The Prince of Poets, Handwriting Advocacy, and More

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:

As handwriting continues to significantly decline in the age of computers, neuroscientists and handwriting advocates weigh in on the cognitive benefits of handwriting over typing. (Guardian)

In January, Abu Dhabi will host three hundred poets from twenty-nine countries for the preliminary round of its Prince of Poets competition. The Prince of Poets—soon to be in its sixth season—is a United Arab Emirates television show similar in structure to American Idol. According to the Middle East Online, the show has “successfully introduced young blood into the tradition of Arabic poetry…through the publishing of many poetry collections in the previous years of the competition.”

Happy one-hundred-forty-first birthday to editor, novelist, poet, and essayist Ford Maddox Ford. Born on this day in 1873, Ford is best known for his novel The Good Soldier and his World War I tetralogy Parade’s End.

If you are considering self-publishing, be sure to watch your hyphen use. Following customer complaints, Amazon removed Graeme Reynolds’s self-published book from the Kindle store for its overuse of hyphens, which “significantly impact[ed] the readability” of the book. (GalleyCat)

At the New York Times Bookends blog, writers James Parker and Zoe Heller discuss the negative consequences of directly responding to one’s critics.

Meanwhile, the Atlantic lists six notable books not previously covered in the periodical this year, and asks the authors of those titles to share the books they loved in 2014. Among the six “best missed” books are Sarah Wildman’s memoir Paper Love: Searching for the Girl My Grandfather Left Behind, and Wendy Lesser’s nonfiction book Why I Read: The Serious Pleasure of Books.

Here’s a more specific year-end list: Brooklyn Magazine lists not books, but notable sentences written over the past year, including gems from a Charles D’Ambrosio essay, a Ben Lerner novel, Perfume Genius’s lyrics, and more.