Enough with the literary-merit top 10 lists. Here are the best book covers of 2009. I personally love the look of Ruben Toledo’s designs, but not at all for the books they represent. An awkward confluence of visionary tones. Who imagines their literary heroines with such artistic flair? It’s unsettling.
Lit. & Academia
- City University of New York dean Ann Kirschner recently read Little Dorrit four different ways (paperback, Kindle, iPhone, audiobook). This week, she talks about it on NPR.
- Mavis Gallant is a writer who gives interesting interviews. (Not all of ‘em do.)
- Age of Innocence, digested.
- One of the great things about being a college professor is that you don’t envy the young.
Film & Art
- Roald Dahl’s wife claims he would have loved Wes Anderson’s recent Fox adaptation.
- Daniel Day-Lewis’ “bush-league Method acting.“
- A video of Picasso’s Guernica in 3D. Seriously cool.
Politics, Daily Life, Etc.
- “Green warfare”
- Food stamps and the way we see them are changing.
- On rude people, screaming children, and “social thuggery.”
- The Daily Beast interviews the mother of one of the White House gate crashers. She’s embarrassed.