TODAY: In 1913, 31-year-old writer Virginia Woolf delivers the manuscript of her first novel, The Voyage Out, to her publisher.
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Sofi Oksanen recommends reading about the Soviet past to understand Ukraine’s present. | Lit Hub Ukraine
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What makes a great opening line? Allegra Hyde looks to Toni Morrison, Nell Zink, Jenny Zhang, and others for answers. | Lit Hub Craft
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Mona Chollet considers the self-fulfilling prophecy of sexism. | Lit Hub
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Azar Nafisi wants us to read more dangerously. | Lit Hub
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“What does it look like, these novels ask, to take anything too seriously?” Tara Isabella Burton on the power of campus novels. | Lit Hub
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On Darryl Hunt’s boyhood in segregated Winston-Salem, long before his wrongful conviction and imprisonment. | Lit Hub
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Why Ben Okri wrote a book for children (and how trees helped him). | Lit Hub
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Flowers in the Attic, 2666, The Talented Mr. Ripley, and more rapid-fire book recs from Kevin Barry. | Book Marks
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Darryl Pinckney considers Norman Mailer’s essay “The White Negro” and the roots of white America’s infatuation with Black. | The Nation
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“It seems more and more that, with each book, I feel less bound to rely solely on my own brain.” Sheila Heti on loss, writing, and ejaculate. | Interview
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“Writing and reading are my only weapons.” Azar Nafisi on the role of books in troubled times. | Los Angeles Times
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The Texas Library Association has formed a coalition against banning books. | KXAN
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Mary Frances Knapp details some of the best self-help books out there. | VICE
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“Like a cracked door the cold seeps through, so did the truth begin to seep into me.” Melissa Febos on the creative and spiritual experience of writing her own story. | Bookforum
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Chris Feliciano Arnold explores the Sesame Street songbook, and parenting through despair. | The Believer
Also on Lit Hub: How Rumi became a poet • Ariel Delgado Dixon on what it means to find a true best friend • Read from Andrey Kurkov’s newly translated novel, Grey Bees (tr. Boris Dralyuk)