Publishing is the Ottoman Empire of industries—no one who’s studied it has any idea how it’s lasted as long as it has. The truth is, from a distribution point of view, the buyer side of publishing is already well within the control of a single monopoly: Amazon.
In 1919, passions inflamed by the emergence of the U.S.S.R., the French author and Nobel Laureate Romain Rolland sent an appeal to the “intellectual workers of the world,” attempting, ultimately, to wrest from them a firmer—and more public—commitment to the … Continued
I grew up in a country where writers were like rock stars. It was the 90s: Norman Mailer-era America was over, had moved on to other things—but in France, you could still see a barely-handsome author on the banner of … Continued
How about this: tonight you’re walking home and you see a man with eight words painted across his chest: truth is not decided by a majority vote True to your nature, you scheme up a story. Centuries ago … Continued
Thornton Wilder first met Gertrude Stein in 1934, when the latter was lecturing in Chicago on the topic of her new work, The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas. They maintained a frank and adoring correspondence for ten years afterward. TO … Continued
The face grew a history, a body. And it grew its very own audience, transforming all who saw it into a unique author of rage.
Hermann Hesse won the Nobel Prize in 1946; thereafter, he spent the majority of his time letter-writing, estimating that his daily correspondence occupied some 150 manuscript pages. Below, Hesse responds to a letter by Felix Lützkendorf, who had written a … Continued
For the past twenty years, Dijkstra has used her camera to investigate the construction of identity. The result is a rich collection of photographs and videos studying both the fragility and resilience of identity.
Sasha Frere-Jones, the New Yorker’s pop music critic, often sounds like a guide taking the reader on a tour of some foreign, distant land. “You could argue that Dr. Dre and Snoop were the most important pop musicians since Bob … Continued
Below, after a night of long drinking, Ernest Hemingway attempts to assuage F. Scott Fitzgerald’s concerns regarding a perceived slight from Gertrude Stein. TO F. SCOTT FITZGERALD October 24, Paris, 1929 Dear Scott: Your note just came and am utilizing … Continued
