In our afternoon reading: recommendations from Tomoé Hill, conversations with Lucy Sante and Bradley Sides, and more.
Art and Literature In an Endless Cycle: Tomoé Hill on “Songs for Olympia”
There’s a long history of literary works inspired by literary works or works of art. For her new book Songs for Olympia, Tomoé Hill opted to go one layer deeper. Her book opens a dialogue with Michel Leiris’s The Ribbon at Olympia’s Throat, which is itself a response to a Manet painting. That said, a detailed knowledge of Leiris’s book is not necessary for enjoyment of Hill’s’; instead, the earlier work by Leiris and Manet provides Hill with a vantage point from which she can reckon with questions of art, gender, intimacy, and her own history. It’s a mesmerizing work, and I caught up with Hill earlier this year to discuss it in greater detail.
Morning Bites: Claire Donato Interviewed, Story Prize Finalists, Tomoé Hill on Art, and More
In our morning reading: interviews with Claire Donato and Tomoé Hill, the Story Prize finalists, and more.
Morning Bites: Tananarive Due’s Influence, Tomoé Hill Interviewed, En Attendant Ana Returns, and More
In our morning reading: exploring the work of Tananarive Due, a playlist from Eugen Bacon and Andrew Hook, and more.
Books of the Month: October 2023
And now it’s October; we’ve entered the home stretch of the year. In other news, one of our editors is still unsure of whether or not they should be writing “2022” on checks, so — it’s been that kind of year. But hey, at least there are books. What follows is a look at some of the titles due out this month that we’re most excited about — ranging from cosmic horror to meditations on the nature of essays. Whether you’re seeking intellectual stimulation or visceral thrills, this list of new books has plenty to offer.
No Feet
No Feet
by Tomoé Hill
We have a joke, he and I: the feet. They belong to me—or rather, they are mine, but also exist as sentient, mischievous creatures of their own. There is a photo of me as a very small child, barely one years old. My father is lying on a flower-patterned sofa, face obscured by a book, and I am sitting on his legs, leaning against one of the cushions. My thumb is in my mouth, and a hand idly between my legs. I look blankly content in the way children do at that age, happy to exist and take in their immediate world. My feet are bare and slightly curled, up to no good, as he would say. We have since endowed my feet with a life of their own. Their childish wickedness is blamed when bleary-eyed, I emerge from the bedroom in search of coffee, my silent step nearly frightening the life out of him when he turns round from whatever he is doing to see me standing there, toes curling in glee at their reception, at odds with the rest of my lack of consciousness. Feet represent intuition: fight or flight, standing one’s ground, going feet first into something.
Morning Bites: Buzzcocks-Inspired Fiction, Tara Isabella Burton, Lydia Lunch’s Latest, Eliane Brum, and More
In our morning reading: fiction inspired by the Buzzcocks, nonfiction from Tara Isabella Burton, and more.