ArtsJournal: Arts, Culture, Ideas

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Gatsby Is Meant To Critique The Rich, Right?

Great Gatsby seems to inspire something that isn't exactly critique of the wealthy. "I parted my hair in the middle and put on a fake plummy accent and bought some white button-down shirts and white khaki pants at the thrift store downtown and wore them all the time." - LitHub

The Battle For Good Sentences

A sentence might sound promising in your head but crumble during its translation to the page. It might get maimed when shaved or become disfigured when tweaked, rejigged, or retrofitted. It might not be compatible with its neighbors. - Hedgehog Review

Updating Books For The TikTok Era

Amazon’s Kindle Vella spotlights the growing market for episodic stories, designed for mobile devices, unfolding as larger narratives over time. - GeekWire

E.M. Forster’s Most Influential Novel Was The One He Couldn’t Publish

As it circulated in manuscript (it was only published posthumously) from the author to Christopher Isherwood and onward, Maurice "became first an open secret and eventually the center of a sort of private reading club for gay male writers, critics, and friends, for decades." - The New Republic

Ebony Magazine’s Former CEO Committed Fraud To Keep It Alive, Alleges SEC

Willard Jackson, who was forced out in 2020, is one of several men accused of diverting crowdfunded investment money raised for marijuana-related business ventures; he allegedly used his share to keep Ebony out of bankruptcy (which it ended up declaring anyway). - MarketWatch

Poetry: The New Digital Divide

Online discussion has created a new landscape for the consumption and production of poetry. To outsiders, there is either a swarm of names or a narrow row of critically-touted volumes; to insiders, as in any subculture, the little differences are everything. - The Drift

Pennsylvania School Board Reverses Ban On Black Authors’ Books, Children’s Bios Of MLK And Rosa Parks

The vote by the Central York district board came after weeks of protests by students and unflattering reports in national media. The list of banned titles also included books by Jacqueline Woodson and Ibram X. Kendi, Malala Yousufzai's autobiography, and a documentary about James Baldwin. - The Guardian

Is The Future Of Newspapers 24/7 Online, With Actual Newsprint Only On Sundays?

That's already the case in Little Rock and Chattanooga, while the Tampa Bay Times prints only Wednesdays and Sundays. Many other papers throughout the US have cut some hard-copy days, especially Saturdays. Yet they all post news online all week long. - Local News Initiative (Northwestern University)

France’s Top Book Prize Has A New Conflict-Of-Interest Scandal

One of the finalists for this year's Prix Goncourt, The Children of Cadillac, was written by François Noudelmann, the romantic partner of one of the 10 jurors, Camille Laurens. What's more, Laurens recently savaged a competing book on the shortlist in a review for Le Monde. - The Guardian

Pennsylvania School District Bans Children’s Books On MLK And Rosa Parks

In a clip from a meeting aired by CNN, which reported on student protests of the ban, members referred to the list of reading and educational material as “divisive” and “bad ideas.” - Miami Herald

Someone Thought Putting The Bible, The US Constitution, And Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless The USA” In One Book Was A Good Idea

"Big-name Christian authors penned a letter blasting it as 'dangerous,' and more than 900 people signed a petition decrying the decision to print it. The advertised publisher, part of HarperCollins Christian Publishing, disavowed the book and denied it ever planned to print it in the first place." - Slate

Supply Chain Problems Are Still Plaguing Publishing, And There Might Be Book Shortages For Christmas

"Supply chain problems have touched almost every aspect of book production, storage, and delivery, mostly as a result of Covid-related bottlenecks. Printer capacity issues plagued the publishing industry last year, too, though 2021 is expected to be worse." - Yahoo! (Quartz)

Sally Rooney’s New Book Hits Weird New Benchmark

The data show that Beautiful World, Where Are You is the most reviewed book of all time. - LitHub

The Best Ever Sword And Sorcery Books

Or the best for this not very fantastic time on the planet, anyway. - Washington Post

What’s Even The Purpose Of Political Writing Anymore?

Osita Nwanevu: "The morsels of rage and misery we offer might not have much political effect, but they do feed an online writing economy that rewards speed, quantity, and deference to algorithms designed for the profit of three or four tech companies." - Columbia Journalism Review

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