Recommended Reading: Katy Simpson Smith on who can fictionalize slavery and writing across time and race. Our own Edan Lepucki writes on reading slavery in fiction.
Writing and Reading Race
Tuesday New Release Day
New releases this week include the much-hyped The Autobiography of Mark Twain, Volume I. Also out in nonfiction is President Obama’s picture book Of Thee I Sing: A Letter to My Daughters, Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand (author of Seabiscuit), as reviewed by the New York Times, Siddhartha Mukherjee’s The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer, and, for hip-hop fans, Jay-Z’s memoir Decoded.
In Which Samuel Beckett Didn’t Intend To Be A Writer
“He was a great exploiter.” From This Recording, Samuel Beckett’s recollections of James Joyce, in his own words.
Portrait Book Documentary
Years ago, we wrote about La Porte, Indiana, a nifty book with a connection to Found Magazine chronicling a cache of found photographs from a small town. Now the book is being made into a documentary.
“To do so, I felt, would be too dangerous”
Over at Electric Literature, Tara Isabella Burton likens the experience of reading her ex’s favorite book – in this case Stefan Zweig’s Beware of Pity – to “rifling through someone’s letters after a death.”
●
●
The Rogue Sarah Palin
Joe McGinniss delves into the cultural phenomenon of Sarah Palin with his new book The Rogue: Searching for the Real Sarah Palin.