Titles are hard, guys. Over at The Daily Beast, Ruth Bernard Yeazell tries to figure out why so often famous paintings have titles that don’t seem to match up with the work at all. Here are four (4) other pieces on titles — I told you, titles are hard.
What Should I Title This?
Qiu Miaojin’s Survival Guide
Qiu Miaojin was a Taiwanese novelist and lesbian activist, and her short life has had a profound impact on queer literature since her suicide in 1995. Recently Bonnie Huie received a PEN translation grant so she could bring Miaojin’s best-known work, Notes of a Crocodile, to an English-speaking audience. You can read an excerpt of Huie’s translation on the Asian American Writers’ Workshop online publishing platform, The Margins.
●
●
How Patrick Bateman Stole Christmas
"Have you guessed who I am? Sometimes I think you have." Is this Dr. Seuss or Bret Easton Ellis? The Awl has a quiz to see whether you can differentiate between sociopaths and the Cat in the Hat.
Proof that Obama is a Socialist
At long last...Google provides proof that Obama is a socialist! "Barrack" Obama, that is.
●
●
Smuggling Ulysses
Ulysses: The one book that publishers (and Joyce himself) desperately wanted to be confiscated - all in an effort to confront censorship, of course. Mental Floss has the full story.
A Debut
Maaza Mengiste, an old school chum, gets high praise from Claire Messud for her debut, the "extraordinary novel" Beneath the Lion's Gaze.
●
●
The Duty of Storytelling
“I don’t try to deliver a message, teach, inform or ‘give back’ in my books. I simply want to tell a story. My writing is totally separated from my activism and social service, which are channeled through my Foundation.” Megan Bradshaw interviews Isabel Allende for Asymptote Journal.
●
●