In our morning reading: reviews of new work by Claudia Rankine and Sufjan Stevens, a remembrance of Randall Kenan, and more.
Afternoon Bites: Justin Taylor Interviewed, Marie-Helene Bertino Recommends Books, Christina Nichol, Skybridges, and More
Interviews with Justin Taylor and Christina Nichol, a look at the skybridges of Manhattan, Marie-Helene Bertino recommends books, thoughts on Kate Zambreno’s Green Girl, and more.
An Intellectual’s Family Situation: Marco Roth’s “The Scientists” Reviewed
The Scientists: A Family Romance by Marco Roth Farrar, Straus and Giroux; 208 p. While there is no shortage of pieces from the relatively short history of n+1 that could be collected into some sort of reader, or called the defining essay on certain subjects, in terms of literary output, three names that appear on the masthead of n+1’s first issue have all fared a bit differently. There’s the mixed response to Keith Gessen’s All the Sad Young Literary Men (Joyce Carol […]
Surreal Doppelgängers, Sublimated Anxiety, and Ominous Missives: On Amelia Gray’s “Threats”
Threats by Amelia Gray Farrar, Straus and Giroux; 288 p. “Did you ever get the feeling that something isn’t quite right?” It’s a question asked by one character to another in passing late in Threats, Amelia Gray’s first novel, but it could also serve as the book’s epigraph. Though a rough description of the novel might make it sound like a familiar plot wrapped in kitchen-sink details — a middle-aged man wanders a small Ohio town, traumatized after the sudden […]
Who will Criticize the Critics?
Posted by Jason Diamond Things I picked up and though about while reading the NY Times Sunday Book Review series of essays, “Why Criticism Matter” this morning.
Bites: Buster Keaton, Warhol’s Blue-Collar Roots, Grrrl’s From the 90’s, Brooklyn’s Poet Laureate, and More
New York Review of Books talks Buster Keaton. Deep down, Andy Warhol was just a blue-collar eccentric. Remember N + 1 talking about the “neuronovel”? Here’s co-founder Marco Roth talking about his essay on the subject on Aussie radio. Photos of Russian explorers at the North Pole in the 50’s and 60’s. The Breeders, Kim Gordon, Bikini Kill, and other essential female artists of the 90’s. Tina Chang: Brooklyn’s poet laureate.