“I can locate the remnants of two or three abandoned cars that haven’t moved in a year, a couple of defunct pay phones, several tire piles, and at least one trashed couch that doesn’t seem to be going anywhere.” Rob Walker on playing Pokémon Go in New Orleans’ Lower Ninth Ward.
Catch ‘Em All
Glad to hear they’re doing well.
Recommended Reading: “Patterns” by Kristiina Ehin, which has a better opening line than anything else you’re going to read this month, I promise.
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“Twine around each other”
Recommended Reading: “Management” by Erin McGraw.
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Artistic Solitude
"I used to run cross country in high school and it was like, I knew if I put in a certain kind of training, it was going to make me faster. If X, then Y. But with writing, it’s like, if X, if I do this thing that’s necessary, which is giving myself the space and time, then what? It’s sort of a question mark. You have no idea. You work so hard to offer yourself up to the space of the unknown." Leslie Jamison (and Angela Flournoy and Katherine Towler) on being alone and setting aside the time to write.
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Grappling with Language
“Aposiopesis: To cut short a trash-talking opponent mid-taunt by suplexing him. Can also be used in political debates.” Matt Seidel walks readers through a glossary of rhetorical wrestling terms.
First Steps
Can a book prepare you for motherhood? A reader asks this question in the Match Book column in the Times.
Beautiful and Pointless?
Does poetry still matter? At NPR, Tracy K. Smith says yes.
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The Inventor
There's a new biography of Angela Carter on shelves. Is it worth your time, even if you're not a fan? In The New York Review of Books, Alison Lurie gives the book a thorough read.
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