Judges for the £25,000 award say the collection, informed by grief for his two brothers, ‘braves large questions’ with its lyric sequence. Read more
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How a Book About Bees Scandalized Europe
On July 8, 1723, a book was put on trial. The Grand Jury of Middlesex County Court, in England, was presented with a work that corrupted public morals to such an extent that it might “debauch the nation.” Bernard Mandeville’s The Fable of the Bees was said to recognize no evidence of God’s influence or providence in the world; it attacked all the decent institutions of society — politicians were derided, the clergy were slandered, and universities mocked; and, most offensive of all, it attempted to “run down religion and virtue as prejudicial to society, and detrimental to the state … and to recommend luxury, avarice, pride, and all kind of vices, as being necessary to public welfare.” The book claimed that vice ought to be pursued because the immoral activities of individuals can generate an overall economic benefit for society as a whole. Vice was not only necessary but desirable. Like Milton’s Lucifer, its author seemed to declare: “Evil, be thou my Good.” Read more
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‘Mothers and Sons’ by Adam Haslett
This deeply satisfying novel is a revelation—a thoughtful, psychologically acute, beautifully written examination of intersecting lives. The characters come alive on the page, commanding readers’ attention. This novel is sure to receive accolades, and it richly deserves them. Read more
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The Art of the Book Deal
How Columbia Journalism School professor Samuel G. Freedman has helped hundreds of students get coveted book contracts. Read more
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‘We Lived on the Horizon’ by Erika Swyler
Swyler achieves a seemingly impossible amount of sophisticated worldbuilding using an economy of vibrant, graceful prose. The story transports and transforms, alchemizing a combination of mystery, romance, and science fiction into an impactful exploration of the importance of connection, the evolutionary nature of identity, and the inevitability of revolution. Affecting relationships and a sinuous, kaleidoscopic third-person narrative further define and develop the exquisitely rendered characters. Read more
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David Lodge, British Novelist Who Satirized Academic Life, Dies at 89
The author of 15 novels and more than a dozen nonfiction books as well as plays and screenplays, Mr. Lodge was twice shortlisted for the Booker Prize, and his work has been translated into dozens of languages. His best-known work, “Campus Trilogy,” dramatized the brief heyday of English literature as a discipline and the jet-setting lifestyle of its professoriate. Read more
The Plagiarism Plot Is Having a Moment. Copy That.
You could assemble an entire library of contemporary work fixated on literary imitation, appropriation and theft. Read more
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The Novel About U.S. Politics So Outrageous It Nearly Wasn’t Published
Robert Coover’s “The Public Burning” was met with bafflement and awe when it appeared in 1977. Reality has finally caught up to his masterpiece. Read more
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Jimmy Carter: Poet, Novelist, Memoirist, Philosopher
He wasn’t just prolific, publishing 32 books. His output also showed an unusual range that included memoirs and forays into historical fiction and even poetry. Read more
‘The Bewitched Bourgeois’ by Dino Buzzati
Dino Buzzati was a prolific writer of stories, publishing several hundred over the course of forty years. Many of them are fantastic—reminiscent of Kafka and Poe in their mixture of horror and absurdity, and at the same time anticipating the alternate realities of The Twilight Zone or Black Mirror in their chilling commentary on the barbarities, catastrophes, and fanaticisms of the twentieth century. Read more
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