Reading Time: 1 Min. In “Literary Theory for Robots,” Dennis Yi Tenen’s playful new book on artificial intelligence and how computers learned to write, one of his most potent examples arrives in the form of a tiny mistake. Tenen draws links between modern-day chatbots, pulp-fiction plot generators, old-fashioned dictionaries and medieval prophecy wheels. Both the […]
Reading Time: 1 Min. Sheila Heti, photographed by Yael Malka. “A writer has to follow their curiosity, first and foremost,” writes Sheila Heti in the opening chapter of her nifty and singular new book, Alphabetical Diaries . “A writer is just one person under the stars,” begins the subsequent sentence, “one person in a universe, […]
Reading Time: 1 Min. You’ve probably heard by now that last night, during the Grammys ceremony, as she was accepting an award, Taylor Swift announced that she has a new album coming out. Many thought that if she were revealing anything, it would be the release date of her re-recording of her Reputation album. Instead, […]
Reading Time: 1 Min. Screenshot from the movie “Saltburn” In Saltburn , the backdrops are as mesmerizing and as essential to the plot as the delicate portrayal of the central relationship between Oliver and Felix. The settings are both tight and enclosed, the campus and the country house. These are my favorite settings for novels—discrete […]
Reading Time: 1 Min. Most of us who enjoy books are largely agreed upon concepts like “good writing” and “clarity and confidence of expression” being fundamental to our delight in the play of words upon a page. We are brought up to learn that conveying our thoughts in “good English” is part of our education […]
Reading Time: 1 Min. Recent books published by alumni of StoryStudio Chicago’s In a Year programs This week StoryStudio Chicago kicked off its third annual Pub Crawl , a month-long online publishing intensive, or program, of classes and panels demystifying the publishing world. The intensive includes advice from established authors, agents, and editors. The local […]
Reading Time: 1 Min. It’s easy to get overwhelmed by all of the new books coming out each month. And, as a result, it’s easy to miss or put off getting books that came out in hardcover, even the ones that garnered all the buzz. But fear not: the paperback reprints of February (also, how […]
Reading Time: 1 Min. Two prominent novelists have broken with PEN America over the organization’s decision to platform controversial actor and outspoken ceasefire opponent Mayim Bialik, as well as its relative silence on the unfolding genocide in Gaza (which so far has claimed the lives of at least 120 writers, poets , and journalists ). […]
Reading Time: 1 Min. In “ Life with Spider ,” your story in this week’s issue, a young man named Fletcher encounters a creature with six legs, jet-black skin, and no eyes, ears, or mouth. This is Spider, and Fletcher finds that Spider is everywhere he is, in increasingly menacing and forward ways. But Fletcher […]
Reading Time: 1 Min. Ruaridh Mollica in Sebastian. In Sebastian, Max leads a double life as a writing student and a sex worker, using his experiences for material. The film explores the themes of identity, intimacy, and shame in the context of Max’s dual existence. Sebastian is equally critical of the literary world and highlights […]
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