“The day you follow me to that mound of oyster shells on the beach is the day I realize muscle and bone have been at war for a long, long time.” The Saturday Rumpus essay by Ashley Inguanta is tender and poetic. Some past iterations are also well-worth a revisit.
That Used To Be You
Hair Trafficking and Russiandating.ru at Triple Canopy
Triple Canopy unveils a redesign with its tenth issue, which includes an essay tracing the global hair trade from Peru to Borough Park and Sam Frank riffing on Andrei Platonov in a twenty-first century epistolary romance.
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Is There Life on Pallas?
John Brunner’s Stand on Zanzibar isn’t the only vintage science fiction novel making waves this week. Andrew Joron takes a look at “German fantasist” Paul Scheerbart’s Lesabéndio – a 1913 novel that was recently reissued by the folks at Wakefield Press.
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The Old Town
“What knits together the families of Roth’s Newark are adults—some foreign-born but many the children of immigrants—who either experienced the insecurity and deprivation of the Old World themselves or heard stories about it from their own parents. What they want most is to find stability in a neighborhood, in a city, and in a country that offers them the chance at security for their families.” On Philip Roth and Newark, NJ.
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In Defense of Unread Books
According to Karen Hopkin, a house full of books—whether they're read or not—enhances intellectual capacity and literary habits.
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Steal This Record
Elvis Costello is calling the hefty price tag on his new box set “either a misprint or a satire” and advising fans to buy a Louis Armstrong box set or to wait until the discs included in his own box set are availble at a cheaper price “assuming that you have not already obtained them by more unconventional means.”
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Blocked
“Trump has blocked me from reading his tweets. I may have to kill myself.” Stephen King responds to news that the U.S. President doesn’t want the author reading his Twitter account. Luckily, reports Entertainment Weekly, J.K. Rowling has stepped in, offering to DM King anything he misses (these are all sentences we regret having to write, fyi). See also: Elizabeth Minkel‘s consideration of Rowling’s second narrative thoughts.
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