TODAY: In 1950, American literary critic and scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. is born.
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“It took months of OCD treatment and two Brené Brown books to understand there is no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in writing—there are only decisions.” Elissa Bassist reflects on treating her writers’ block by treating her OCD. | Lit Hub Memoir
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Sometimes, altering the canon is a good thing: How The Rings of Power is reimagining important characters. | Lit Hub Film & TV
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14 books to read for National Translation Month, recommended by indie booksellers. | Lit Hub Reading Lists
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Red tape and unspoken rules: How state welfare offices perpetuate a culture of blame. | Lit Hub Memoir
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“I am the only one who ever lived who remembers / my mother’s voice in the particular shadow / cast by the skyfilled Roman archway.” New poetry from Jorie Graham. | Lit Hub Poetry
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How growing up in “a family reluctant to tell stories” shaped Ellen Meeropol’s new novel. | Lit Hub Craft
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Tanya Paperny considers the works of Polina Barskova, which interrogates and refutes Russia’s myth of itself. | Lit Hub Politics
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Kristin Beck remembers Rösli Näf and Anne-Marie Piguet, two women who fought to save Jewish children in World War II-era Europe. | Lit Hub History
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Goodbye Brooklyn: Michael Gonzales on the borough—and the community—that shaped his life and art. | CrimeReads
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Ian McEwan’s Lessons, Robert Harris’s Acts of Oblivion, Kate Beaton’s Ducks, and Ling Ma’s Bliss Montage all feature among the Best Reviewed Books of the Week. | Book Marks
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“One needs to have heroes who live under similar societal constraints in order to know how to break free of them.” Heather O’Neill on the life and enduring work of Mavis Gallant. | The Walrus
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Nursing a broken heart? These books might help. | The Atlantic
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Heather Platt delves into what community cookbooks show about the history of Los Angeles. | Los Angeles Times
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Ibram X. Kendi talks about why kids need to read diverse stories and books about history. | Reader’s Digest
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“There’s a sense in which all West Indian literature is a celebration of the remarkable, inimitable, considerable nothing that is us.” Alina Stefanescu interviews Pamela Mordecai. | BOMB
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Roberto Tejada on typography, experimental lineage, and Latinx aesthetics: “In Latin America’s avant-gardes, surrealism and the long baroque have served in concert to confront issues of aesthetics, the neoliberal economy, and questions of class conflict.” | LARB
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An introduction to disorientation guides, student-made pamphlets distributed at the start of the school year to “educate students on the less sunny side of their institution by introducing them to campus activism.” | Teen Vogue
Also on Lit Hub: The seven deadly sins of writing • New poetry by John Koethe • Read from Gayl Jones’s latest novel, The Birdcatcher