Ghostly Presences Ghostly Presences
Unable to write effectively but unable to remain silent, W.G. Sebald, like the narrator of The Emigrants, is condemned to speak unsatisfactorily.
Aug 17, 2016 / Books & the Arts / Becca Rothfeld
Leaving Home to Go Home Leaving Home to Go Home
Yaa Gyasi’s ideas about fiction are suffused with her lifelong attention to the fluctuating shadows that race casts on American life.
Aug 12, 2016 / Erin Vanderhoof
Before the 1 Percenters, There Were the Uzedas Before the 1 Percenters, There Were the Uzedas
In The Viceroys, Frederico De Roberto’s novel of the Risorgimento, the Uzeda family corrupts everything it touches.
Aug 10, 2016 / Books & the Arts / Frederika Randall
Never-Endings Never-Endings
Georges Perec’s books are designed to stir readers to think actively, freshly, and imaginatively about what could have been, and what might come next.
Aug 3, 2016 / Books & the Arts / Joanna Scott
Jesse Ball’s Extreme Minimalism Jesse Ball’s Extreme Minimalism
His settings are dark, sketchy, and unrealistic by dint of what’s held back.
Jul 28, 2016 / Sasha Chapin
Máirtín Ó Cadhain: Found in Translation Máirtín Ó Cadhain: Found in Translation
They way to see the author’s satire of small-village life whole is to see the translations multiplied.
Jul 28, 2016 / Books & the Arts / Aaron Thier
Svetlana Alexievich’s Voices Svetlana Alexievich’s Voices
At a time when populism is in vogue, the Nobel Laureate has gone in the opposite direction. We need to read her and listen to the people she hears.
Jul 6, 2016 / Books & the Arts / John Palattella
Blindness and Vision Blindness and Vision
In Lina Meruane’s Seeing Red, both the reader and the protagonist learn to see blindness.
Jun 30, 2016 / Aaron Bady
Letters From the July 18-25, 2016, Issue Letters From the July 18-25, 2016, Issue
London calling… Sign of the times?… Connecting the dots… Left to her own devices?… Live long and… prosper?… GOP Humpty Dumpty…
Jun 30, 2016 / Our Readers
What Rebecca Schiff Knows What Rebecca Schiff Knows
Her most obvious forebear in minimalist stories is Lydia Davis. But Schiff is certainly charting her own path.
Jun 17, 2016 / Erin Vanderhoof