Every day Poets & Writers Magazine scans the headlines—from publishing reports to academic announcements to literary dispatches—for all the news that creative writers need to know. Here are today’s stories:
The Swedish Academy announced this morning that singer-songwriter Bob Dylan has won the 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature for “having created new poetic expressions within the great American song tradition.” Dylan will receive 8 million kronor (approximately $900,000), and is the first American to receive the prize since novelist Toni Morrison in 1993. Read more—including the ensuing debate about the decision from around the literary world—at the G&A Blog.
Meanwhile, Dario Fo, the winner of the 1997 Nobel Prize in Literature, has died at the age of 90. An Italian playwright, Fo wrote more than eight plays, most notably “Accidental Death of an Anarchist” and “Mistero Buffo.” (New York Times)
“I don’t think black glamour or black beauty was ever in question for black people. It’s only a question from the perspective of the white gaze and that we have had to waste so much time combating derogatory language over our looks and our bodies.” Poet Claudia Rankine speaks about black glamour. (Cut)
Fiction writer Dave Eggers has launched the project “30 Days, 30 Songs,” which features musicians and bands “united in our desire to speak out against the ignorant, divisive, and hateful campaign of Donald Trump.” Launched on Monday, the project will feature a protest song each day by artists such as R.E.M., Death Cab for Cutie, and Aimee Mann. (Los Angeles Times)
At the New Yorker, writer Rebecca Solnit reimagines a New York City where city streets, parks, and memorials commemorate women instead of men. Solnit presents a New York City subway map with all stops renamed after the city’s great women.
Poet and writer Jane Wong has launched “The Poetics of Haunting in Asian American Poetry,” a digital project to consider “how social, historical, and political context ‘haunt’ the work of contemporary Asian American poets.” The online website includes audio and video conversations, poetry, and photographs with poets such as Bhanu Kapil, Don Mee Choi, and Sally Wen Mao.
“But the dream for later in life, if you want to know, is this: I walk down a garden, and dive into a river. I swim a few hundred yards down the river. I hop out and walk to my wooden shed in among the beech trees. I get dry, brew some coffee, and write until I need to leap into water again. Repeat until oblivion.” The Rumpus interviews Max Porter, author of the novel Grief is the Thing With Feathers.
