Legal threats from Broadway's 'Mockingbird' sink productions around the country
Across America, small theaters are canceling productions of Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird," citing a threat of litigation from a powerful, sharp-elbowed Broadway producer related to a contract...
View ArticleWomen's Prize for Fiction longlist announced
The longlist for The Women's Prize for Fiction 2019 have been announced. The winner will be declared in June.The Silence of the Girls by Pat BarkerRemembered by Yvonne Battle-FeltonMy Sister, the...
View ArticleNobel Prize for Literature will be announced this fall--for 2018 and 2019
After skipping 2018's announcement due to scandal, the Nobel Foundation has announced that the Nobel Prize in Literature will be awarded in 2019 - and that Laureates will be announced for both 2018...
View ArticleSoft foods helped humans form 'f' and 'v' sounds
According to researchers, the English language might never have enjoyed a richness of F-words had it not been for early farmers and the food processing they favored. Dairy products and other soft...
View ArticleTrump Budget Calls for Closing the National Endowment for the Arts
In what has become an annual rite under the Trump administration, the president's fiscal year 2020 budget proposal calls for the elimination of the National Endowment for the Arts. Trump's initial...
View ArticleIn Y.A., where Is the line between criticism and cancel culture
Late last month, the author Kosoko Jackson withdrew the publication of his début young-adult novel, "A Place for Wolves," which had been slated for a March 26th release. The book, which follows two...
View ArticleWill Bibles designed for the Instagram generation get millennials into...
There are a plethora of reasons young people say they are turned off by the religion they were born into, or religion in general. Some cite the conservative views of many faiths, like opinions on...
View ArticleEuropean parliament approves sweeping changes to copyright law
The European parliament has approved a controversial directive introducing sweeping changes to copyright enforcement across Europe. The European copyright directive is best known for two provisions it...
View ArticleUK bookstore chain Waterstones says it can't pay living wage
More than 1,300 writers including Kerry Hudson, David Nicholls, Sally Rooney, Michael Rosen and Val McDermid have backed a campaign for Waterstones booksellers to be paid the living wage. The support...
View ArticleDeaf poet Raymond Antrobus wins Ted Hughes prize
After fiercely challenging Ted Hughes's description of deaf children as "alert and simple" in a poem in his first collection, the deaf spoken-word poet Raymond Antrobus has won the Ted Hughes award...
View ArticleMost people think local journalism is financially healthy. Here's the...
According to a Pew Research public opinion poll 3 in 4 Americans believe that local news outlets are in good financial shape and fewer than 1 in 6 pays for local news. "I found the survey results to...
View Article11 words that started out as spelling mistakes
Mental Floss has a fun article on words that started as spelling mistakes. For example, nicknames were originally called eke names, with the verb eke used here in the sense of "to make longer" or "to...
View ArticleThe Library of Congress to remove "illegal aliens" subject heading
The Library of Congress rejected pressure from student activists to change its subject heading "illegal aliens" to "undocumented immigrants," arguing that many do have documentation of some type and...
View ArticleRichard Powers wins Pulitzer for "The Overstory"
The 2019 Pulitzers have been announced. The winners in the "Letters" category are: Fiction: The Overstory by Richard Powers Nonfiction: Amity and Prosperity by Eliza Griswold History: Frederick...
View ArticleNetflix is on a book acquisition spree
Netflix has been on a book acquisition spree over the past year, developing screen adaptations of dozens of novels, series, short story collections, and graphic novels. About 50 of these literary...
View ArticleSci-fi and fantasy Grand Master Gene Wolfe has died aged 87
Gene Wolfe, a towering figure in science fiction whose magnum opus The Book of the New Sun was hailed as a masterpiece by Ursula K Le Guin, has died at the age of 87.
View ArticleDaphne Du Maurier poems found 90 years on
Thirty years after her death, Daphne du Maurier has not run out of surprises. Undiscovered poems written some 90 years ago when the author of Rebecca was still a literary unknown have been discovered...
View ArticleMark your calendars for this Saturday, April 27, for the fifth annual...
The fifth annual Independent Bookstore Day is this coming Saturday, and the excitement is increasing as stores receive their IBD catalogue orders. IBD is hosting a Twitter party with Bookstore Day...
View ArticleWarren Adler, who examined family dysfunction in 'The War of the Roses,'...
Warren Adler, a prolific novelist who launched a long and lucrative Hollywood career with his classic story "The War of the Roses"— the story of a hollowed-out marriage that became a runaway movie hit...
View ArticleTolkien estate disavows forthcoming film starring Nicholas Hoult
The family and estate of JRR Tolkien have fired a broadside against the forthcoming film starring Nicholas Hoult as a young version of the author, saying that they "do not endorse it or its content in...
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