Totally Shocked That 55% of Americans Know the True Meaning of Socialism

The results of the poll taken by Democracy Corps don’t really shock me: 57% think Obama is too liberal, 51% disapproval rating, etc. The 57% of Americans who think Obama is a socialist is what gets me.  I hate to sound like an uppity liberal douchebag from New York, but do those people polled really understand what socialism is?  I know when you ask questions like “is the president doing a shitty job,” or “is Obama too liberal,” that’s easy […]

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Bites: Best Book Covers, “Bush-League Method acting,” Social Thuggery, and More

Enough with the literary-merit top 10 lists.  Here are the best book covers of 2009.  I personally love the look of Ruben Toledo’s designs, but not at all for the books they represent.  An awkward confluence of visionary tones.  Who imagines their literary heroines with such artistic flair?  It’s unsettling. Lit. & Academia City University of New York dean Ann Kirschner recently read Little Dorrit four different ways (paperback, Kindle, iPhone, audiobook).  This week, she talks about it on NPR. […]

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Bites: Gentrification Lit, Adam Langer, Dustin Hoffman Loves Libraries, Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin host the Oscars, and more

N+1 discuss “gentrification novels”. Discussed are Jonathan Lethem, Prospect Park West, etc.  As a Park Slope resident, I feel a little bit shitty right now. Lit. Rare books for the “cultured traveler” Adam Langer, one of the great Chicago writers, tells us some music he likes. HTML Giant tells us about Warm Milk Press. The American zeitgeist implodes upon itself as James Franco, following his quirky stint on daytime television, is slated to guest star on 30 Rock. Dustin Hoffman: […]

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Weekend Bites, The Frightening Edition: Keats Misdiagnosed?, the Penis as Literary Device, ScarJo to Rape Arthur Miller’s Work, Truths in Ghostbusters, and Why M&M’s Might As Well Be Crack

Happy Halloween!  In honor of the spooky holiday, Vol.1 has collected some particularly frightening Bites, ranging from the traditionally fun-filled, the absolutely outraging, and the sadly serious. Lit. Did medical malpractice lead to the death of John Keats, leaving the poet starving and anguished?  Wait, isn’t that what poets are definitively? After losing his own book deal, South Carolina governor Mark Sanford praises Ayn Rand. In a review of Alistair Morgan’s Sleeper’s Wake, The Rumpus expostulates on the penis as […]

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Bites: Rainbow bookshelves, killed book covers, readers of print bring it in, mock executions, finding Jesus’ head, Atwood’s green tour

By Willa A. Cmiel Book Bench explains it correctly when they call organizing your books by color “an exercise that feels dorky and juvenile.” But look, not (really) so! I guess the exposed wooden beams and built-in wall shelves help romanticize the whole nerdy practice. Killed book jackets from Print. Readers of the printed word are worth wayyy more than you are. The Chasm Between the Value of Print and Web Readers: $709 versus $46. (via The Millions) Upon my […]

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Bites: Attempt at bad poetry leaves me unfulfilled, Raymond Chandlers LA, up yours Barnes and Noble, Will Sheff helps Norah Jones, and more

By Jason Diamond Come on city of my birth (that being Chicago), this is the worst poetry you can do? No sonnets about Mike Ditka? Not a single haiku on Hot Dougs? Seriously people, come on! If I ever needed one quote from The Awl to sum up the love I feel for that website, then I have found it with “If our Congress can be measured on a scale of feces (and it should), Senator Byron Leslie Dorgan is […]

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The Gospel According to Harry (and Scholars, and Fanatics, and Movie-Goers)

By Willa A. Cmiel I would claim to be a part of the original Harry Potter generation. The series starts near Harry’s eleventh birthday, and the first book came out in 1997 when I was eleven years old. Although “too old” for children’s books now (I still read Alice in Wonderland, often), I grew up with Harry. I was with him from the very start. At this point, though, Harry Potter belongs to no generation, as much as he belongs […]

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