Recommended Reading: This piece by Adelle Waldman at The New Yorker on loving and loathing Samuel Richardson, “the man who made the modern novel.”
Clarissa Explains It All
“This annoying world”
We’ve grappled before with the dark world of Kindle self-publishing. We even published a cautionary tale of trying to live off Kindle erotica. In The Guardian, a look at the worst book covers of the Kindlesphere, all of which appear on an excellent Tumblr.
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“Gallop[ing] terribly”
We’re nearing the halfway point in football season (have you done your reading?), so that means it’s time to revisit one of the finest poems ever written about the game: James Wright’s “Autumn Begins in Martins Ferry, Ohio.”
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RIP Doris Lessing
Nobel laureate Doris Lessing passed away last night at the age of 94. The author of The Grass is Singing, The Fifth Child and The Golden Notebook took home the Nobel in 2007 for "subjecting a divided civilisation to scrutiny," in the words of the prize committee.
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“Author Loses Leg in Lagoon”
Writing the London Review of Books' "Diary" this week, South African scholar and political activist R.W. Johnson: "Author Loses Leg in Lagoon."
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A Little Bit Groupon
Last week, I relayed the news that The Circle, the upcoming novel by Dave Eggers, casts its eye on the cultish workings of a Google-esque company in California. But how Google-esque will the company be, exactly? Nick Clark takes a look at the evidence.
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Did You Hear That?
Grab your tinfoil caps, everyone. Ben Granger at 3:AM Magazine has published a new piece on Umberto Eco, Dan Brown, and conspiracy literature.
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Greater and Greater
The passing of Muhammad Ali was sad for fans of both sports and greatness alike. One little known Ali fact is that he once composed a line-for-line sonnet with another one of "the greatest," the poet Marianne Moore. Let none other than George Plimpton explain it to you.
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