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Ooty Literary Festival honours Perumal Murugan
On a sunny autumn morning, the Gothic-hall of the iconic century-old Nilgiri Library resonated with cheers as writer Perumal Murugan received his Lifetime Achievement Award for fostering literary arts and culture in Tamil Nadu. It was the opening day of the 7th edition of the Ooty Literary Festival. In a conversation that followed, Perumal Murugan shared how he turned author. “Introduction to…
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An epic literary hoax: new book explores 19th-century manuscript
Recently I spoke to David L. Cooper, Associate Professor of Slavic Languages & Literatures at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign and the author of a new book, The Czech Manuscripts: Forgery, Translation, and National Myth, which explores the controversy surrounding the manuscripts from a fresh perspective. For those who aren’t familiar with the Czech manuscript…
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Estonia to be guest of honor at 2025 Bologna Children’s Book Fair
In 2025, Estonia will be the guest of honor at the Bologna Children’s Book Fair. The fair, which is the world’s oldest and largest children’s literature event, brings together thousands of children’s book authors and creators from around the world every spring. Each year, one country is awarded the status of Guest of Honor at…
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Literary Fight Club: On the Great Poets’ Brawl of ‘68
One Saturday evening in 1968, the poets battled on Long Island. Drinks spilled into the grass. Punches were flung; some landed. Chilean and French poets stood on a porch and laughed while the Americans brawled. A glass table shattered. Bloody-nosed poets staggered into the coming darkness. Allen Ginsberg fell to his knees and prayed. The…
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Year of the Rabbit: Why We’re Seeing So Many Bunnies on Books
The bunny is having its book cover moment. If you don’t believe me, head to your closest bookstore and look for recent award winners: you’ll find Bora Chung’s Cursed Bunny, recently shortlisted for the National Book Award for Translated Literature, cozied up next to last year’s winner for fiction, The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty.…
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A Vicious Cycle: Jessica Strawser on Telling and Re-Telling Traumatic Stories
Jane Smiley recently said, “Reading novels is a form of emotional education.” If that’s true, then writing novels must be a form of emotional exploration—into all the reasons a theme won’t let us go, and what it is we most want to say. If you’re writing about a difficult truth, it’s easier to imagine how…
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Beyond Poor Things: An Ode to Alasdair Gray’s Lesser-Known, Equally Deserving Books
When a dead author has one of their novels made into a film, they get let out of the underworld for a season, though usually they return in their most familiar forms. Since Yorgos Lanthimos adapted the novel Poor Things by the late Alasdair Gray—winning the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival and getting…
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Horror for the Holidays, Or, Scary Novels To Read While Being Nice to Your Family
I find the holidays a good time for horror. Whether the festive season makes you happy or miserable, you can read about people who are (hopefully) in more immediate and serious trouble than you. If your family has gathered, as so many do at the holidays, you can finish the last page of a novel…
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Debut Books and the Newbery Medal: Will a first-time author win the Medal again?
When a new Newbery year starts and we start to identify potential contenders, I always start with authors I know. Previous Newbery winners, kids’ favorites, writers whose past books I’ve rated highly. But debut authors rarely get onto my radar right away. Starred reviews, word of mouth, and, of course, recommendations from Heavy Medal readers…
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Rosemary Hennessy talks SWGS, ‘In the Company of Radical Women Writers’
By Hugo Gerbich-Pais 11/28/23 11:40pm In many ways, Rosemary Hennessy’s university education was marked by the immense social and cultural changes of the late ’60s, ’70s and ’80s. “I started my undergraduate work in 1968, and the world turned on its axis that year,” Hennessy said. “I went off to college wearing patent leather…