Jennifer Weiner on Gender Disparity in Reviews, J.D. Salinger's Unknown Writing, and More

Every day Poets & Writers Magazine scans the headlines—from publishing reports to academic announcements to literary dispatches—for all the news that creative writers need to know. Here are today's stories:

Yesterday, the Academy of American Poets announced that poets Toi Derricotte, Jane Hirshfield, and Arthur Sze have been elected to the Academy's Board of Chancellors, which is the nonprofit organization's advisory board comprised of distinguished poets.

Novelist Jennifer Weiner compares the frequency of male and female authors reviewed by the New York Times in 2011. She writes, “The men who received two reviews plus a profile were David Foster Wallace, Albert Brooks, Julian Barnes, Kevin Wilson, Nicholson Baker, Tom Perrotta, Russell Banks, Jeffrey Eugenides, Haruki Murakami, and Allan Hollinghurst. The only woman who received two reviews plus a profile was Tea Obreht.” (GalleyCat)

Author Caleb Crain writes of his personal encounters with the paintings of Elizabeth Bishop. (Paris Review Daily)

Two years after J.D. Salinger's death, Salinger biographer Kenneth Slawenski asks, "What was Salinger writing all of those years, and is it any good?" (Salon)

There are talented people in the comedy world, such as Megan Amram, Jesse Case, Brett Gelman, and Elizabeth Laime, who make use of poetry in their work. (Laughspin)

Novelist Cormac McCarthy surprised agents and producers alike by handing in his first spec screenplay titled The Counselor. The producers of the film adaptation of McCarthy's novel The Road purchased his new script in a preemptive acquisition. (Deadline)

The Calgary Herald reported that avant-garde songwriter Laurie Anderson hoped to create an opera adaptation of Thomas Pynchon’s famous novel Gravity’s Rainbow. However, Pynchon's rebuff was that she could, "as long as it was scored entirely for solo banjo." (New York Daily News)

Humorist Dan Bergstein details step-by-step instructions on how to write: "Step Three: Pudding cup." (Barnes and Noble Review)