“Writing isn’t entirely mental. You’re a physical being, and sometimes when your writing is broken, it’s your body that needs attention, not your mind.” Rebecca Makkai has some tips for breaking writer’s block and a very cool perspective on writing as a whole person. Pair with our interview with Makkai about her latest novel, The Hundred-Year House.
“Writing isn’t entirely mental.”
New Release Tuesday
One of the most anticipated novels of the year is out today: David Mitchell’s The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet. Also newly available, Booker shortlister The Quickening Maze by Adam Foulds.
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The End of Woman-Baiting
“What do women have to do with the internet? We submit that, at least in the eyes of media executives, women are the internet. Women, we mean the internet, are commanding a larger share of the traditional print market. The internet, we mean women, is less responsive to conventional advertising than to commenting, sharing, and other forms of social interaction. Women, we mean the internet, are putting men, we mean magazine editors, out of work. The internet, we mean women, never pays for its content — or for their drinks!” The editors at n + 1 take on the woman-baiting article.
Duck You Autocorrect
James Gleick talks to one of the software engineers behind autocorrect, that “impish god” responsible for turning our ids to I’ds and moviestars to Natalie Portmanteaus. In response, Jen Doll wonders whether we love to hate autocorrect “because when it messes up we’re happily reminded that phones and computers are not actually smarter than people.”
Roger Angell has worked at the New Yorker for 58 years.
In his profile of Roger Angell, Sridhar Paddu offers this astute observation from Charles McGrath: “Which is the greater—Roger the writer or Roger the editor? It’s kind of a toss-up.” Bonus: Angell’s piece about Don Zimmer, who just passed away this week, is well worth your time.
Broken Embraces
Catch it while you can: Charlie Rose‘s hour-long interview with Pedro Almodóvar and his muse, Penélope Cruz, touches on character, confidence, and control, and is currently available online. Almodóvar’s latest film, Broken Embraces, which I saw last summer in Madrid sans subtitles, was so visually stunning and well-acted that despite my meager translation the film enthralled. With a proper translation, it should be ravishing.
Libraries Pitch In
Libraries are doing double-time. At NPRs Planet Money, a librarian writes in about how her local library is offering recession resources to those most affected by unemployment.
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