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:
Writer and New York Times media critic David Carr died last night at the Times offices in Manhattan. Carr, who worked at the Times since 2002, wrote about the intersections of media with business, culture, publishing, and government for the past twenty-five years. Times film critic A. O. Scott wrote that Carr “managed to see the complexities of digital-age journalism from every angle, and to write about it with unparalleled clarity and wit.” Carr was fifty-eight.
Omnipresent actor James Franco will add another literary adaptation to his résumé. Franco is set to star in a television series adaptation of Stephen King’s novel 11/22/63—a drama-thriller in which Franco will play a high-school English teacher. (Variety)
The eleventh annual PEN World Voices festival will take place May 4–10. This year, the festival will include a special program focused on contemporary African diaspora literature. Nigerian novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie is organizing the African program, and will also deliver the closing night lecture. (New York Times)
“All this classifying, it seems to me, is the very antithesis of literature. The way of literature is to seek universality. Writers try to reach beyond those things that divide us: culture, class, gender, race. Given the chance, we would resist classification.” At the Guardian, Aminatta Forna discusses the troublesome aspects of “labeling” writers.
Europe’s Indie Book Day, which began in Germany in 2013 and quickly spread to other parts of Europe, will take place this year on March 21. The campaign urges people to support and buy from independent sellers on the designated day, and hopes to become as popular as Record Store Day in the United States. (Bookseller)
“When we read a novel we feel less lonely, if it’s a good novel. Why? Because, despite the fact that it’s fiction—in a way, a pack of lies—we feel we are seeing into someone else’s mind.” At the Paris Review, Tao Lin interviews Clancy Martin about his new nonfiction book Love and Lies: An Essay on Truthfulness, Deceit, and the Growth and Care of Erotic Love.
Speaking of love, tomorrow is Valentine’s Day. Did you forget? Don’t worry. Electric Literature has provided a list of last minute literary gifts for your bookish Valentine.
Today, however, is “Galentine’s Day.” There’s a literary gift guide for today, too. (Book Riot)
