As part of their This Means War series, which marks the centenary of World War I, The Irish Times published a short story by Belinda McKeon. Sample quote: “Strange the way the mundane memories are the ones to push through most forcefully.”
War Games
Hilary Mantel’s Hospital Diary
“In the days after the procedure I was sometimes so exhausted by movement that I would wait patiently for someone to come in and give me a paper cup of pills that was almost, not quite, out of my reach. But somehow, I would always contrive to get my pen in my hand, however far it had rolled… When Virginia Woolf’s doctors forbade her to write, she obeyed them. Which makes me ask, what kind of wuss was Woolf?” Hilary Mantel writes a diary on hospitalization for the London Review of Books.
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Stories and Glass
From the Paris Review: Daniel Torday on lost family stories, Pliny the Elder, and the origins of glass.
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The Art of Blurbing
At the Guardian Book Blog, Anthony Horowitz wonders “who’s helping who in the cover blurb game.” We of course recommend pairing his article with Alan Levinovitz’s Brief History of Blurbs from last year.
Stranger Danger
Siglio Press has just come out with a book version of Sophie Calle’s The Address Book, excerpts of which can be seen at The New Yorker.
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The Moth Wins MacArthur Award
Among the institutions that have just won MacArthur Awards are The Moth, for promoting the art and craft of storytelling, and the Center for Investigative Reporting, for engaging the public and sparking policy change.
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