slate
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Knausguaard as a Lady
Katie Roiphe of Slate has some ideas about what Knausgaard’s critically acclaimed work would be like if, instead, he was a woman. I imagine to this committed Knausgaardians would say that they are responding to the quality of his writing…
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Who Are We Writing For?
Sandwiched between fictions on one side and instructions on the other, a woman is often denied the breathing room necessary to find her individual sexuality. In a conversation at the Nervous Breakdown, Rumpus contributor Ashley Perez and author Cris Mazza…
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By Its Cover
Jennifer Weiner’s recent claim that a serious author photos indicate serious literature is submited to scientifically unsound empirical testing over at Slate. Comparing the head shots of “Women’s Lit” writers to those of “Literary Fiction” best-sellers, Eliza Berman discovers an unexpected trend in the…
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Nobody Likes Mansfield Park
You think your mom was a harsh critic? Slate published an excerpt of criticism about Mansfield Park from Jane Austen’s friends and family. Austen compiled the criticism in an 8-page document, which just shows that even successful novelists are insecure.
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Soldiers on Donkeys, Corpses in Pools
Peter van Agtmael “has no desire to be at war.” But he spends his life documenting it with his camera, in all its manifestations: from the barracks to the homes of veterans. In the introduction to his recent book-length collection, Disco…
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Famed Ulysses Pharmacy Faces Taxman
Sweny’s, the pharmacy made famous in Joyce’s Ulysses (when Leopold Bloom visits the Dublin shop to purchase lotion and soap for his wife Molly), opened more than 167 years ago and has remained more or less unchanged for most of that…
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Weekly Geekery
It’s time to shut down the comments section. And all the writers around the world rejoice. Jerkology 101: The science of sorting out your social life. E-books you can fold. Techy the Slate writer says, “Only you can prevent the…
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Weekly Geekery
Keats said truth is beauty, but science disagrees. Changing technology means our writing is literally going to the crapper. Investigating the interaction between the mind and the outside world. Sussing out the Ur text of memes. What is the state…
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Great American Novels and Wars
In his newly published The Novel: a Biography, Michael Schmidt takes some time to study how the wars of the 20th century shaped the great American novel, citing Norman Mailer, Kurt Vonnegut, and Joseph Heller among those that best dealt…
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Rumpus Round-Up: All the Abramson News Fit to Print
Jill Abramson, the first woman to head the New York Times as executive editor, was abruptly fired Wednesday and replaced by managing editor Dean Baquet. The New Yorker attempted to explain why, with the leading theory being Abramson’s discovery several…
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Long Story Short
Author Joshua Ferris is about to release his third book, To Rise Again at a Decent Hour, and Reagan Arthur, his publisher at Little, Brown, has been with him from the very beginning. After more than 8 years of collaborating, the…
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The Many Faces of Librarians
This past week was National Library Week! Still imagine all librarians as the curmudgeonly figures you encountered in elementary school? Think again. Slate has a photo project representing the diversity of librarians—showcasing their personalities, appearances, and many vast fields of study. It…