Literary Links

A Twist of the Kaleidoscope: Three cases for literary criticism

If, like me, you review books on your blog, you’re a literary critic. In this article Kasia Bartoszyńska discusses three books about literary criticism to answer the following questions:

Has academia ruined literary criticism? Is this the end of literary studies? Has contemporary culture reduced authors to mere influencers building their brand? Or is the discussion of literature nothing but a flimsy pretext used by university professors seeking to promote their political beliefs? Do young people even read books anymore?

How AI is affecting the way kids learn to read and write

USA Today reports on a recent survey suggesting that 40% of the nation’s English teachers have used AI in their classrooms: “The increase in AI and technological advances in U.S. classrooms has challenged English teachers to adapt their reading lessons and writing assignments.” 

Reject the Linguistic Coup: Speak Up for Trans People

“The Trump administration is trying to shape public perception on transness by manipulating language and symbols—don’t let it.”

The Nation presents one example of how the current government in the U.S. is manipulating language for their own purposes. It’s important for the American public to understand how this process works.

Double Vision and Full Dissolution

Los Angeles Review of Books discusses the writing career of Andrea Barrett, for whom “scientific exploration offers an overarching metaphor for the quest to understand the cosmos and humanity’s place in it.”

The Brain Science of Elusive ‘Aha! Moments’

Scientific American undertakes an explanation of “Aha! Moments,” those sudden bursts of insight that “can be portals to a scientific breakthrough, an innovative business proposal, a hit song or the plot of a best-selling novel. Or they may provide a life-changing perspective on a personal dilemma.” 

Why don’t you remember all your dreams?

“Whether you recall them or not, you likely dream nightly.”

How and why we dream are questions that have fascinated people for millennia. This article from Popular Science examines some of the latest thinking about why dreams are so hard to remember.

On Being Mentored by a Chinese Woman Writer Who Lived a Thousand Years Ago

“Wendy Chen Considers What Translating Li Qingzhao Taught Her About Her Own Work”

Chen provides insight into how the life of a women writer of long ago and how the process of translation influenced her own writing life:

As I highlight in my introduction to The Magpie at Night, a collection of my translations of her poetry, Li Qingzhao earned fame for her poetry when she was still a teenager, married for love, assembled a vast collection of art and antiquities, had to flee her home due to war, divorced an abusive second husband, and was even imprisoned for a short time. What I didn’t know, when I first started translating her in college, was that her poetry would take me on a decade-long journey and redefine my own voice as a writer.

How Women Are Upending the Action Thriller

“A new trend in fiction, film and TV seems to be emerging where women are placed at the centre of traditionally male action thrillers,” writes Gillian McAllister, author, most recently, of Famous Last Words. “ The typical narrative – of women being captured and killed by men – is upended.”

A Writer Whose Novels Explored the Edges of Normalcy

“Misdiagnosed with schizophrenia and institutionalized for years, Janet Frame was drawn to the inner worlds of people conventionally treated as inside-less.”

I hadn’t heard of New Zealand author Janet Frame (1924-2004) until I read this profile by Audrey Wollen in The New Yorker. Frame was hospitalized after a suicide attempt in her early twenties. While still hospitalized, she published her first book of fiction, The Lagoon and Other Stories, in 1951; the book won a prestigious New Zealand literary prize. Frame was designated to undergo a lobotomy, but a doctor read about the prize in the paper and canceled the surgery a few days before it was scheduled to take place. She continued to write about characters experiencing unrelenting misery because of “their inability to connect or communicate . . . in a world committed to conformity; the silent parts of themselves enclose and protect.” 

© 2025 by Mary Daniels Brown