U.K. Press Publishes Only Women in 2018, To Kill a Mockingbird on Broadway, and More

by
Staff
2.16.18

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:

English book publisher And Other Stories has taken up the challenge proposed by novelist Kamila Shamsie to publish only women authors for a year. (BBC News)

“It didn’t take long for me to learn that the literary world, despite an exterior sheen of civility, could be a discouragingly conventional place teeming with unchecked male egos.” Adrienne Miller, former literary editor of Esquire, reflects on her experience in the 1990s publishing world. (Vogue)

Jeff Daniels has been cast as Atticus Finch in Aaron Sorkin’s forthcoming Broadway adaptation of Harper Lee’s classic novel To Kill a Mockingbird. The play will premiere on December 13. (Deadline)

Congressman John Lewis, whose award-winning graphic novel series, March, told the story of his role in the civil rights movement, announced a new book project, Run, which will pick up where March left off. “In sharing my story, it is my hope that a new generation will be inspired by Run to actively participate in the democratic process and help build a more perfect union here in America,” Lewis said in a statement. Run: Book One will be published in August by Abrams ComicArts. (Time)

At the Guardian, Joyce Carol Oates shares the books that shaped her life, changed her mind, and made her laugh: “I have been laughing aloud at countless passages in Michael Wolff’s scathing, hilarious, terrifying and (in an odd way) comforting Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House.”

The Violet Valley Bookstore opened earlier this month in Water Valley, Mississippi, and is the small town’s first queer/feminist bookstore. (Publishers Weekly)

“More than perhaps any other writer, Forugh Farrokhzad gave Iranian women permission to be bold, furious, lustful, and rapturous. She ripped the decorous conventions off women’s writing, holding up a mirror for women’s hopes and pain.” Fiction writer Jasmin Darznik shares how Iranian poet Forugh Farrokhzad influenced her writing, including her debut novel, Song of a Captive Bird. (Signature Reads)