TODAY: In 1944, poet Eavan Boland is born.
- “Constipation is being good, keeping between the lines, staying small, keeping contained, following the rules (or pretending to). Taking a shit is being bad.” Jessica Gross provides possibly the definitive literary survey of… constipation. | Lit Hub Criticism
- Dynastic privilege, a terrible novel, and the race for a crucial senate seat: Anjali Enjeti on Matt Lieberman’s ill-advised Georgia campaign. | Lit Hub Politics
- “Privacy is a form of power, and whoever has the most personal data will dominate society.” Carissa Véliz on life under surveillance capitalism. | Lit Hub Tech
- “Real discovery emerges from changing or questioning or pushing against given and inherited stories.” A conversation with K-Ming Chang and Ysabelle Cheung. | Lit Hub
- “He made it alright to believe in something ethereal about the ocean, something divine.” Jock Serong on James Hamilton Paterson and the book that changed his life. | Lit Hub
- On the “misogyny paradox” and the crisis of heterosexual coupledom: Jane Ward wonders how love can fit into patriarchal ideas of marriage. | Lit Hub Politics
- Fornicating and fighting: Bettany Hughes offers a brief history of the ancient cult of Aphrodite. | Lit Hub History
- James Parker on a Jimi Hendrix biography, Fintan O’Toole on the letters of Martha Gellhorn, Rebecca Onion on Octavia Butler’s apocalypse fiction, and more of the Reviews You Need to Read This Week. | Book Marks
- The philosopher and the detectives: Philip K. Zimmerman examines how Ludwig Wittgenstein’s passion for pulp fiction fueled his studies of language. | CrimeReads
- “If Scorsese takes an interest in something, it must have become part of America’s DNA.” How Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence, published a century ago, defined an American era. | BBC
- A new book shows how French symbolist poetry influenced the visual work of Henri Matisse. | Financial Times
- Dan Gentile issues a call to San Franciscans: fulfill your civic duty by buying books. | SFGate
- When it comes to choosing a book to read in quarantine, “maybe escapism versus reality is a false choice.” | NPR Code Switch
- Everything you wanted to know about how the New York Times Best-Seller List gets made. | The New York Times
- Read a profile of the acclaimed Bedouin poet Sheikha Helawy. | Haaretz
- “In fiction writing textbooks, there’s often a passage urging fledgling writers to ask, “What does this character want?” The answer, “Access to affordable healthcare to protect his family” lacks narrative oomph.” Lee Connell writes a letter to the residents of her father’s building. | The Paris Review