How Kurt Vonnegut Predicted the Automation Crisis Player Piano may have been written 67 years ago, but its prescience is uncanny — though not inexplicable. It is a product not only of Vonnegut’s extraordinary imagination, but his years of experience working directly with engineers, whose mentality the novel reflects in reaching its logical conclusion. Getting […]
GOODREADS HACKS: GET A DNF SHELF, MARK REREADS, AND MORE If you find it hard to keep up with all the cool kids who use Goodreads to track their reading, this article will put you in the know about some of the more esoteric aspects. The main subject here is how to create a DNF
Why we need to stop forcing ourselves to finish books we hate When I was younger, I felt that I had to finish every book I started. But some time around my 40th birthday I realized that I had probably completed about half my life and no longer had the luxury of time to waste
Richard Russo: On the Moral Power of Regret One of the most memorable novels I’ve ever read is Richard Russo’s Empire Falls (2001). When I came across this essay by Russo, I knew I had to stop and take the time to settle in with it. I hope you learn from it as much as
I came across so many interesting articles this week that it’s hard to limit my list. Here are some of my favorites. On the Centennial of Iris Murdoch’s Birth, Remembering a 20th-Century Giant The intensity of Murdoch’s gaze, boring into you from the dust jackets of her many novels, seemed a promise of the books’
These are some of the literature-related articles from around the web that caught my eye over the past week. Quartzy HALF OF ALL TRANSLATED BOOKS IN THE US COME FROM JUST NINE COUNTRIES This one caught my eye because I’m trying to read more books translated from other languages this year. The good news:
“She took things too seriously. She was difficult and unyielding. That’s why Susan Sontag’s work matters so much even now.” This is how I see her monstrosity: residing not in whether she was or was not likeable, but in her relentlessness, and her refusal to pander. The word ‘monster’ comes from the Latin monere, to
Quotation: Susan Sontag Was a Monster Read More »
Preparing the annual list of people from the writing whom we lost over the year is the least favorite of my year-end blogging tasks. Rereading the list always painfully takes my breath away. Ursula K. Le Guin, 1/22 Barbara Wersba, 2/18 Lisa Garcia Quiroz, 3/16 Philip Kerr, 3/23 Anita Shreve, 3/29 Drue Heinz, 3/30 Sergio
Remembering Those We Lost in 2018 Read More »
Source: World’s Highest-Paid Authors 2018: Michael Wolff Joins List Thanks To ‘Fire And Fury’ Since I have no specific category for this story, it will have to stand here on its own. Can you guess who is #1 on the list?
World’s Highest-Paid Authors 2018: Michael Wolff Joins List Thanks To ‘Fire And Fury’ Read More »
The History and Future of the Western in 10 Books Part immigrant story, part adventure tale, and part allegory of truth and justice—the Western has been entertaining American readers for nearly two hundred years. Maybe we’re drawn to the setting: a frontier where mountains claw at the sunset and calamity is just around the corner.
