There used to be 32 letters in the English alphabet, but that seems quaint when you consider the fact that iPhone users have access to 1,767 unique emoji. Then again, as Gretchen McCulloch explains, emoji aren’t exactly a dire threat to the written word.
Now I know my þ, ƿ, œs
LOLerature
“Iz in ur Goolag/Havin a sad.” LOLerature is the LOLCats for the literary set. Some of the references are pretty obscure, too. The internet is now complete.
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Always and Everywhere
“After silence that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.” You’ve seen the quote on Pinterest and Tumblr, so why not dig a little deeper into Aldous Huxley’s ideas about the transcendent capabilities of music?
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No Whining Allowed
Elissa Schappell thinks writers need to stop whining. “Writers seem to think that by virtue of intellect or sensitivity that we suffer more than others, that the work we do is more necessary than other work. This idea is not only ridiculous, it’s shameful,” she wrote after 2paragraphs asked her “What Do You Like Least About Being A Writer?” Pair with: our interview with her earlier this year.
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LMAOR
Andy Borowitz (of The Borowitz Report) picks five novels “that are enough to make anyone laugh.”
Fictitious Abstractions
Recommended Reading: On educating teenagers’ emotions through literature.
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From Under a Heavy Plinth
“The story that Lee’s book tells (or tries to tell, because much evidence has been obscured or lost) is not about patience on a monument but about talent buried under a heavy plinth, and discovered only just in time—the late achievement less a measured distillation than a lifesaving decoction.” James Wood reviews Hermione Lee‘s new biography of novelist Penelope Fitzgerald for The New Yorker. Pair with Niamh Ni Mhaoileoin‘s Millions essay on the new age of biography.
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Clickbait Lit
Hanging On
After visiting more than 2,000 of America’s independent bookstores, Kate Brittain found herself thinking their demise might not be so inevitable. The cards, she writes, remain stacked against them, but they nonetheless offer a few things that may well keep them in demand. Pair with: our tribute to e-book pioneer Michael Hartt.