Pakistani author Mohsin Hamid, writing in The New York Times Book Review, about television vs. the novel: Television is not the new novel. Television is the old novel. In the future, novelists need not abandon plot and character, but would do well to bear in mind the novel’s weirdness. At this point in our technological evolution, […]
novels
Are You In A Haruki Murakami Novel?
An elephant mysteriously vanishes. A giant frog is waiting in your apartment. Your cat mysteriously vanishes. Two moons hang in the sky. Your wife mysteriously vanishes. A strange man comes to you and asks you to find a sheep, or a woman calls and asks for ten minutes of your time. You might be the […]
The Philosophy of French Society
“Of course, since Descartes and the 17th Century there have been other French philosophers and many of them have turned their attention to the processes of human thought but the Cartesian legacy is still very important in the French intellectual tradition. In a Cartesian society, everything is ordered according to clear, precise, mathematical, scientific principles, […]
There Is Just One Problem with Feeling Alive
“Sophie stood on the gravel path, thinking. She tried to think extra hard about being alive so as to forget that she would not be alive forever. But it was impossible. As soon as she concentrated on being alive now, the thought of dying also came into her mind. The same thing happened the other […]
Helpful tips from a poet who lives in Brooklyn: 1. MOVE OUT OF BROOKLYN I know not every novelist in America lives in Brooklyn, it just seems that way. There are a million stories on the L Train, and they’re all basically about dorky people doing dorky things. Which is fine. The best novel to […]
