None of my audiobooks are. Audible, the Amazon division that controls about 90% of the audiobook market, won't carry them because, if you want to sell your audiobooks on Audible, you have to let them add Amazon's Digital Rights Management (DRM) to them, and I refuse. - Publishers Weekly
There’s this long history of certain people seeing urban life through the lens of decline. If you look at contemporary usages of this idea of “urban doom,” it’s actually very similar to the way a lot of people in the ’70s and ’80s were talking about cities. - Curbed
"(His gift was) to elevate the formulaic celebrity profile with humor, a literary voice and the polish of a short story. That was the only way Mr. Zehme … could accept his fate performing what many writers consider one of the lowest forms of journalism." - MSN (The Washington Post)
It’s no longer necessary that he connect in people’s minds with any actual art. It’s enough that he stands for that bigger thing: unfettered creativity. In fact, it’s better. A clear line connects Picasso’s description of his pictures as “a sum of destructions” and the capitalist mantra of “creative destruction.” - Washington Post
Almost all of the South Asian books known internationally were written in English, but there's an extremely vibrant literary scene in the subcontinent's own languages. The University of Chicago's SALT project (South Asian Literature in Translation) aims to make that literature accessible to the wider world. - The Guardian
Yes, the family had long called it “The Bruegel,” but it was an affectionate dig at a painting that was clearly a fake. Turns out, the family joke was a hidden masterpiece, a genuine work of Pieter Bruegel the Younger, a 17th-century Flemish artist. - Washington Post
"It may partially be due to the fact that Ramadan is a religious holiday, which makes associations with socially controversial subjects, and standard soap opera fare, more sensitive. It may also be that so many more people are paying attention. But mostly it's the increasingly intense competition." - Deutsche Welle
Six years ago, the National Geographic Society, decided that the sculpture, known as “Marabar” and designed by the artist Elyn Zimmerman, was in the way of expansion plans for its headquarters, and later agreed to help find it a new home. - The New York Times
"Leading industry choreographers Chloé Arnold, Marguerite Derricks and Mandy Moore share their experiences on what it's really like to create dances for the stars." - Dance Magazine
Norman Lebrecht: "Bernstein was music director for a record 11 years. His successors were doomed by comparison. Pierre Boulez was too ascetic, Zubin Mehta superficial, Kurt Masur heavy weather, Lorin Maazel boring, Alan Gilbert half-baked and Jaap Van Zweden an accounting error." - The Critic
"After spending more than 20 years in public behind shiny, opaque robot-style helmets as half of the pathbreaking dance-music duo Daft Punk, Thomas Bangalter was ready to be seen without barriers." - The New York Times
Said artistic director Rob Melrose in his announcement calling off Derek Walcott's adaptation of Homer's Odyssey, "We knew going into this production the scope was difficult, and we thought it was appropriately resourced, … (but) it is impossible to bring this production to completion." - Houston Chronicle
"The union … has been bargaining with The Broadway League, which represents industry producers, presenters and general managers, since mid-January to create a new touring contract. Now, Actors' Equity has authorized … a strike on all Broadway national tours" if negotiations remain stalled. - The Hollywood Reporter
To avoid a charge that could have sent him to prison for up to 30 years, Mihcael Rohana — who did the deed at Philadelphia's Franklin Institute in 2017 — will plead guilty to interstate trafficking, which carries a maximum two-year sentence. - KYW (Philadelphia)
"A federal judge in Austin, Tex., has found that a library board in Llano County likely infringed the constitutional rights of readers in the community by unilaterally removing books it deemed inappropriate." - Publishers Weekly
