2014
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Little Jack’s Love Letters
I shall worship her with quiet dignity. I shall draw her attention to me by exploits, success, and possibly a small measure of fame,” wrote a young, romantically inclined Jack Kerouac to a friend in one of a cache of…
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Once in the West by Christian Wiman
Caitlin MacKenzie reviews Christian Wiman’s Once in the West today in Rumpus Poetry.
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A Sentimental Translation
Although A Sentimental Novel, the final work from Alain Robbe-Grillet, was published in French in 2008, the English translation didn’t follow for almost another four years. Partially, this was due to the book’s content: a lengthy series of Robbe-Grillet’s sadistic fantasies.…
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Dan Weiss’s Morning Coffee
Woah woah woah, Chris Ware is releasing a serialized novella over at The Guardian. The mortuary railway and other secrets of Sydney. Asking the important questions: do animals cry? The Atlantic on World War 2 and the beginnings of the…
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The Rumpus Interview with Lev Grossman
Lev Grossman discusses the challenges of writing a series, why his 20s were a lost decade, and his relationship with his readers.
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The Power of Print
As reported a week or so ago by Joe Pompeo at Capital, The American Reader plans to abandon its digital platform and turn all of its focus toward print.
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The Non-Fiction Dilemma
Ever wonder how to write about other people without getting sued? Well, here are some answers. Another flavor of invasion of privacy is called false light. Suppose you post a photo of a criminal arrest. Jane Doe, a bystander, appears…
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Angelheaded Hipsters Burning
And we are, aren’t we, us fiftysomethings? We’re the pierced and tattooed, shorts-wearing, skunk-smoking, OxyContin-popping, neurotic dickheads who’ve presided over the commoditisation of the counterculture; we’re the ones who took the avant-garde and turned it into a successful rearguard action…
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Spotlight: Bue Bredsdorff’s “The House in Sønderhå”
“The House in Sønderhå” is the first from a series of mini comics about places cartoonist Bue Bredsdorff has lived.
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Song of the Day: “Let Me Be Mine”
It’s hard to imagine rocking out for more than twenty years, without much of a respite, but that is exactly what Spoon have done. The difficult-to-label rock group that formed before Kurt Cobain’s death recently released their eighth studio album,…
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Notable Portland: 9/18–9/24
Thursday 9/18: The Reed College English department welcomes novelist and short-story writer Lynne Tillman for a reading. Reed College, 6:30 p.m., free. Laila Lalami reads from her latest imagined memoirs of the New World’s first explorer of African descent, The…
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Patriarchy’s Slow Unwinding
For the New York Times Magazine, A.O. Scott argues about the “slow unwinding” of patriarchy in American culture, drawing on modern television, history, and literature. In part responding to Ruth Graham’s essay at Slate, in which she urges against adults reading…