Medium announced that several online magazines will be migrating over to the Medium publishing platform. The list includes Electric Literature, The Awl, Pacific Standard, The Hairpin, Time Inc.’s Money and Fortune, and others.
Digital Publications Unite
So do we drop the ‘Y’ in YBA now?
Gearing up for his forthcoming retrospective at the Tate Modern, Damien Hirst told the Guardian that he “still believe[s] art is more powerful than money.” This from the man whose tiger shark and formaldehyde sculpture “The Physical Impossibility of Death in the Mind of Someone Living” sold for $12 million– the figure that Don Thompson reports in The $12 Million Stuffed Shark.
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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.
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Poor Gatsby
The Great Gatsby debuted in 1925 to poor sales and mediocre reviews. So how did it become one of the most famous novels in America? At Slate, Cristina Hartmann explains how Fitzgerald’s opus, which netted the author royalties worth a grand total of $13 in his lifetime, went on to become a classic. Related: our own Bill Morris on a book about the novel by Sarah Churchwell. (h/t The Paris Review Daily)
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52 Years Since Lolita
52 years since Lolita: The Reader’s Almanac recounts the many publishers who turned down Nabokov’s masterpiece in 1953. From one rejection letter: “I recommend that it be buried under a stone for a thousand years.” (via @ElectricLit)
Something Is Off
“Music and Memory” Playlists
Granta asks past contributors for short playlists of songs on the theme of memory. Last week features selections by Aimee Bender, Isobel Dixon, and Adam Mars-Jones; weeks past include playlists from Jeffrey Eugenides, Lorrie Moore, and Wells Tower.
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Timekeepers
Need some more Jeanette Winterson in your life? The New Statesman is here with a short story. Titled “Gnomon,” it centers on a medieval blacksmith, Stephen, who’s asked to create his town’s first mechanical clock. Sample quote: “Time is irregular. One hour is not the same length as another.”
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