Literature

Write-minded: Weekly Inspiration for Writers is currently in its fourth year. We are a weekly podcast for writers craving a unique blend of inspiration and real talk about the ups and downs of the writing life. Hosted by Brooke Warner of She Writes and Grant Faulkner of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), each theme-focused episode

Narrator Dion Graham joins AudioFile’s Michele Cobb to discuss his narration of King: A Life, written by Jonathan Eig, and one of AudioFile’s 2023 Best Biography & Memoir Audiobooks. Listen to hear Graham discussing the research and preparations that went into this narration, and the challenges he faced bringing it to life. It’s a riveting

There was a lesson at school about the painting Las Meninas, when Shaun was fifteen. It was about how the painting disoriented its viewer and left them not knowing what it was they were looking at. It’s a painting inside a painting, his teacher had said – look closely. Look here. Velázquez, the artist, is

All photos courtesy of e-Kitabu. In 1993, I was a teenager, volunteering to work with street children in Kibera, the largest “slum” on the continent of Africa. I held babies, played hokey-pokey and Swahili versions of patty cake with grade-school kids, fielded requests for money by street children as we rode the matatus to downtown

When finishing a novel, there is an introspective sweet spot before publication and after the final edits get turned in, when, in a quiet anxious period, I’m forced to look at my creation, to try and understand what I have done, to remember how this thing was formed. An important question for any journey: what

Finally, we can say that if male aggressiveness and sporadic violent competition do seem to be general aspects of human nature, group violence, along with social inequality and subordination, are generally not—­at least not when we live in the social conditions under which we evolved as a species. Those conditions changed as the domestication of

‘Tis the season—of year end lists. Also, year-end gifts, year-end busyness, all while the rush of late-year books keep tumbling out, reminding us that 2023 definitely isn’t over yet. From these rich stacks I am grateful to gather work by Tacey M. Atsitty, Shane Book, Nick Laird, Tomasz Różycki, Alice Notley, Marlon Hacla, and translators

Igbo goddesses! Trans Jesus! Queer political marriages! December doesn’t always have a wealth of SFF offerings, but the books being released before the end of 2023 seem to have the perfect hooks to make them irresistible additions to your TBR and/or gifting piles. This month’s list ranges from Chịkọdịlị Emelụmadụ’s debut to Geoff Ryman’s latest,

In the summer darkness of the Massachusetts Berkshires, my friends and I build a fire. These are not just any friends—they’re dear friends from high school, friends I rarely see anymore because of distance and moving and money and all else that comes with growing up. It’s been two years since all six of us

My new poetry book, The Shining, attempts to tackle many feelings characteristic of our current moment. The fear and isolation that we’ve all undoubtedly felt as we’ve battled the coronavirus pandemic over the past few years is merely one. I remember early moments of our 2020 lockdown feeling as if I were trapped in The

The story goes something like this. William Friedkin needed to find the right little girl for his film. She had to be strong and stable, good humored and intelligent, someone who could say lines like “Let Jesus fuck you” and not be left irreparably damaged. Friedkin didn’t want any responsibility for setting some innocent little

In 1978, a young man escaped from the psychiatric institution where he had been held for fifteen years, ever since he murdered his older sister as a six year old boy. After his escape, he began a brutal killing spree that left at least four people (and one dog) dead. Anyone looking for a rational

TODAY: In 1926, A. A. Milne’s Winnie-the-Pooh is first published.  “What these readers are expressing is not so uncommon: the fear of indirect contact. They can’t bear to think that their beloved author has passed through the filter of some other being.” Todd Portnowitz on the translating the stories in Jhumpa Lahiri’s new collection. |

In this week’s Dispatches from The Secret Library, Dr Oliver Tearle reviews John Plotz’s personal reading of a fantasy classic by Ursula K. Le Guin The American author Ursula K. Le Guin (1929-2018) is widely regarded as one of the finest authors of what is broadly termed ‘speculative fiction’. During the course of her long

October 13, 2023, 10:37am According to PEN America, Florida is one of the worst states in the country for those who care about the freedom to read: 13 school districts in Florida banned books in the second half of 2022—more than in any other state—adding up to a total of 357 bans. But now, Banned

TODAY: In 2016, Bob Dylan wins the Nobel Prize in Literature.   What does playing the devil incarnate do to a young girl? Marlena Williams looks at Linda Blair’s infamous role The Exorcist. | Lit Hub Film and TV “Reading a book aloud, especially to a child, means getting on that frigate together, being passengers