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.
“Literature strengthens our imagination. If we all have the tools to try to imagine a better world, we’re already halfway there.” Lisa Lucas, executive director of the National Book Foundation, is confident that books will continue to have a prominent place in American culture. “We have an unlimited number of invitations to this party.” (TIME)
The Believer has announced the lineup for its third annual festival, which will take place in Las Vegas in April. Featured authors include Hanif Abdurraqib, Tommy Orange, and Mira Jacob. (Los Angeles Times)
Just days after its release, former New York Times executive editor Jill Abramson’s new book, Merchants of Truth, is facing accusations of plagiarism. The book has also been met with criticism concerning factual errors. (Vulture)
How should a writer respond to social media backlash? Authors Keira Drake and Jonah Winter share their experiences. (New York Times)
At the New Yorker, Emily Lordi reads Michelle Obama’s Becoming as a memoir of motherhood. “What Obama brings to this genre is, first, a powerful sense of self, which precedes and exceeds her domestic relationships…and, second, a conviction that the roles of wife and mother are themselves undefined.”
“They whisper from the other side of the struggle for authenticity, saying, ‘You are not wrong, dear one. Everyone else is.’” Jesse Green uncovers the queer compassion of America’s most enduring twentieth-century children’s books. (New York Times)
Michael B. Jordan is moving from Black Panther to Black Leopard, Red Wolf: The actor has bought the rights, along with Warner Bros., to produce a screen adaptation of Marlon James’s fantasy epic, which was released on Tuesday. (Hollywood Reporter)
In the wake of the New Yorker’s exposé of thriller author and former William Morrow executive editor Dan Mallory, members of the publishing and literary industries are asking the same question: What next? (Publishers Weekly)
“Generations after a collapse, well, you’ve just got a different world now. That’s what we’ve all got to deal with, and we’ve all got to address.” At the New York Public Library, N. K. Jemisin joined Maria Dahvana Headley, Sam J. Miller, and Alice Sola Kim in discussing their contributions to the speculative fiction anthology A People’s Future of the United States. The talk was led by Victor LaValle, the book’s coeditor. (Tor)
