Three cheers for Jim Crace, who just took home the 20th annual IMPAC Dublin Literary Award! If you remember our coverage of the shortlist, you’ll know that the Harvest author beat out TransAtlantic author Colum McCann and Americanah author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, among others.
Jim Crace Takes Home the IMPAC Award
Know Your Book Covers
Think you know your Arthur Conan Doyle from your Agatha Christie? This week, The Guardian quizzes you on the book covers of classic crime novels. In case you missed it, previous weeks featured science fiction and literary classics.
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It Was Nothing, Really
W.H. Auden lived a secret life, not as a man with a second family or an illicit habit but as, weirdly enough, a genuinely kind human being. He paid for a friend’s costly operation and camped outside the apartment of a woman who suffered from night terrors until she felt safe enough to sleep on her own again. So why did the poet want to hide his good deeds? He claimed he didn’t want to be admired for basic decency.
Copyeditors Required
“On Thursday, an uncorrected proof of her debut novel, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, with the writer’s name was misspelled as “JA Rowling”, became the muddled copy to fetch four figures at auction.” The Guardian presents a survey of famous literary typos and malapropisms. See also our own Edan Lepucki‘s interview with her beloved copyeditor Susan Bradanini Betz.
Guernica Interviews Gore Vidal
Guernica has a previously unpublished interview with Gore Vidal, who died recently at the age of 86.
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Whose Hasn’t?
Sergey Stefanovich’s “The Library” takes viewers through Duncan Fallowell’s library “which has spilled over into every available space and become an art installation in its own right.”
Stories in Space
Recommended Reading: On new posters from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and space travel’s place in storytelling. Dominic Smith asks why there aren’t more stories in space.
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