Among other things he left out of his famous poem, William Carlos Williams failed to give us any details about the kitchen in which he ate plums. At The Toast, Mallory Ortberg rewrites the poem so it takes place in a communal dorm kitchen.
Always Label Your Milk
Please Be Quiet, Please
Recommended Reading: This essay from The Rumpus on total noise and total silence, touching on everyone from Mikhail Zoshchenko to Don DeLillo.
●
●
Welcome, Il’ja!
The Millions is delighted to welcome new staff writer Il’ja Rákoš, whose deep dive into the work of László Krasznahorkai publishes today. He is the author of an essay collection in Ukrainian, Os’ Khristianska Vira, and has previous published an interview with and appreciation of Nobel laureate Svetlana Alexievich at the site. He lives in Kyiv.
Next Step: Skynet Becomes Self-Aware
James Harriman-Smith wants to know what humans can learn from a computer’s reading of Shakespeare’s plays. As it turns out, there’s quite a bit.
The Church of Scientology vs. The New Yorker
Last February, everyone was talking about Lawrence Wright‘s epic New Yorker profile of Paul Haggis and The Church of Scientology. But now, as The New York Times reports, the Church has released Freedom, a 51-page retaliatory glossy with DVD accompaniment.
New Quarterly Conversation
A new issue of The Quarterly Conversation covers Gaddis, Müeller, and the Nordic masculinity of Per Petterson, among other topics.
●
●
Football Book Club: Allie Brosh’s ‘Hyperbole and a Half’
This week, Football Book Club will be reading Allie Brosh’s Hyperbole and a Half: Unfortunate Situations, Flawed Coping Mechanisms, Mayhem, and Other Things That Happened — as well as chatting about Steven Millhauser’s Edwin Mullhouse, bemoaning our empty NFL-free lives, and weeping about the shittiness of our respective teams.
●
●
A Book about Beauty
In his latest Year in Reading, Chigozie Obioma told us about Eka Kurniawan’s Beauty Is a Wound, “the howling masterpiece of 2015…a howl, an outrage, and a sheer burst of particular talent.” In an illuminating interview for Electric Literature, Kurniawan discusses the label “magic realism,” epic creation, and his ideas for his next novel.