May 24, 2012 On the Shelf Great Gatsby, Great Casting, Commas By Sadie Stein Electric Literature’s Required Reading kicks off with a Ben Marcus story and accompanying animation. Your new favorite time waster: I Shot the Serif. Zach Galifianakis is Ignatius J. Reilly. Most comma mistakes. Zelda draws Scott. Speaking of, the first glimpse of Baz Luhrmann’s Great Gatsby trailer elicits … strong emotions.
May 23, 2012 On Television Dear Joan Holloway, the Sixties Will Pass By Adam Wilson Dear Joan Holloway, First off, a thank you. Thank you for reminding me why I still tune in. Things were iffy for a while, what with Don’s extramarital dalliances confined to the boudoirs of his fever dreams, Betty in a budget fat suit, and Campbell and Price going all Fight Club on us. But last night you were back, barely contained by a skin-tight scoop neck that left no curve concealed. You were back and in top form, trotting out instaclassic lines, like “My mother raised me to be admired,” in your signature, sultry deadpan. You were back, and what I’m saying is, Joanie, without you there is no Mad Men; there are men and they are mad, but you add the uppercase. Read More
May 23, 2012 Listen Arthur Miller Reads Death of a Salesman, February 1955 By Sadie Stein From the 92nd Street Y Poetry Center’s archives.
May 23, 2012 Arts & Culture Finding Francesca Woodman By Jillian Steinhauer Francesca Woodman, Caryatid, 1980, diazotype, 7' 5 in. x 3'. Courtesy George and Betty Woodman © 2012 George and Betty Woodman We’re fascinated by artists who die young. Something about the unnaturalness of an early death gives us a kind of morbid thrill. We hail their genius, attracted by the mystery of the unknown (and unknowable). Maybe we’re envious—at least, the parts of us that seek fame and approval. For the dead, everything is fixed and frozen; there’s no more work and no more pressure to perform. Pore as we will over their output, what they’ve left behind in the world will never change. Francesca Woodman was an artist who died young. She committed suicide, jumping from a window when she was twenty-two. I was thinking of waiting to tell you that, of trying to withhold the information until later in this essay, but the effort seemed futile: if you’re in art school, or read the New York Times, or have looked at the Guggenheim’s Web site lately, or even if you get the Skint, a daily New York events e-mail, you already know. The Skint mention is particularly curious. Somehow, in a newsletter composed of brief, one-line descriptions of featured events, Woodman’s suicide merited inclusion: “Thru 6/13: 120 works of photographer francesca woodman (nsfw), who committed suicide at age 22 in 1981, go on display at the Guggenheim.” The implication seems to be that her suicide either makes her more interesting or more worthy of an exhibition. Read More
May 23, 2012 On the Shelf Owls, Hatred, and Blurbese By Sadie Stein The lit-flick streak continues! The Palme d’Or is likely to go to one of several adaptations. As Harry Potter mania fades, hundreds of pet owls are being abandoned across England. How to open a new book. Quiche Lorraine, the comic. Need inspiration? Dial-a-poem! Andrew Ladd decodes Blurbese for the nonreviewer. When less is more: minimalist covers. Cineastes! Help save an endangered film before it’s too late! William Hazlitt, “On the Pleasure of Hating.”
May 22, 2012 On Poetry Hemingway on “The Lady Poets” By Sadie Stein Thanks to Tongue Journal and the Poetry Foundation for bringing us this fantastic bit of annotation! In November 1924, Ernest Hemingway published “The Lady Poets with Foot Notes” in Der Querschnitt. It’s a satirical poem full of lit-world in-jokes and allusions to female poets of the day, and Hemingway scholar Michael Reynolds has IDs them. The poetesses are: 1. Edna St. Vincent Millay 2. Aline Kilmer 3. Sara Teasdale 4. Zoe Akins 5. Lola Ridge 6. Amy Lowell The Poetry Foundation has more to say about all of them!