Recommended Reading: Becca Rothfeld on courtship and gender roles in Murasaki Shikibu’s The Tale of Genji, a classic work of Japanese literature written at the turn of the eleventh century.
Legendary Lovers
Poet Laureate (Again)
"Her exchanges with Americans in small towns and rural communities are inspiring an appreciation of poetry and history – and remind us that poetry has value for all of our lives." The Library of Congress appointed Tracy K. Smith to a second term as the 22nd Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry for 2018-2019. For her second term, Smith edited an anthology called American Journal: Fifty Poems for Our Time, which will be published by Graywolf Press in association with the Library of Congress. Pair with: our review of Smith's memoir, Ordinary Light.
Whatever I choose is cool because I am cool.
The Rumpus has an interview up with Ann Friedman, executive editor at GOOD, and curator of the beloved tumblogs Lady Journos and #realtalk From Your Editor.
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Remembering Marinetti
The Smithsonian has a good reminder about the links between design and history, about how time can seemingly erode the politics behind an aesthetic movement, about the relationships between images and texts, about how Italian futurism may still look cool but came from a group of sexist and at least partially fascist men.
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While a Fox Was Brown
This interactive guide to the demise (or, rather, the rise) of the passive voice by Vijith Assar at McSweeney’s is every bit as fascinating as it is troubling. This notable piece from The Millions by Fiona Maazel should act as a nice grammatical complement.
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All Toured Out
There are book tours and then there are book tours. You either get the full-scale, all-expenses-paid treatment from your publisher, or else you get a request to plan it all and pay for it all yourself. In the weeks after his latest novel came out, our own Bill Morris set off on a DIY tour -- all driving, no flying -- about which he’s been writing dispatches for The Daily Beast. This week, he thinks about the changing nature of book promotion, recounts his nights in dumpy motels and compares his experience to that of our own Edan Lepucki. (FYI, they talked about writing their novels in a Millions piece.)
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