“For American readers, literary evocations of Korea have come, for the most part, in the form of dystopian novels written by people without any direct connection to the country.” Ed Park on reading Dalkey Archive Press’s series Library of Korean Literature, launched in collaboration with the Literature Translation Institute of Korea.
Dispatch from Korea
Yugolysses
The “Yugoslavian Ulysses,” (not actually titled Yugolysses) has been newly translated into English, and gets a thoughtful but mixed review in TNR.
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Tuesday New Release Day: Desai, James, Gordon-Levitt, Beach, Mueller
New this week are Anita Desai’s The Artist of Disappearance and P.D. James’ Pride and Prejudice sequel Death Comes to Pemberly. Joseph Gordon-Levitt hangs up his acting duds to put out The Tiny Book of Tiny Stories: Volume 1, and, speaking of tiny stories, there’s Lou Beach’s 420 Characters: “these crystalline miniature stories began as Facebook status updates.” On the nonfiction side, there’s Extra Virginity: The Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil by Tom Mueller.
Sound-Word Index: Say What You Really Feel
Emoticons are unbelievably passé, right? And GIFs are just too much work, right? It’s time to better utilize our technological advancements. Behold The Sound-Word Index, a project by Blanche de Lasa, Stina Gromark, and James Godwin that can use “sound, volume and rhythm” to “help to translate our emotions hidden behind our screens.”
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Writerly Advice
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Edan Lepucki Interviews the NBA Finalists
Our own Edan Lepucki (who has a novel coming out soon, by the way…) interviewed four of the finalists for this year’s National Book Awards: Tenth of December author George Saunders, The Lowland author Jhumpa Lahiri, The Good Lord Bird author James McBride, and The Flamethrowers author Rachel Kushner. We reviewed both Saunders and Kushner’s works here and here, respectively, and you can also take a look at the rest of the NBA finalists over here.
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