Science and Literature: Coming Together for the All-American Solar Eclipse
During the “All-American Eclipse,” everyone in the US will see at least a partial eclipse, but the difference between a partial and a total eclipse, according to astronomer Jay Pasachoff, is like standing outside the opera house versus attending it.
An Interview with Adam Biles of Shakespeare and Company
Shakespeare and Company is one of the best-known bookshops in the world. The first time I visited was a hot summer’s day many years ago. I was a little embarrassed about my tourist’s awe.
Chronicling Loss—and Humanity—With Kanishk Tharoor
On Kanishk Tharoor’s radio series and in Swimmer Among the Stars, his stories remind us of the power of empathy and connection in our shared experience and the need for imagination, even playfulness, in times of adversity.
The Art of Climbing
Recently, I began thinking how some of the poems I love most evoke this sense of motion; in particular, I began thinking about two pieces about the act of climbing: Langston Hughes’s “Mother to Son” and Carl Phillips’s “The Pinnacle.”
A City of One’s Own
These days living and working as a writer in Istanbul requires a bravery that most American writers have never imagined they would have to muster, a bravery far beyond what it already takes to put pen to paper.
The Middle of Nowhere in a Comic Pane
Self-hatred, alcoholism, small-town deprecation. Roughneck hits all the rural notes. When a character has a run-in with Oxycontin, the reaction is to immediately blame it on outsiders. “All the kids are getting it from down South,” someone says.
Making (and Breaking) a Poem
One of the hardest things to learn about writing poems is how to break lines—where to enjamb or full-stop, where to leave sentences dangling into surprise, where to make one thing appear like it will be another.
Writing Appalachia
One of the finest contemporary writers mining the extraordinary diversity of the complicated landscape of southern Appalachia is Ron Rash. Rash, whose work sprang to national attention with his novel Serena, writes almost exclusively of these mountains and her foothills.
Reading Backwards
Finally recognizing this pattern has led me to an unconventional idea: we should teach literary survey courses backwards. And those of us who are no longer in lit classes (or who have steered clear of them altogether) should read that way ourselves.
Review: HARD CHILD by Natalie Shapero
These often dark and deeply personal poems are armored with comedic turns and allusions to our “rotting times.”