America’s oldest LGBT bookstore, Giovanni’s Room, is closing on May 17. The Philadelphia staple is shutting its doors after four decades due to the owner’s retirement and financial problems. At Salon, Steve Berman remembers the store and discusses how its closure will affect the publishing and LGBT community. “So LGBT books are forced to the edges, to the shadows, despite claims of assimilation. Gay authors have to do more and more marketing to find readers. Gay publishers have to struggle with shrinking venues to showcase their titles.”
The End of Giovanni’s Room
Needs More Filigree
Kate Heart has put together an array of charts breaking down the covers of 2011’s Young Adult fiction. Spoiler: the average book featured filigree and a white girl whose head is “mostly/ completely missing.”
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End Games
Recommended Reading: Drew Nelles on Ben Lerner’s 10:04 and Naomi Klein’s This Changes Everything.
At Least The CIA Is Reading Your Books
The CIA might just be America’s most literary government agency, no? Not only did they (maybe) help fund the early days of The Paris Review but, according to Eric Bennett, the group also funded the nation’s most prestigious and storied creative writing program. Over on Iowa Public Radio, you can hear some details.
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The Me Bird, Animated
18bis, a design and animation studio located in Rio de Janeiro, has animated Pablo Neruda’s homonym poem, “The Me Bird.” Laughing Squid has more information, as well as a behind-the-scenes look at how the video was made.
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Masthead Revisited
“This is a story about a woman who was erased from her job as the editor of the most famous literary magazine in America.” For Longreads, A.N. Devers writes about Brigid Hughes, the second editor of The Paris Review, who has been all but scrubbed from the magazine’s history. See also: Dever’s 2011 Year in Reading entry.
Going Rogue: The Unauthorized Index
Slate corrects an oversight to Sarah Palin’s otherwise impeccably edited memoir: no index. Theirs runs from “Alaska, autumn bouquet of” (page 1) to “‘you betcha’ – revelation of as not actually Alaska’s state motto” (page 309), and includes such helpful detours as “exclamation point, usage of” (pages 4, 26, 120, 121, 122, 138, 150…) You almost – almost – don’t have to read the book.
The Poetry of Borders
Over at the Southern Humanities Review, Javier Zamora, Veronica Marquez, and others share their poems in a special feature for undocumented writers. Pair with Andrew Kay’s Millions essay on the power of poetry.
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