliane by Lily Tuck; The Marvels by Brian Selznick; Scrapper by Matt Bell; and The Story of My Teeth by Valeria Luiselli. For more on these and other new titles, go read our Great Second-Half 2015 Book Preview.
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Coates: A Public Intellectual
The New York Times profiles MacArthur Genius and National Book Award winner Ta-Nehisi Coates as one of America’s foremost public intellectuals. His book We Were Eight Years in Power: An American Tragedy (which we have been anticipating for months) is released this Tuesday.
Ask a Grown Woman
High school girls “Ask a Grown Woman” what it’s like to date someone of the same gender. The answer is surprisingly honest.