The Paris Review
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We All Contain Multitudes of Tacky
Ever droll, Sadie Stein writes in the Paris Review about the reaction we’re (all) prone to have when people recommend literature based on our professed likes and dislikes: When someone says I will like something, I tend to assume the something in question will…
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Devout Apostrophes
This week, the Paris Review has a really beautiful interview up with the poet Mary Szybist. She talks about religion, Wallace Stevens and her abiding love for the apostrophe: I have always been attracted to apostrophe, perhaps because of its resemblance to prayer. A voice reaches out…
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In Depth on Peter Matthiessen
The novelist, CIA operative, and founder of the Paris Review died on Saturday. Two days before, the New York Times Magazine published an extensive look at Matthiessen’s life. His family descended from whalers, he spied on communists, and at one…
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On Writing and Uncertainty
Is writing a fundamentally speculative act? This is one of the questions Jenny Offill was asked in an interview with the Paris Review. Offill discusses the uncertainty that comes with being a writer, working constantly at a craft that can never…
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Which Book Are You?
If you’re eager to know more about you and your future, you certainly need to check this high school literature zodiac Rumpus contributor Timothy Leo Taranto created for The Paris Review. No birthdays or constellation involved, all you need to know is…
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Write Your Worst Secret
Amy Hempel started writing fiction in her late twenties when she took a workshop with Gordon Lish at Columbia; she stayed in this workshop as a student for years. In an interview with The Paris Review, Hempel recalls her first…
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Do Authors Use Symbols on Purpose?
In 1963, a high-schooler named Bruce McAllister decided he would prove to his English teacher once and for all that the symbols she was asking students to find in books like The Scarlet Letter were not actually put there on purpose by…
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RIP Lou Reed
Lou Reed, who changed the face of rock music both with the Velvet Underground and as a solo artist, passed away yesterday at the age of 71. We trust you know where to find his music, but you may also…
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“He Put Her Out in the Cold”
When she aims the pistol at the doorman, he grabs her wrist and snatches the gun, then she starts to scream, “Baby, what have I done?” For The Paris Review, Aaron Gilbreath writes about jazz, heroin and love gone wrong. Read…
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F. Scott Fitzgerald Does Othello
In honor of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s birthday a couple days ago, the Paris Review posted some audio clips of him reading passages from Keats and Shakespeare. “While he may not recite like a trained Shakespearean, his reading is clear, emotive, and…
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Alas, Poor Transatlantic Review!
The Paris Review just celebrated its sixtieth birthday—and not a gray hair in sight! But many game-changing, sterling-quality literary magazines didn’t make it to that ripe old(ish) age. At Flavorwire, Jason Diamond rounds up some of the Paris Review‘s most promising peers…
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“Ooh! A Pencil App!”
“I’m bored. New window!” Treasured Rumpus illustrator Jason Novak illustrates the secret lives of web journalists over on the Paris Review‘s blog. Bloggers, you might want to shield your eyes. It hits a little close to home.