Recommended Reading: Helen Vendler on John Berryman. You could also read Stephen Akey on Berryman’s collection The Dream Songs.
Tragicomic
Seeking an End to eBook DRM
Joe Wikert explains why the book industry needs to learn from the music industry, drop DRM, and adopt a unified ebook format.
A Good Character Is Hard To Find
I've told you about The Atlantic's By Heart series plenty of times before. This week brings us novelist Paul Lisicky taking a close look at how Flannery O'Connor's "flawed" characters are the ones we find ourselves drawn to most.
●
●
Hari Kunzru Reads Tonight
Tonight at 7pm, Hari Kunzru will visit WORD bookstore at 126 Franklin Street, Brooklyn, NY for an event co-hosted by The Millions. Visit the WORD website for further details and RSVP. Join us!
●
●
Margalit Fox Talks Obituaries
Max Linsky interviewed Riddle of the Labyrinth author Margalit Fox about the other career she’s had for eight years: obituary writing. Fox remarks on how obituaries have grown from being “the bastard stepchild of American journalism” into “the best gig” in the entire industry. Here’s one of my favorite Fox obituaries, by the way.
Amtrak Residency, First Class
The 24 writers selected to be part of the first Amtrak Residency Program have been announced. For more about the residency check out our past coverage of the program and our own Nick Ripatrazone's essay on reading and writing on trains.
●
●
New Contest from Kirkus Reviews
To celebrate the 80th birthday of Kirkus Reviews, the editorial staff is holding a contest in which the grand prize winner gets a literary tour of New York City. This includes “two round-trip tickets to Manhattan, two nights’ stay at the Library Hotel, two passes to the Greenwich Village Literary Pub Crawl, gift certificates to several of the city’s finest independent bookstores, breakfast at a round table at the Algonquin Hotel, and dinner at Public in SoHo.”
●
●