The new owner, Meng Ru Kuok, runs the Caldecott Music Group, which includes BandLab Technologies, NME Networks, and major guitar-maker Vista; he says his relaunched Gawker will be notably different from past versions. (Interestingly, the purchase included the domain name and trademark but not the article archives.) - Variety
None of the folios were identical; sometimes a letter or word would be different, evidence of the typesetter at William Jaggard’s London printshop tinkering with errors throughout the process. - LitHub
Some K-12 decision makers perceive school librarians as little more than quaint remnants of a bygone era. And if the number of our nation's certified school librarians continues to decline as it has for the past few decades, this perception may one day become a reality. - Governing
"Blackouts" by Justin Torres took the fiction prize; nonfiction honors went to Ned Blackhawk's "The Rediscovery of America: Native Peoples and the Unmaking of U.S. History;" Craig Santos Perez’s “from incorporated territory (åmot)” was cited for best poetry; young people’s literature was won by Dan Santat’s “A First Time for Everything.” - AP
Rumors that authors would take a stand regarding the Israel-Gaza conflict during the ceremony were flying in the days leading up to the event, but it was unclear what the statement would include, leaving several sponsors concerned. - The New York Times
Actually, there are two controversies. One is about restoration to the list of some of the epithets that were deemed offensive and eliminated in 2020. More appalling is the addition of some word forms, particularly plurals of irregular nouns, that just don't actually exist in English, such as "feceses." - Slate
"In the 1880s, almost a century after Burns died, Edinburgh forger Alexander 'Antique' Smith produced hundreds of fake manuscripts, selling them to booksellers, pawnshops and collectors. … Many of his counterfeits remain in circulation (and) can fetch tens of thousands of pounds at auction today." - BBC
In a statement, the jury said: "The modernist experiment continues to burn incandescently in Sarah Bernstein's slim novel, Study for Obedience. Bernstein asks the indelible question: what does a culture of subjugation, erasure and dismissal of women produce? - CBC
Psychologists Chris Westbury and Geoff Hollis "wanted to see how a word’s phonology (sound), spelling, and meaning influenced whether people found it amusing, as well as the effectiveness of incongruity theory — the idea that the more something subverts expectations, the funnier it gets." - Mental Floss
There's a reason Finnegan's Wake often has reading "gropes" instead. "Fialka leans into that visionary aspect, describing his group as 'more a performance art piece than a book club.'" - The Guardian (UK)
"Over the past four decades, Andrew Wylie has reshaped publishing in profound and, some say, insalubrious ways. He has been a champion of highbrow books and unabashed commerce, making great writers famous and famous writers rich. In the process, he has helped to define the global literary canon." - The Guardian
