“First of all, writing is a way to find community with others, to discover whether you share judgment with them. Secondly, literary-critical debates are efforts to express what someone in a culture sees as urgent and important. Interpretation (or what I understand as simply “reading”) is where a culture comes to consciousness of itself. . […]
Quotation: Writing About Literature Read More »
Looking over some blogging resources recently reminded me that the first question would-be bloggers are encouraged to consider is why they blog. But as soon as I started to dismiss this directive as so obvious as to not merit consideration, I realized that, although I’ve certainly answered this question in my own mind, I’ve never
Students Protest Book Bans in Pennsylvania School District Last week’s Literary Links included an article about censorship in a Pennsylvania school. Here’s a follow-up: “students have spoken up, demanding that materials by Black and Brown authors be reinstated in the classroom.” Becoming the Thing That Haunts the House: Gothic Fiction and the Fear of Change
The Man Behind the Myth: Should We Question the Hero’s Journey? Sarah E. Bond and Joel Christensen dispute Joseph Campbell’s well-known theory “which proposed the existence of a singular ‘hero’s journey’ (also known as the Monomyth), as experienced by ancient heroes such as Odysseus in Homer’s Odyssey.” How Extortion Scams and Review Bombing Trolls Turned
Censorship on the Rise Worldwide A report from Publishers Weekly: “Since the start of the Covid pandemic, there’s been a rise in instances of government censorship of books around the world.” 3 Things to Know About the Ending of a Story I see a lot of discussion in literature-related posts about fictional introductions, but not
11 Translated Books by Asian Women Writers to Read This #WITMonth More suggestions in honor of Women in Translation Month. The Buffoonery of White Supremacy Trying to Disguise Itself as Literature “Tracing the history of white supremacy storytelling back to William Faulkner” Taking note of the items worn by the insurrectionists at the U.S. Capital
On the Books: How to Keep Track of New Releases I have a list of every book that I’ve read since July 1991. I started keeping it on my very first computer, an IBM PCjr. Over the years I’ve managed to maintain the list through several computer and computer program changes, including the biggest computer
Authors say Texas state museum canceled book event examining slavery’s role in Battle of the Alamo This HAS to be the week’s lead story. A promotional event for a book examining the role slavery played leading up to the Battle of the Alamo that was scheduled at the Bullock Texas State History Museum on Thursday
They Are Giving Hemingway Another Look, So You Can, Too Gal Beckerman, an editor at the New York Times Book Review, talks with Lynn Novick and Ken Burns about their three-part series on Hemingway currently airing on PBS. The documentary filmmakers were drawn to Hemingway because of his complex status as both an influence on
A Literary Guide to Combat Anti-Asian Racism in America “Anti-Asian violence and discrimination has increased precipitously, but it has a long history in the United States” Jae-Yeon Yoo and Stefani Kuo offer a reading list to help readers in the U.S. better understand racism against Asian Americans: We’ve compiled this list as a way to
