Miguel de Cervantes died and was buried 399 years ago, and apparently no one thought to mark his grave. But the Guardian has reported that after two years of searching a team of archaeologists have found and positively identified the Don Quixote author’s body, and there are plans to open his crypt to the public next year in honor of the 400th anniversary of his death.
Cervantes Found
Get Your Poetry On
Danielle Pafunda celebrates her daylong reign over the Academy of American Poets’ Twitter feed with a cento contest: She tweets the lines, you compose the poem, and three winners take home a selection of signed books written by these contest judges.
A 2BR/2BA of your Own
Broke New York writers - by which we mean, New York writers - take note: the city's Department of Housing is allotting a small number of $1,022 two-bedroom apartments to working artists through a convenient online application. (If that's too rich for your blood, though, we've also noted previously that Write a House is giving away free houses to writers in Detroit.)
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Mixer Publishing Contest
"Mixer publishing, with guest editor Paul Tremblay (author of Swallowing A Donkey's Eye), is offering a $1,200 honorarium for the best speculative/sci-fi story, graphic narrative (comic), or poem." The contest deadline is June 30th.
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Hanging On
After visiting more than 2,000 of America’s independent bookstores, Kate Brittain found herself thinking their demise might not be so inevitable. The cards, she writes, remain stacked against them, but they nonetheless offer a few things that may well keep them in demand. Pair with: our tribute to e-book pioneer Michael Hartt.
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A Note from the Author
It was probably inevitable that Rap Genius would spawn Poetry Genius, but it was not so inevitable that Junot Díaz would make an appearance on the latter. On Saturday, Díaz annotated a number of passages from his own The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, including a footnote where he says he went “buckwild.”
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Reviewing Reviews
Our own Emily St. John Mandel guest judged Electric Literature's Critical Hit Awards this month. She discussed what she looks for in a book review in an interview with Brian Hurley. "I prefer reviews that go beyond talking about literature, so that the book under review is considered in the context of the surrounding world," she said. The winners are Andrew Winer's review of The Kraus Project by Jonathan Franzen, Rachel Monroe's review of The Contested Murder of Latasha Harlins by Brenda Stevenson, and our own review of Karen Green's Bough Down by Suzanne Scanlon.
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