In 1968 Italo Calvino published 14 reasons why we should read the classics, and his list still feels relevant. Pair with the Millions’s essay on, well, reading the classics.
Reasons to Read the Classics
Book Pirates
The American author is dead, long live the American author! At the New York Times, a eulogy.
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Jason Reynolds on the Language of Discussing Racism with Kids
Jason Reynolds discusses the goal behind writing a nuanced book on racism for children with Ibram X. Kendi.
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Leah Hampton on the Bifurcated Vantage Point
Leah Hampton discusses her debut collection, F*ckface: And Other Stories, which takes a closer look at lives in the modern-day American South.
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Dispatch from the Online Retail War
During its ongoing contract talks with the publisher, Amazon has been displaying that Hachette’s books ship in “up to 3-5 weeks.” James Patterson, one of their biggest authors, has declared on Facebook that “there is a war going on between Amazon and book publishers.” The Washington Post has more on the backstory of Amazon’s strategy, while the New York Times blog details how Patterson and other authors are fighting back.
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Xerxes, Xystus, and Xanthippe
What did the letter X stand for before xylophones and x-rays? Past examples include historical figures, plants, and animals, all mostly of a Greek bent.
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Shakespeare in Asia
“It’s fair to say Shakespeare is having a cultural moment in Asia, with a “boom” of new film adaptations and dramatic stagings,” and the Royal Shakespeare Company just received 1.5 million pounds to keep that boom going by translating all of the Bard’s plays into Mandarin. Melville House has the full story, and it pairs well with both this diagram of a translated book’s usual lifespan and this discussion of Shakespeare’s best plays.
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The Crisis of Criticism
“Then there’s the no-one-reads-anymore hysteria, the lack of supportive careers for apprenticing writers, the MFA deathtrap, etc. It feels self-indulgent as a critic to say, ‘But the whole critical structure has broken down, let’s talk about that.’ The critic only comes into play when the books are actually produced and put onto the market, meaning their jobs are tied into this whole decaying, rotting mess of an industry.” Jessa Crispin writes on the self-hating book critic.
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