Over at The Point, Spencer McAvoy writes about the language and vision of Joy Williams, a writer who “instead of drawing boundaries between us and whatever Other, posits language as an experience of self-limitedness.” Williams’s new collection of short stories, The Visiting Privilege, is one of the most anticipated books of 2015.
On the Limitations of Language
Not Really a Good Person
"I wasn’t exactly feeling this. Still, I did try to rationalize what I was doing: maybe being altruistic and selfish at the same time was actually a good way to live, making sure sacrifice doesn’t go too far?" A psalm for a selfish hospice volunteer from Andy Mozina over at Electric Literature.
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Just Like in the Movies
Belle and Sebastian’s Stevie Jackson, better known (at least to this writer) as the Sultan of Twee, sits down with Rick Moody as part of the Swinging Modern Sounds feature over at The Rumpus. Among other things, Jackson says that he thinks the John Lennon album Sometime in New York City is a “total masterpiece” and says that at one point in his life he could recite the book Trainspotting.
What the World Eats
Peter Menzel and Faith D’Aluisio photographed 30 families in 24 countries, each time surrounding their subjects with their weekly food purchases. Their work was collected in their What the World Eats photo album, but you can take a look at some of their pictures over here.
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“The conspirators sit smoking thoughtfully”
Recommended Reading: “The Colonel’s Daughter,” new fiction from Noir author Robert Coover.
Maybe Now You Can Understand It.
Artist John Vernon Lord drew inspiration from Irish literature’s “books of the dark” to adapt James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake into a series of illustrated images. Over at The Guardian, Lord discusses how he developed some of his pages.
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