“If you read through all the citations, you’ll start to detect certain patterns. Any aspirant Nobel Prize–winner should take note—these may hold the key to victory.” The Paris Review has read through all of the Nobel Prize-winner citations and came to a couple of conclusions, such as “you should be great… but it also helps if you’re epic. Oh, and fresh!” Pair their piece with our own overview of newest laureate Patrick Modiano’s work, and The New Yorker‘s look into the translation of Nobel Prize-winning authors.
How to Win
“Their judgment of themselves was remorseless.”
Recommended Reading: Matt Jakubowski’s short story, “Sharpening the Sickle to Shame the Scythe,” which I dare you to say out loud several times in a row.
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Tuesday New Release Day: Doctorow; Joyce; Cantor; Creeley; Urquhart; Russell; Vonnegut; Kushner
Out this week: Andrew’s Brain by E.L. Doctorow; Perfect by Rachel Joyce; A Highly Unlikely Scenario by Rachel Cantor; Selected Letters of Robert Creeley; The Visionist by Rachel Urquhart; and new paperback editions of Karen Russell's Vampires in the Lemon Grove, Kurt Vonnegut’s Letters and Year in Reading favorite Rachel Kushner’s The Flamethrowers.
Measuring Detail Density
"Every story that works gets the level of description that it needs. Which isn’t to say that the level of description needed for every successful story is the same." Tobias Carroll surveys the wide variety of detail density in fiction for Electric Literature.
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Covering Anna Karenina
We care quite a bit about book covers here at The Millions, hence our recent rounds of cover-judging. To honor the hundredth anniversary of Tolstoy's death, Flavorwire has compiled a selection of Anna Karenina's many covers, and opportunities for judgement abound.
You Too Could Be a Turnip
Those of you with more than a passing familiarity with the Brothers Grimm will know that classic fairy tales were often dark and macabre. They're considerably more frightening than the sanitized versions we read to our children today. At Salon, Maria Tatar talks to Laura Miller about her translation of The Turnip Princess, a new collection of previously undiscovered fairy tales. Sample quote: "There isn’t that strict division of gendered labor that you find in the Grimms." You could also read Kirsty Logan on the trouble with fairy tales.
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