TODAY: In 1934, American novelist, poet, environmental activist, cultural critic, and farmer Wendell Berry is born.
- Adam Scovell travels back to the Wirral Peninsula, “determined to find some of the old ghosts that haunted Malcolm Lowry.” | Lit Hub Criticism
- On Shahrzad Mozafar and other Muslim women who fought for a forbidden love: the game of futsal. | Lit Hub Sports
- “Agents and authors frequently argue over money, but Michael Ovitz and I never did. We struggled over the work.” Jillian Medoff on breaking up with her literary agent. | Lit Hub Writing Life
- Before the wedding, divulging family secrets: Emi Nietfeld recalls the first meeting between her fiancé’s parents and her mother. | Lit Hub Memoir
- New titles from Mohsin Hamid, Anthony Marra, Emmanuel Carrère, and Tess Gunty all feature among the Best Reviewed Books of the Week. | Book Marks
- Jillian Medoff with courtroom dramas that will leave you reeling. | CrimeReads
- “I will never ever part with many books. Maybe I’ll have them cremated with me.” How Lynne Tillman organizes her books. | The New York Times
- Elaine Castillo recommends ten overlooked novels. | Publishers Weekly
- “A life of work and feeling, from which art and love are created, is in the context of its daily recording actually quite ordinary.” Apoorva Tadepalli on the diaries of Edna St. Vincent Millay. | The Nation
- Tobias Carroll recommends some excellent new books in translation. | Words Without Borders
- “The subversive potential of so many works derided as trash is that they focus on female interiority, female pleasure, female aspiration.” Sophie Gilbert considers the radicalism of romance novels.
- On the career of Stalin’s architect Boris Iofan, “a precise reflection of all the compromises that architects must make with power.” | MIT Press Reader
- “Privately, in the comfort of my own home, writing about my system has been a practice of healing.” Sydney Hegele talks about how dissociative identity disorder affects their writing (and vice versa). | Electric Literature
Also on Lit Hub: Edgar Gomez unpacks their internalized machismo • Chrysta Bilton tells the story of her birth (with a very brief appearance from her father) • Read from Alejandro Zambra’s newly translated novel, Bonsai (tr. Megan McDowell)