You’ve probably heard the internet adage, “If it exists, there is a porn of it.” Never has that been truer than in the case of the political erotica of 2016. From a particularly colorful Cruz/Rubio series: “’Who is this Hillary you’ve been texting?’ Rubio asks Cruz. ‘Saying things like ‘meet me when Marco’s not home,’ ‘I can hook you up,’ ‘what’s the price’ … don’t act all naïve right now!'”
Of Rainfall and Fluffy Bathrobes
American Gaze
“What does it look like to be the child of war? A product of war? What does it look like to be a queer child from a very traditional Confucian family? How does one feel to pay homage to a family but to also, in a way, betray those familial values?” Kaveh Akbar interviews Ocean Vuong about linguistic identity, syntax, and the American gaze for Divedapper.
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Get Shorty
Want your writing to have punch? Want your readers to believe you? "The five-word sentence as the gospel truth...Express your most powerful thought in the shortest sentence," Roy Peter Clark writes in The New York Times. Sorry that every sentence in this post is more than five words.
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I Turn My Camera On
When does photojournalism become exploitive? At Granta, a podcast examining the ethics of photojournalism.
Celebrating Beverly Cleary
With her 95th birthday approaching, Beverly Cleary gets the profile treatment in the Times. (previously at The Millions: Cleary's underappreciated memoirs)
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“Beck has published nine books since 2008”
Laurie Winer's exploration of Glenn Beck's literary career is sure to raise some eyebrows.
In the Ring with Norman Mailer
Is there a better way to honor Norman Mailer than by throwing a few punches? Nate Freeman was bored at the book party for J. Michael Lennon's new biography, Norman Mailer: A Double Life, so he got into a drunken fist fight in Mailer's apartment. We bet Mailer would approve.
“To me, Godspeed is more than just a band, it’s an idea.”
Canadian post-rock outfit Godspeed You! Black Emperor will soon release their fourth studio album, 'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend!, and it’s definitely worth checking out. You can stream the record over here. The band was also recently interviewed for The Guardian, too, and this entire post should keep you occupied for a while.
Capital G
"Good TV is not merely good TV (i.e. better-than-average TV), but TV that is so good it deserves to be taken as seriously as great films and even great Literature (yes, with a capital 'L'). As such, watching Good TV and discussing Good TV are qualitatively different than watching and talking about other kinds of TV. The emergence of Good TV is a rather big deal in the recent history of American culture. It may well be one of the top two or three cultural developments of this still-young century." Todd Hasak-Lowy dissects the TV revolution. (Pair with: our own Michael Bourne on the new age of cable and Broadway.) (h/t The Rumpus)