“The problem is that young children have terrible taste and enjoy garbage. Another problem, which compounds the first problem, is that they want to hear the same books hundreds of times in a row. So for all the joys that storytime can offer, it frequently entails a kind of dismal self-abnegation that’s too excruciating even to describe as tedium—an actively painful sense of my precious time on earth being torn from my chest and tossed into a furnace.” Gabriel Roth writes about the terrible Poky Little Puppy for Slate, and his complaints pair well with Jacob Lambert‘s Millions series, “Are Picture Books Leading Our Children Astray?” and “Again, I Ask…“
The Problem with the Poky Little Puppy
Meet Your Professors
You’ve probably met them all: the three kinds of English professors, as defined by McSweeney’s. Our own Nick Ripatrazone writes about the fictional lives of high school teachers.
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Fin
Picture books have always been a good way to teach your children difficult concepts. They cover everything from bodily functions to the makeup of modern families. At Slate, Gabriel Roth writes about a picture book that taught his child about death. You could also read T.K. Dalton on teaching your children about gender.
Dido’s Lament
Listen to Tessa Hadley read her story “Dido’s Lament” from the August 8th and 15th issue of The New Yorker. If you’re looking for the Aeneid, we recently had Virgil day here at The Millions.
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Bourdain & Books
As we mourn the loss of Anthony Bourdain, the Los Angeles Times remembers his impact on the literary world and the ways in which the literary establishment wanted him to ‘shape up’. A well-read chef and writer, Bourdain’s most well-known book was Kitchen Confidential. Pair with this essay on food writing.
Reclaiming the Allegory
Recommended Reading: On the literary tradition of the allegory and what it means for modern storytelling. Staff writer emeritus Emily Colette Wilkinson writes on The Dark Knight as political allegory.
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Sudoku Comics
Sudoku getting too easy, you say? Try making (or, rather, writing) one instead, like this nine-paneled comic that works across, down, or on a diagonal.