Congratulations You Failed
The World Cup of Tabs
You’re probably up to your neck in World Cup coverage, but here are some gems well worth your attention no matter what: Teju Cole created a “Copa do Mundo do Brasil” playlist to set the mood; Pablo Torre’s one-sentence-long summation of Day One in São Paulo; an excerpt from Aleksandar Hemon’s The Matters of Life, Death, and More: Writing on Soccer; The New Republic’s round-up of “eleven writers and intellectuals on the World Cup’s most compelling characters“; and, of course, Shaj Mathew’s recent Millions review of Brazil’s Dance with the Devil.
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His Gift for Matching Books to Reviewers Was Uncanny
“He was surely the greatest literary editor there has ever been – brilliant, autocratic, endlessly curious and possessed of an extraordinary fund of knowledge about a vast range of subjects. True, he was not always easy to deal with, but when has the best ever been easy?” John Banville on the late Robert Silvers.
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Live Like Philip Roth, Literally
Philip Roth's New York City apartment is now for sale, and with its choice location and its floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, we doubt it will be available for very long.
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HMH Broke
With debts and liabilities in excess of $1 billion, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has officially filed for bankruptcy.
RIP Mike Wallace
60 Minutes pioneer Mike Wallace passed away this morning at the age of 93. At CBS’s website, colleague Morley Safer remembers his friend.
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Bookstore MFA
“There’s something about shopping for books where you’re open for anything. You’re faced with a wall of books, and you don’t know anything about most of them. At some point, it’s just you and the poems.” Carl Adamshick talks with the Los Angeles Review of Books about Powell’s and the “bookstore MFA.” Pair with our own Janet Potter‘s essay on loving bookshops.
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