The world isn’t exactly wanting for character studies of Captain Ahab, but Chris Power manages to come up with a novel analysis of the character in this essay about the Moby-Dick antagonist. In Power’s telling, Ahab was valuable in part for what he told us about the 20th century — namely, he foreshadowed the dictators and despots to come. You could also read Hester Blum’s contribution to this essay about the best American novels.
Proto-Stalin
Say That Again?
Duncan Murrell has a new essay up on the Harper’s Magazine blog about how difficult it is for journalists to speak to their sources through interpreters. “I became concerned that my interpreters were not delivering my words in the way I delivered them and in precisely the way I meant them,” he writes.
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Why A New Madame Bovary?
Lydia Davis, whose new translation of Madame Bovary comes out September 23, blogs at The Paris Review Daily about why we need yet another translation of Flaubert.
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The Southern Review’s New Digs
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Comic Macbeth
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Splendid, Vibrant
Recommended Reading: Tolu Ogunlesi on how “Nigeria’s literary scene has burgeoned into this splendid, vibrant space.”
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