Happy weekend from the mental health restoration team
By far the most chilling passage in the old family memorabilia I’ve been digging through is this one, from a letter sent by Terrell State Hospital — formerly, the North Texas Lunatic Asylum — to inform my grandmother’s mom that her daughter, Louise, died from tuberculosis-related complications:
We are sorry this girl could not have been [...]
McCarthy takes the rooster
Cormac McCarthy’s The Road — powerful as Blood Meridian — takes the last round of the ToB over Shteyngart’s very smart and very funny Absurdistan.
Loser acclaim
Singling out excellent essays by Zelda Lockhart and K.L. Cook, Pete Coco reviews When I Was a Loser for Time Out Chicago.
Early acclaim for Thomson novel
Rupert Thomson’s Death of a Murderer garners praise in the U.K. (Via.)
The market will not lie or cheat you
Jasper Merian, a protagonist of Calvin Baker’s Dominion, worries over choosing names.
Given his tendency to utter pronouncements like “I would have named my own house Colonus… But I thought by now they surely must have heard of that place. I called it Stonehouses instead, in hopes it might keep them off us [...]
As of This Writing
TEV points to a compendium of Clive James links, courtesy of James himself, and recommends As of This Writing.
That kind of day
You have five minutes to kill yourself — with common office supplies — in advance of a staff meeting. (Many thanks, Jessa.)
On A.M. Homes’ The Mistress’ Daughter
A.M. Homes’ January 2005 New Yorker essay on meeting her biological parents for the first time while in her early thirties is a fine piece of writing — absurd, disturbing, and adamantly unsentimental.
In a waiting room, as she watches her father turn in paperwork for the blood test she’s agreed to undergo, she [...]
Chris Lehmann on defining deviancy down
Chris Lehmann’s D.C. Observer column debuts this week with “The Pleasurers of the President,” a scathing attack on the “louche pundit hubris” of the D.C. press corps following the U.S. attorney firings.
While “dogged investigators at online journalism outlets such as Talking Points Memo’s TPMmuckraker.com have done great work documenting the D.O.J.’s thuggish management of [...]
Trust-funders’ mission complete
“Williamsburg” becomes an adjective, and in Greenpoint even the graffiti has gentrified. (Thanks, Dana.)
Quotes for the ages, coined recently
Dwight Garner is looking for your favorite quotes from recent novels.
The name that sells the thing
The Branding and Freedom in the Market Economy conversation between Colson Whitehead and Calvin Baker happens this Friday, at Lolita, at 7 p.m.
In anticipation of the event, here’s an excerpt from Whitehead’s Apex Hides the Hurt.
He came up with the names. They were good times. He came up with the names and like any good [...]
Spring literary calendar
Between PEN World Voices and Nextbook’s What’s He Doing Here? (on Jesus in Jewish Culture), the end of April is going to be busy.
Johnny and Pocahontas
Jim Ruland’s review reminds me to get back to Matthew Sharpe’s “vividly realized farce,” Jamestown. (Via.)
Bechdel and Karr on memoir meeting life
Memoirists Alison Bechdel and Mary Karr disclose the difficulties of showing personal nonfiction to the people — in this case, mom and old friends — depicted in it. (Via.)
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