It’s easy to find essays targeted at writers that argue that rejection isn’t really that bad. In her new book, How to Not Write, Lisa Carver takes the argument a step further, as she says that not only does rejection not hurt you, it “frees you” and “facilitates action.” At The Rumpus, an excerpt from the book.
Not for Us
Much Better Than Downton Abbey, I Promise.
When you woke up this morning, did you say to yourself, “I wish I could listen to a bunch of lectures from the University of Texas’ British Studies curriculum?” If so, you’re in luck.
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‘Sweetbitter’ Comes to TV
Stephanie Danler’s best-selling, semi-autobiographical novel, Sweetbitter, has been given the green light by Starz network for a six-episode series. “As she learns the ropes of restaurant work, [Tess] falls for bad-boy bartender Jake, and makes her first forays into wine, drugs, lust, betrayal and adulthood,” writes the Los Angeles Times. Pair with Jason Arthur‘s essay on novels about work.
Julian Assange Opens for M.I.A.
Now this is one of the strangest things to happen at a concert in a while: M.I.A. kicked off her tour to promote her new album Matangi by getting Julian Assange to open for her at Terminal 5. The Wikileaks founder spoke to the audience via Skype.
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Finding Adventure
“I had seen enough movies to know that when a knife is tossed by the hero to someone in need, it lands exactly where it should. So I picked up the knife, and I centered myself. ‘Be the hero,’ I whispered.” Caroline Paul’s The Gutsy Girl: Escapades for Your Life of Epic Adventure, “part memoir, part manifesto, part aspirational workbook,” encourages everyone to add a little more adventure to their lives. Angela Qian writes about the adventure of learning to read in another language.
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Margaret Atwood Talks Twitter
“Time goes all stretchy in the Twittersphere, just as it does in those folk songs in which the hero spends a night with the queen of the faeries and then returns to find that 100 years have passed and all his friends are dead…” Margaret Atwood talks Twitter with Robert McCrum.
Good/Bad Franzen
Get to know the ins and outs of bookstore reading etiquette with this helpful guide (featuring none other than Jonathan Franzen) illustrated by Kate Gavino. Gavino, whose book Last Night’s Reading: Illustrated Encounters with Extraordinary Authors is out now, got her start with a wildly successful Tumblr account.