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November 15, 2017
Between the News and a Prayer
Danez Smith’s poetry bends language to hope for the possibility of a better world.
David B. Hobbs
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October 26, 2017
What Was It Like to Be Ernest Hemingway?
The world of the Hemingways rattled with frequent gunfire.
John Banville
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October 6, 2017
Carmen Maria Machado’s Earnest Vision
Her new fiction collection reminds us that a new, more inclusive world is possible.
Larissa Pham
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July 20, 2017
The Poetics of Jazz
A new book presents an alternative aesthetic history of jazz—and is also a challenge to all music critics.
David B. Hobbs
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June 26, 2017
Percival Everett’s Abstract Art
His new novel, So Much Blue, is a meditation on seeing and abstraction, and it might be key for recognizing a new form of literary social critique.
Paul Devlin
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June 19, 2017
Mary Gaitskill Remains Open to Opposition
The closest thing we get to a precept in Somebody with a Little Hammer is that we should all try to learn to think for ourselves—and, even then, things can go wrong.
Larissa Pham
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April 14, 2017
Hwang Jungeun’s Noisy, Crowded Space
It’s rare for a novel to be so dense in social meaning, and yet so lightly composed.
E. Tammy Kim
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March 20, 2017
Caught Between Modernity and Tradition
With sympathy and ruthlessness, U.R. Ananthamurthy’s novel Samskara gives shape to the mutinies that raged within mid-century India.
Ratik Asokan
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March 17, 2017
The Model of Perfection in Morgan Parker’s Poems
The poet allows the struggles and the messiness of life—with a particular focus on black womanhood—to breathe.
Christopher Soto
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March 16, 2017
Sarah Manguso’s Existential Aphorisms
In 300 Arguments, the author’s rejection of the conventions of storytelling helps reinforce the sense of her own smallness.
Michele Moses