The theater and lit worlds suffered a great loss this week with the passing, Tuesday, of Elizabeth Swados, 64, a prolific writer and composer .
Sari Botton
Reading Lolita in Patriarchy: Rebecca Solnit on Being Mansplained About How She Must Have Misread Nabokov
“It isn’t a fact universally acknowledged that a person who mistakes his opinions for facts may also mistake himself for God.”
Siri Hustvedt on Knausgaard’s ‘Feminine Text’ and the Gendering of Literature
A deep examination of gender bias among readers and writers alike.
Belly Chains on a Baby Bump: What It’s Like to Be Pregnant in Prison
“One woman [told me] that if she didn’t keep her shackles on, she wouldn’t be able to go to her appointment and [that] other women have been denied access to prenatal vitamins.”
‘The One Who Gives Birth to Herself’: Rachel Syme on Empowerment and Agency Through Posting Selfies
It’s difficult to select just one perfect quote as a representative sample of Rachel Syme’s excellent ode to the selfie, at Matter.
When Your Name Precedes You: Jeannie Vanasco On Feeling Bound to the Dead Older Sibling She’s Named For
“I was sixteen, the age Jeanne would always be.”
‘Unyielding Boredom’: On the Slow Passage of Time Behind Bars
“I may have laughed more, and harder, there than anytime in my life. (Also, cried. Also, raged.)”
Searching for Meaning Inside a Tech Company’s First Bookstore
University Book Store—begun by students in 1900—is just up the road from University Village, and while they serve superficially different markets, it’s difficult not to see Amazon’s choice of location as yet another act of aggression toward indie bookstores, whose owners and employees are particularly suspicious of the company’s motives. Speaking over her reading-stack-as-topography desk […]
‘Don’t You Write Anything Happy?’: Chinelo Okparanta on Learning from Public Readings
Once, I did a reading in New York where an older lady came up to me afterwards and said, “Your writing is beautiful, and there’s no doubt you’re a great writer, but I’m sorry I won’t be reading any more of that story. That was just too painful for me.” Then, a year or two […]
‘Why I Created My Own World’: Mark Hogancamp on ‘Marwencol,’ The Fantasy Town Where He’s a Hero
“I know Hogancamp’s story well, but every time I hear it, I’m struck by his resilience, and also by how cruel and violent people can be.”
