Category: words

The cartoonist’s essay about the rise of superheroes is online, and he makes his opinion clear: “International fascism again looms large (how quickly we humans forget – study these golden age comics hard, boys and girls!) and the dislocations that have followed the global economic meltdown of 2008 helped bring us to a point where the planet itself seems likely to melt down. Armageddon seems somehow plausible and we’re all turned into helpless children scared of forces grander than we can imagine, looking for respite and answers in superheroes flying across screens in our chapel of dreams.” – The Guardian (UK)

This week in comics news: “Cartoonist Art Spiegelman, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his graphic novel Maus, withdrew his introduction to a new Marvel comics collection after its publisher insisted he remove a description of Donald Trump as ‘Orange Skull,’ drawing a comparison between the president and Captain America’s fascist enemy, the Red Skull.” – Newsweek

“He would reject work, but praise the writing. His form rejections included a note: “It happens that I am both the editor of the Blue Moon and also the head of a critical revision business. If you have your manuscript revised I, as editor of the Blue Moon, shall then be glad to consider your story for publication in the magazine.” More than 30 writers agreed. Jessup took their money, and kept their stories.” – Literary Hub

Linguistic decline is the cultural equivalent of the boy who cried wolf, except the wolf never turns up. Perhaps this is why, even though the idea that language is going to the dogs is widespread, nothing much has been done to mitigate it: it’s a powerful intuition, but the evidence of its effects has simply never materialised. That is because it is unscientific nonsense. – The Guardian

“The New Colossus” (“Give me your tired, your poor, …”) was not mainstream American sentiment when Emma Lazarus wrote it in 1883 (one year after the Immigrant Act and the Chinese Exclusion Act). Indeed, it was somewhat radical, and she was inspired by the work she did with the despised refugees who were flooding the U.S. in her day (Jews from the Russian Empire). Slate history maven Rebecca Onion talks with Lazarus biographer Esther Schor about the poem and how its reception has changed over the decades. – Slate

It’s not only because so many people learn them as second or third languages. Recent research has indicated that, even when a language is new or developing, it has to have simple rules in order for large groups of people who don’t know each other well to make themselves understood. – The Economist

When we learn how the world is made through words, we also learn to be sceptical of our current iteration of reality and more tolerant of other perspectives. If life can be differently worded, it can be differently lived. – The Guardian

“In Sub-Saharan Africa, … ‘book fairs’ have been publishing industry affairs where players meet to do deals … away from the reading public. Until recently. In the last decade and a half, there has been a rise of a new kind of literary festival where writers and readers interact over their text and how it affects their lives.” – Quartz

“Genesis was capable of making dozens of inferences about the story and several discoveries. It triggered concept patterns for ideas that weren’t explicitly stated in the story, recognizing the themes of violated belief, origin story, medicine man, and creation. It seemed to comprehend the elements of Crow literature, from unknowable events to the concept of medicine to the uniform treatment of all beings and the idea of differences as a source of strength.” – Nautilus