“[In his novels, he] mythologized the history of an entire continent, while at the same time creating a Rabelaisian portrait of the human condition as a febrile dream in which love and suffering and redemption endlessly cycle back on themselves on a Möbius strip in time.”
Author: Matthew Westphal
The Life Cycle Of A Pop Song
The Awl charts the entire course, from the Conception Phase and Underground Phase, through the Indie and Hipster Phases, into and out of the Top 40, to the Shame Phase and beyond. (Not to forget the karaoke afterlife.)
French Court Swaps Bob Dylan Out Of Hate Speech Case
The case stems from a 2012 Rolling Stone interview in which, to some eyes, Dylan appeared to equate Croatians with Nazis. The judge ruled that, since Dylan gave the interview in the U.S., he couldn’t be liable – but the publisher of the French edition of Rolling Stone could.
Cast of ‘Fun Home’ Wades Into South Carolina’s Legislators-Against-Lesbians War
A group of state lawmakers threatened the College of Charleston with a budget cut after a reading list for incoming freshmen included Alison Bechdel’s graphic memoir. So the cast and creators of the musical based on the book are going to Charleston next week for concert performances and discussions.
‘The Best Documentary Ever Made On The Basis Of A Dubious Premise’
“The filmmakers follow the narrow limits of a self-imposed rule, and their obstinacy courts cinematic disaster. They set the movie entirely within the capsules of a cable-car line in Nepal that connects the ancient mountaintop temple of the title with a neighboring village. The film’s two-hour duration is filled solely with a dozen ten-minute trips.”
Random House Wins Bidding To Publish New Shirley Jackson Collection
“The new collection, called Garlic in Fiction, is edited by two of Ms. Jackson’s children … and includes her fiction (like the short story ‘Paranoia,’ which was published for the first time in The New Yorker last summer), as well as drawings, lectures and works of nonfiction that previously appeared in women’s magazines of the 1940s and ’50s.”
So You Think You Can Be An Actor, Tough Guy?
Alex Andreou: “I have worked 14-hour shifts in a travel agency, seven days a week, for six months during the Greek tourist season, with no day off. I have handled multi-billion industry investigations as a competition expert, with days and weeks which I thought would never end. None of it compares – not even close – to the self-imposed temporary obsession that preparing for a part demands.”
What We Mean When We Talk About Happiness
“‘Are you satisfied with your life?’ ‘How are you feeling?’ Does either question tell us what we really want to know?”
Gary Shteyngart Resigns From Blurbing Books (Here’s His Resignation Letter)
“It is with deep sadness that I announce that the volume of requests has exceeded my abilities, and I will be throwing my ‘blurbing pen’ into the Hudson River during a future ceremony, time and place to be determined.” (He is making exceptions, though, including all owners of long-haired dachshunds.)
Resetting ‘Three Sisters’ Among Expats In Yemen
The isolated Arab country “presents a conflict zone, but not one that gets international attention; far-flung but not exotic; visitors who hope to do good with varying degrees of conviction;” and the “claustrophobia” of life in an expatriate community.