Category: words

“A series of ownership changes — including Village Voice Media and Voice Media Group — left Seattle Weekly on shaky financial footing by the time Sound Publishing acquired it in 2013.” – Crosscut

Rea Hederman, the publisher of the intellectual journal, announced Monday that Emily Greenhouse, 32, and Gabriel Winslow-Yost, 33, have been named co-editors, and that Daniel Mendelsohn, a longtime contributor to the Review, will assume the newly created role of editor at large. – The New York Times

With new accusations of plagiarism for novelist AJ Flinn and Danny Boyle’s film Yesterday, it’s time to revisit what can – and cannot – be proven in literary theft. True, “it has long been claimed that there are somewhere between three and 36 basic plots in all forms of storytelling,” but that can’t account for specific details. Still … “legal action is very tricky in cases which don’t concern actual language copying but rely on copying of themes, plots or structure.” – The Guardian (UK)

Yuck. New letters show his cruelty – and though Dickens tightly controlled his image during his life and burned more than 20 years of correspondence (including that with his wife), the new letters have caused some consternation in the literary world. “Reading the material was quite difficult to be honest. … Dickens is a literary great who I have studied and admired for many years but some of the letters made very uncomfortable.” – The New York Times

One of the fisherpoet legends is Moe Bowstern who, yes, named herself. Apparently writing poetry comes with being on a fishing ship, she says. “Well, I mean, have you ever been fishing? … It’s unbelievably boring. And so you just have to think of something else to do.” –NPR

Meg Wolitzer, author of The Wife (among many other novels): “All of this is heady, effervescent stuff for a novelist. … I felt a particular kind of excitement. It wasn’t just the generic Hollywood feeling to which many of us are susceptible. The face for which I had created the outline had been filled in, saturated with new meaning.” – The New York Times

Here you go – because although “these days the awards are a more subdued hooray for Hollywood, some of the best books on the industry have always warned of the dream factory’s problematic side.” – The Guardian (UK)

“The increasing prominence of radical Islam, or Islam as a political force, is obviously one factor. The other factor, especially in the West, is the increasing emphasis on culture and ethnicity, religion included, as a means of self-definition. … Rushdie’s satirical look at religion comes across quite differently when Islam is conceived of as an identity. What began as a critique of ideas is taken as an insult to a group, and often a marginalised group, at that.” – Aeon

“On an internet occupied by as many finger-wagging ‘grammar Nazis’ as slovenly texters who prefer emoji to verbal displays of emotion, the Oxford comma has become a cause célèbre. This is especially true on dating apps, where many users have deemed the punctuation mark something they ‘can’t live without’ — a designation that’s put it in the same lofty category as cheese, the beach, and Game of Thrones.” – GQ

The Second Coming, a series that was to be released next month under DC’s Vertigo imprint, depicted Jesus Christ’s not-entirely-triumphant return to earth. “Shocked to discover what has become of his gospel,” Jesus undertakes “a most holy mission from God,” learning from a super-hero called Sun-Man “what it takes to be the true messiah of mankind.” The comic was withdrawn following a petition, by conservative group CitizenGo, which calls The Second Coming “outrageous and blasphemous.” – The Guardian