Essays Notable Articles

The Greatest American Novel? 9 Experts Share Their Opinions

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When you set out to debate “the great American novel,” the stakes are high. We asked nine English scholars to choose one novel as the greatest our country has ever produced.
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Lists Notable Articles

Most Anticipated: The Great Second-Half 2013 Book Preview

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At 9,000 words strong and encompassing 86 titles, this is the only second-half 2013 book preview you will ever need.
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Notable Articles Reviews

Modern Life is Rubbish: Tao Lin’s Taipei

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There is a small, deadly class of book that makes you never want to set pen to paper again. Tao Lin's novel is a grave case of this kind, where you are faced with the consequences of writing down all the things you do or think. What if they sound like this? Colorless, witless, humorless. Picking out individual passages cannot express their cumulative monotonous assault on the senses.
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Notable Articles Screening Room

Judging Luhrmann’s Gatsby: Five English Scholars Weigh In

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You might think that the people who know Fitzgerald's novel best would have the most disapproving view of the movie. To test that hypothesis, we asked five English professors who specialize in American literature to take in an early showing and share their thoughts. And to our surprise, they liked it.
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Essays Notable Articles On Poetry

So That If I Died It Mattered

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When asked to explain my choices, I’ve said, “Art is how you explain what it feels like to be alive in the 21st century. I am an emotional historian.” But that’s really my answer to, “Why should we all make art?” My why is more personal.
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Annals of Japery Notable Articles

Amazon Announces Purchase of English™

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Plans are also in the works to acquire German, Spanish, French, and Mandarin Chinese, Bezos said, as well as several nonstandard dialects of English™, including African-American Vernacular English, popular among the highly desirable 18-25 upscale suburban demographic.
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Essays Notable Articles

The Weird 1969 New Wave Sci-Fi Novel that Correctly Predicted the Current Day

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Stand on Zanzibar is set in the year 2010, and this allows us to make a point-by-point comparison and marvel at novelist John Brunner’s uncanny ability to anticipate the shape of the world to come. Indeed, his vision of the year 2010 even includes a popular leader named President Obomi.
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Books as Objects Notable Articles

Judging Books by Their Covers 2013: U.S. Vs. U.K.

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Notable Articles The Millions Originals

Introducing The Millions Originals and An Excerpt of Our First eBook, ‘Epic Fail’

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Notable Articles Screening Room

Ten Books to Read Now That HBO’s Girls Is Back

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These are books that -- like Girls -- explore what it is like to be young and hungry -- hungry for love and hungry for sex, but most of all, hungry for recognition and hungry for adulthood. Ultimately, the girls in these books, like the girls of Girls, are hungry to become the women they will one day be.
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Lists Notable Articles

Most Anticipated: The Great 2013 Book Preview

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Notable Articles Screening Room

Big Bird is History: Why We Fund PBS

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CTW’s Sesame Street started in 1969 as a grand experiment to see what would happen if you gave all children (inner city, rural kids, and suburban alike) entertaining pre-school lessons as a head start. When you consider the alternatives, this is an awfully cheap way to educate and unite kids all over the country.


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Lists Notable Articles

Literary Fiction is a Genre: A List

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Let's consider literary fiction as a straightforward genre, like romance or science fiction, with certain expected tropes and motifs.
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Essays Notable Articles

Is This Book Bad, or Is It Just Me? The Anatomy of Book Reviews

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You can critique the critics. You can be a meta-Michiko. Use this knowledge wisely.
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Essays Notable Articles

The Marquise Went out at Five O’clock: On Making Sentences Do Something

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When I find that a sentence I’m writing isn’t working, I don’t think about what I want that sentence to look like or to be; I don’t pull it from the page to weigh it in my hand; I don’t worry over its internal balance. I simply ask myself, 'What do I need this sentence to do?'
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Essays Notable Articles

A Right Fit: Navigating the World of Literary Agents

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If it sounds like I’m saying, “It’s all about who you know,” that’s because that is exactly what I’m saying. You can rail about how unfair that is, and how it makes publishing into an incestuous little club, and to a degree you would be right. But that’s the way the machine is built, people.
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Lists Notable Articles

The Great Taxonomy of Literary Tumblrs: Round Two

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Six months ago, I rounded up a list of my favorite literary Tumblr accounts. Alas, six months in the real world is different from six months online, and Tumblr now has grown by a few million blogs. So with that in mind, I’ve decided it’s time for another list — a better list, a bigger list.
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Lists Notable Articles

Dickens’s Best Novel? Six Experts Share Their Opinions

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What was Charles Dickens’s best novel? It depends whom you ask of course. Searching for clarity, I decided to pose the question to a handful of leading Victorianists. I sent out emails to select scholars asking them if they’d be interested in choosing a novel and making their case. Just about everyone I reached out to was game.
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