Junot Diaz, Jennifer Egan, Stephen King – these are just a few of over 600 authors and creatives that have signed an open letter the American people, voicing their opposition against Trump. Although the presumptive Republican nominee’s unfiltered and brash campaign may have stirred appeal for some Americans, the literary community is not about to dawn their “Make America Great Again” caps. The letter, posted to Literary Hub, highlights the value of “pluralism” and “principled disagreement” and resists the candidate who “appeals to the basest and most violent elements in society”. The brief letter is provided in full below. AN OPEN …
For those of us who live in the states, Portland is kind of like the cool older sister you also kind of hate. True she prides herself on a green life and introduced you to the wonders of kombucha, but she also sneers at soda cans and fried foods and all the delicious fatty goodness we have left in this world. Even so, time and time again, Portland and the surrounding state of Oregon prove more progressive and cool than other states. Adding to it’s history or enlightened-older-sister moves, today the city of Portland has decidedly rolled its eyes at …
At the forefront of the Beat generation, a writing era marked by untethered narrative, hallucinogens and the dawning of a hippie heaven, is a man who wrote very little himself. As a major influence of the era, Neal Cassady didn’t write much, and his novel, The First Third, is not nearly as well recived as other books of the time. Nonetheless, Cassady was the Beat generation guru, the literal force behind the wheel of Kesey’s traveling hippie mobile, and, according to Jack Kerouac, the man who’s letter influenced On the Road, the novel that spurred many a sabbatical and quarter life crises. According to …
George Saunders is one among few writers to achieve such recognition for a short fiction writer. And that’s not to put down short fiction. Half of my favorite reads span a mere ten to twenty pages and I’d eat the New Yorker fiction section for breakfast if someone told me it was part of a nutritious breakfast. Nonetheless, there’s a tradition of awarding longer fiction over shorter fiction, and mixing up quality with quantity. That being said, Saunders has won two PEN awards, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the National Magazine’s Award for Fiction (just to name a few), all of which …
Leave it to Spielberg and Disney to tackle this Roald Dahl tale. Rich with Dahl’s trademark fantasies and creative musings, the film replicates the book’s magical feel, and the trailer is getting us all too excited to return to the story nestled at the heart of so many childhood memories (and adults – there’s no shame in admitting it). For anyone who read the book as a kid, you probably remember wanting to be ‘brave Sophie’ and thinking how rad it would be to have a giant friend. Who needs the neighborhood kids when you’ve got a 20 foot tall …
