The funny thing about Wes Anderson is that it’s both hard to imagine yet simultaneously all too obvious why he is wildly popular in some milieus, hardly known in others, and wholly eschewed in a third circle. A recent interview with Mr. Anderson from Filter Magazine pointedly asks the writer/director about the relative success of his first film Bottle Rocket, what it’s like working with the brothers Wilson, and the merits of being a “cult” favorite. The Filter interview also begins to explain how the music plays into Anderson’s larger vision for each film. If only it told us what musical gems we had to look forward to in his upcoming project.

Lisandro Alonso
Susannah Breslin
Margaret Cho
T Cooper
Ron English
James Frey
Jaclyn Friedman
Malcolm Gladwell
Danny Goldberg
Andrew Sean Greer
Van Jones
General Lawrence Nkunda
Jack Pendarvis
Princess Superstar
Mary Roach
Bucky Sinister
Steven Soderbergh
Tristan Taormino
Dean Wareham
Lawrence Wechsler

The Boatloads by Dan Albergotti
Ms. Hempel Chronicles by Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum
American America by Ethan Canin
The Sky Below by Stacey D’Erasmo
A Day and a Night and a Day by Glen Duncan
The Farther Shore by Matthew Eck
Brief Encounters with Che Guevara by Ben Fountain
Writing in the Dark by David Grossman
In Other Rooms, Other Wonders by Daniyal Mueenuddin
Ghost Train to the Eastern Star by Paul Theroux
Vacation by Deb Olin Unferth
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
Vienna Triangle by Brenda Webster
Stoner by John Williams

Before Dick Fuld oversaw the implosion of Lehman Brothers, and before John Thain had to apologize for accepting an outrageous bonus from Merrill Lynch, there was Frank Woolworth. The gloss and shine that characterized New York pre-Crash of 1929, and then again pre-Panic of 2008/09 resulted, in large part, emanated from the publicity stunts and good business of Mr. Woolworth. …more

The Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger dives into the complicated issues that arise when newspapers attempt to unpack the most complicated topics. …more

With the first half of the five-hour epic still in limited release, Steven Soderbergh’s Che film is already fomenting great debate on the Web. …more

Janet Malcolm reaches into the archives of her childhood and discusses a hardly-known American novelist in an essay from the New York Review of Books. Malcolm reviews …more

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NPR on the books that James “Sawyer” Ford reads and the literature of Lost.

The blog of unnecessary quotation marks.

Bulgaria v. Czech Republic, a hoax sculpture sparks a diplomatic spat.

LIFE photos.

Curtis Sittenfeld’s inauguration novella.

The ten creepiest old ads.