Archive for February, 2010

Preview a new Mockett essay

Discover Nikkei runs an excerpt from Marie Mockett’s “Comportment Compartment,” which is forthcoming in The Asian American Literary Review.

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On the interconnectedness of stories and ideas

Iris Murdoch’s novels were deeply informed — if not consciously shaped — by her readings in philosophy. Walker Percy found a theoretical framework for his fiction in Kierkegaard, who also influenced Kafka. And Donald Barthelme urged his students to choose their “literary fathers” carefully, and to be well-versed in philosophy. Hiding Man, Tracy Daugherty’s biography, suggests that reading Beckett and . . .

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New Conover: The Routes of Man

Ted Conover’s Newjack is one of my favorite nonfiction works of the past decade. His new book reflects on roads — how they shape the world and affect us.

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A(n ironical) moment of uplift

The great Jenny Diski, upon learning that students in some writing programs are taught to end their poems with redemption, applies this formula to blogging.

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