August 4, 2015 Contests #ReadEverywhere, Even with Expressionist Masterworks By Dan Piepenbring Screamingly good prose. We’ve now entered the final month of our joint subscription deal: get The Paris Review and the London Review of Books for just $70 U.S. Already a Paris Review subscriber? Not a problem: we’ll extend your subscription to The Paris Review for another year, and your LRB subscription will still begin immediately. You may have noticed our magazines in conspicuous places lately: seamlessly integrated into famous artworks, for instance, or into the murals on the walls at the pub. These aren’t crass acts of vandalism—they’re part of a contest. From now through August 31, post a photo of yourself reading The Paris Review or the London Review of Books on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, or Pinterest, and use the #ReadEverywhere hashtag and one of our magazines’ handles. The grand prize is an Astrohaus Freewrite, the hotly anticipated smart typewriter that lets you write virtually anywhere. Need some inspiration? Pinterest users can get a glimpse of the competition here. Subscribe today.
July 27, 2015 Contests #ReadEverywhere, Even on Your Wedding Day By Dan Piepenbring Our editor, Lorin Stein, and our contributing editor, Sadie Stein, reading and wedding, wedding and reading. This summer we’re offering a joint subscription to The Paris Review and the London Review of Books for just $70 U.S. Already a Paris Review subscriber? Not a problem: we’ll extend your subscription to The Paris Review for another year, and your LRB subscription will still begin immediately. You may have noticed our magazines in conspicuous places lately: on the steps of the courthouse, for instance, in the eager hands of newlyweds. This isn’t a paean to the institution of marriage—it’s a contest. From now through August 31, post a photo of yourself reading The Paris Review or the London Review of Books on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, or Pinterest, and use the #ReadEverywhere hashtag and one of our magazines’ handles. The grand prize is an Astrohaus Freewrite, the hotly anticipated smart typewriter that lets you write virtually anywhere. Need some inspiration? Pinterest users can get a glimpse of the competition here. Subscribe today. And get hitched, if the spirit moves you.
July 21, 2015 Contests #ReadEverywhere, Even in the Clouds By Dan Piepenbring Your LRB may be used as a flotation device. It doesn’t grow on trees. It does grow, somehow, in this one garden. This summer we’re offering a joint subscription to The Paris Review and the London Review of Books for just $70 U.S. Already a Paris Review subscriber? Not a problem: we’ll extend your subscription to The Paris Review for another year, and your LRB subscription will still begin immediately. You may have noticed our magazines in conspicuous places lately: gardens, freeways, the sky. This isn’t a subliminal attempt to drive you insane—it’s a contest. From now through August 31, post a photo of yourself reading The Paris Review or the London Review of Books on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, or Pinterest, and use the #ReadEverywhere hashtag and one of our magazines’ handles. The grand prize is an Astrohaus Freewrite, the hotly anticipated smart typewriter that lets you write virtually anywhere. Need some inspiration? Pinterest users can get a glimpse of the competition here. Subscribe today. And please do not attempt to defy gravity with your LRB unless you’re a trained professional.
July 14, 2015 Contests #ReadEverywhere, All Summer Long By Dan Piepenbring A highly literate dog. If you haven’t heard, this summer we’re offering a joint subscription to The Paris Review and the London Review of Books for just $70 U.S. Everyone is excited about this deal—people, pets, pigeons. From now through August 31, post a photo of yourself reading The Paris Review or the London Review of Books on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, or Pinterest, and use the #ReadEverywhere hashtag and one of our magazines’ handles. The grand prize is an Astrohaus Freewrite, the hotly anticipated smart typewriter that lets you write virtually anywhere. Need some inspiration? Pinterest users can get a glimpse of the competition here. Subscribe today. And good luck! Bertie Pigeon reads the LRB.
July 2, 2015 Contests #ReadEverywhere Returns By The Paris Review Last year’s winning entry, by David Lasry. You’ve probably heard about our joint subscription deal with the London Review of Books—this summer, you can get a year of both magazines for the low price of $70 U.S. We’re also bringing back last summer’s #ReadEverywhere contest. From now through August 31, post a photo of yourself reading The Paris Review or the London Review of Books on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, or Pinterest—use the #ReadEverywhere hashtag and one of our magazines’ handles. The grand prize is an Astrohaus Freewrite, the hotly anticipated smart typewriter that lets you write virtually anywhere. Have a look at last year’s winners if you need inspiration—if the beekeepers, pelicans, elephants, and fireworks don’t convince you of the fierce competition, the modernist Swedish architecture assuredly will. The contest kicks off today. Get yourself a joint subscription, and ready your shutter finger.
November 28, 2014 Contests Announcing the Winner of Our Windows on the World Contest By The Paris Review Earlier this week, we announced the five finalists in our Windows on the World contest; today we’re happy to say that the winner is Simon Rowe, with his view from Himeji City, Japan. Simon will have his view sketched by Matteo Pericoli. Congratulations to him, and many thanks to all who entered! Simon Rowe Simon Rowe, Himeji City, Japan Time has gathered Japan’s villages into towns and cities, even turned some into metropolises, but the cho, or neighborhood, remains the heart and soul of the nation. Mine resembles an overcrowded circuit board with its dense clusters of houses spanning a century in design and its winding pathways, which deliver children to school, businessmen to bus stops, and elderly to their kitchen gardens. This is Kamiono-cho, in Himeji city—where the westward sprawl that begins in Osaka finally runs out of steam. Bamboo grows as thick as a man’s leg in the forests beyond the neighborhood, lofty and mesmerizing when the valley winds blow. In Autumn, the smell of burning rice chaff reaches through the window, signaling the end of the harvest season and the start of the festivals that celebrate its bounty. Taiko-drum volleys rattle my window, just as the earthquakes do. Snow dusts the rooftops in winter. Through the opened window, knife-edged winds carry a whiff of Siberia—chilling, yet invigorating. Spring sees cherry blossoms garnish the neighborhood and family picnics mushroom beneath them. Then the blossoms fall, like the brief and beautiful life of a samurai, with the first spring rains. Summer arrives and the window is shut to the whining insects and the suffocating humidity, which descend on the city. The pane rattles once more with the typhoons of late summer; TV antennas waggle on tiled roofs, momentarily lost to the rain. The old neighborhood, once famous for strawberry growers, is vanishing. Where fruit grew, model houses now stand. Outside them, housewives gather on dusk to chew over the day’s proceedings and await their children’s return from school. Long after dark, the buses will disgorge their tired husbands, who will drift heavy-hearted back to their homes and sleeping families.