Recommended Reading: Year in Reading alumna Elissa Schappell interviews Elena Ferrante about feminism, friendship, and her latest Neapolitan novel. Pair with Cora Currier’s essay on reading Italy through Ferrante’s books.
Goodbye to Naples
Je Ne Sais Quoi
In her controversial book The Fall of Language in the Age of English, Minae Mizumura argues that English, thanks largely to its global predominance, threatens to lessen the diversity of expression in the world. At Bookslut, she tells interviewer Corinna Pichl about her book, her issues with lingua francas and things you can say in Japanese that you can’t say in English.
Jeremy McCarter on James Baldwin’s New Anthology
At Newsweek, Jeremy McCarter reviews The Cross of Redemption, a new anthology of James Baldwin’s previously uncollected essays and public letters: “At a time when serious people claim we live in a ‘post-racial’ society, the reappearance of Baldwin’s writing—insistent, accusatory, outraged—feels like a terrible family secret coming to light in an Ibsen play, or Banquo’s ghost showing up to spoil the party.”
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New from Ann Beattie
In the Fall 2015 issue of VQR, check out new fiction from Ann Beattie. You could also read our recent interview with the author.
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Trailer for Packing for Mars by Mary Roach
Part 10: Space Hygiene: “Unfortunately, removing the helmet created a situation where the body odors were forced out of the neck of the pressure suit…” Check out this funny and artful trailer for Packing for Mars by Mary Roach.
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Tuesday New Release Day: DeLillo, Tulli, Ozick, Martin
Don DeLillo’s first short story collection, The Angel Esmerelda, is out this week, as is Magdalena Tulli’s genre-defying In Red. New in paperback are Cynthia Ozick’s Foreign Bodies and Steve Martin’s An Object of Beauty.
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Liberty is the air we breathe
The text of Salman Rushdie’s PEN World Voices lecture on liberty and censorship has been published on the New Yorker‘s website.