Literature

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

In college, I had a part-time job clerking the front desk of the music school dean’s office. Between Xeroxing and answering phone calls, most of my shift was spent reading. While taking my first Classics course on ancient mythology, my very keen-eyed professor recommended I read Mary Renault. I tore through The Last of the

There is a story my family likes to tell: a moment I cannot remember. I am a toddler, still chubby-cheeked, with a blunt blond bob. I am standing in the yard of my childhood home. In front of me, my father has begun butchering the family pig. This is his work, his vocation. He is

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University) What connects the Police hit song ‘Every Breath You Take’ with the James Bond novel Goldfinger? And is the Police song a paean to devoted love or a sinister message to an ex-lover? Let’s take a closer look at the meaning of ‘Every Breath You Take’, a song taken

October 11, 2023, 11:03am As reported by Publishers Weekly earlier this morning, Random House will publish Salman Rushdie’s new memoir, Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder, on April 16, 2024. The book will mark Rushdie’s first time speaking at length about the brutal attack he suffered while onstage at the Chautauqua Institution in upstate New York

TODAY: In 1963, Jean Cocteau dies at 74.    John McPhee on his sixty-year friendship with Bill Bradley, of the New York Knicks. | The New Yorker Also on Lit Hub: Insomnia, imposter syndrome, and all the ways Rebecca Clarren learned to write her book • Adam Thirlwell on Witold Gombrowicz’s The Possessed • New

October 10, 2023, 2:42pm Today is the sixty-sixth publication anniversary of Ayn Rand’s 1100-page magnum opus of unreadable doggerel libertarian science fiction, Atlas Shrugged. Set in a dystopian United States in which private businesses suffer under increasingly burdensome laws and regulations (isn’t it always the way), it’s the story of railroad executive Dagny Taggart and