TODAY: In 1914, James Joyce’s Dubliners is published, in a run of 1250 copies. Though it debuted to generally positive reviews, in its first year, the book sold only 499 copies—one short of Joyce being able to contractually profit from it.
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Weird wild stuff: Ann Beattie close-reads Frederick Barthelme’s story “Box Step,” featuring the underworld, an ant farm, and a souvenir palace (and that’s just for starters). | Lit Hub Criticism
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Yao Xiao considers the (delightful) utopian fantasy of American Born Chinese and the potential for edgier stories for Asian Americans. | Lit Hub Film & TV
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Find the vibe, break up the band, and other lessons in interviewing musicians from Chris Payne. | Lit Hub Music
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“As a writer, do I indulge in the very bunker mentality that my novel criticizes? Do I want—more than I admit—to escape?” Deborah Willis on the existential contradictions of writing fiction on an imperiled planet. | Lit Hub
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“An almost violent kind of achievement: a writer knifing forward, slicing open a new terrain.” 5 Book Reviews You Need to Read This Week. | Book Marks
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David Remnick remembers legendary editor Robert Gottlieb, who died yesterday at age 92. | The New Yorker
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“We saw each other maybe once a year, whenever she had trouble with men. She could never figure it out, she was often lonely. I was lonely too, but I’d been lonely for a long time.” Two stories by Alena Lodkina. | HEAT
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Nadira Goffe talks to Ali Hazelwood about her best-selling STEM romance novels. | Slate
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Tired: Girlbossing. Wired: Critterposting, the Beatrix Potter-inspired anti-hustle movement. | Vox
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Ryan Skinnell on the destructive myth of the universal genius. | JSTOR Daily
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“Parents who want to protect their children, by not making them feel guilty because great grandpa was a Klansman aren’t protecting their kids from anything.” Art Spiegelman on fascism and book bans. | PEN America
Also on Lit Hub: Aisha Harris reflects on the “black friend” trope, then and now • Why we need stories that center female friendships • Read from Itamar Vieira Junior’s newly translated novel, Crooked Plow (tr. Johnny Lorenz)