In the Media: January 2016

In the media is a fortnightly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous fortnight and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as traditional media are likely and the categories used are a guide, not definitives.

January’s been living up to it’s reputation as the most miserable month in the calendar. There’s been the misogynistic and racist response to Sarah Howe’s Young Writer of the Year Award and TS Eliot Award wins. Poet, Katy Evans-Bush responded with ‘TS Eliot prize row: is winner too young, beautiful – and Chinese?‘ in The Guardian.

The deaths of David Bowie and Alan Rickman at least inspired some great writing: Stacey May Fowles, ‘Reconciling David Bowie‘ on Hazlitt and Sali Hughes, ‘I’ve had it up to here with the grief police‘ on The Pool. Gwendolyn Smith, ‘Forget Snape – in concentrating on him, we leave out one of the greatest roles Alan Rickman ever performed‘ in The Independent and Daisy Buchanan, ‘Alan Rickman’s Colonel Brandon taught me an important lesson about love‘ on The Pool

In happier news, there were a number of other prize wins for female writers: Kate Atkinson won the Costa Novel Prize; Anuradha Roy won the 2016 DSC prize for south Asian literature; A.S. Byatt won the Erasmus Prize, and the writers shortlisted for the Costa Short Story Award were revealed, including Annalisa Crawford, Peggy Riley and Erin Soros.

Glamour welcomed a transgender columnist: Juno Dawson will chart her journey in the magazine. I’ll add Juno’s column to the regular columnists list once it has a permanent URL.

The Observer revealed their New Faces of Fiction for 2016 and Joanna Cannon wrote this great piece – The Monster Under the Bed – about her inclusion.

And the woman with the most publicity of late is Amy Liptrot with ‘I swam in the cold ocean and dyed my hair a furious blue… I was moving upwards slowly‘ in The Guardian; interviews in The Independent and The Pool.

The best of the rest:

On or about books/writers/language:

• Morgan Jerkins, ‘Writing While Black: On Cliche, Stereotype and the Struggle to Describe Blackness‘ on Literary Hub
• E.V. de Cleyre, ‘On “the Terrible Efficiency of Gaslighting”‘ on Brevity
• Sarah Weinmann, ‘True-crime stories: a centuries-old craze from Ben Franklin to Making a Murderer‘ in The Guardian
• Zetta Elliott, ‘Nobody’s Cheerleader‘ on her blog
• Lauren Groff, ‘on Writing with Lightness‘ on The Atlantic
• Sian Cain, ‘Why a non-white Nancy Drew could be amazing‘ in The Guardian
• Lenika Cruz, ‘The Promising Case of a Non-White Nancy Drew‘ on The Atlantic
• Catherine Lacey ‘on the Inspiration Behind Nobody is Ever Missing‘ on the WHSMITH blog
• Brigid Delaney, ‘A Little Life: why everyone should read this modern-day classic‘ in The Guardian
• Zoe Heller and Francine Prose, ‘Is the Writer’s Only Responsibility to His Art?‘ in The New York Times
• Gideon Lewis-Kraus, ‘The Trials of Alice Goffman‘ in The New York Times Magazine
• Claire Fuller, ‘The Huge, Unwieldy Beast versus Flash Fiction‘ on Women Writers, Women’s Books
• Adelle Waldman, ‘The Ideal Marriage, According to Novels‘ in The New Yorker
• Ali Smith ‘on Trumpet by Jackie Kay‘ in The Guardian
• Sarah Crompton, ‘Sexism on the stage – meet the women tearing up the script‘ in The Guardian
• Maria Turtschaninoff, ‘Why is feminist fantasy important?‘ in The Bookseller
• Catherine Hokin, ‘The Challenges of Writing Historical Fiction‘ on Helen MacKinven’s blog
• Deborah Smith, ‘On Translating Human Acts by Han Kang‘ on Asymptote
• Alison Glock Cooper and T Cooper, ‘Transgender: identity is never one single thing so tick the box that says ‘other’‘ in The Guardian
• Ann Mah, ‘Elena Ferrante’s Naples, Then and Now‘ in The New York Times
• Chloe Angyal, ‘I Decided Not To Read Books By White Authors For A Year. Conservatives Lost Their Damn Minds‘ on The Huffington Post
• Carmiel Banasky, ‘Topography of a Novel: The Suicide of Claire Bishop‘ on Blunderbuss
• Laura Miller, ‘Ladies of Leisure: The resurgence of the housewife novel‘ on Slate
• Martha Tennent and Maruxa Relaño, ‘How a Mother-Daughter Translation Team Makes it Work‘ on Literary Hub
• Peter Bebegal, ‘Cracking the Codes of Leena Krohn‘ in The New Yorker
• Sarah Lyall, ‘The Author Elizabeth Strout on ‘Lucy Barton’ and How Her Characters Come Into Being‘ in The New York Times
• Isabel Rogers, ‘on What a Poet can teach a Novelist‘ on Isabel Costello’s Literary Sofa
• Vidhu Aggarwal, ‘“I’m nothing, if not”: An Anecdote of a Jar‘ on VIDA
• Dawn Finch, ‘Why are we still talking about diversity and inclusion?‘ on An Awfully Big Blog Adventure
• Samantha Hunt’s Literary Mixtape: how to be a deranged cult leader in The Guardian
• Emma Claire Sweeney, ‘on the power of poetry and fiction‘ on Legend Press
• Joanna Biggs, ‘Work is where we make friends, exert power, fall in love‘ in The Guardian
• Non Pratt, ‘No taboo should be off limits when writing for teenagers‘ in The Guardian
• Brittany K. Allen, ‘I Wrote the Accent: A Black Writer Considers “Urban Romance”‘ in The Toast
• Laura Miller, ‘Why Fates and Furies was this year’s most talked-about novel‘ in The Guardian
• Cynthia Ozick, ‘The Novel’s Evil Tongue‘ in The New York Times

Personal essays/memoir:

• Alana Massey, ‘Marriage and Two Kids: A Most Scandalous Fantasy‘ in The Cut
• Lydia Kiesling, ‘Death and Heirs: A View from the San Francisco Housing Market‘ on The Millions
• Saigowri Kuruvada, ‘How I Learned To Accept My Self-Harm Scars‘ on Buzzfeed
• Isabel Murray, ‘I’m a Disgusting Sleeper‘ on The Awl
• Rowan Whiteside, ‘Uninvited‘ in Standard Issue
• Jane Campbell, ‘The Long Run‘ on Hazlitt
• Yurina Ko, ‘Little Big Eater Girl‘ on The New Inquiry
• Fleur Smithwick, ‘A response from my mother to the weird kid blog‘ on her blog
• Jen Gann, ‘Why Am I So Sad About Having a Boy?‘ in The Cut
• Monica Sok, ‘On Fear, Fearlessness, and Intergenerational Trauma‘ on VIDA
• Jenny Diski, ‘The Island of lost words‘ on her blog
• Lyz Lenz, ‘Growing Up With White Paranoia: Persecution vs. Privilege‘ on Pacific Standard
• Ellabel Risbridger, ‘#BREAKFREE From Likes: ‘I’ve Grown Up On The Internet’‘ in Marie Claire
• Cris Mazza, ‘A Finished Brain‘ on The Rumpus
• Julianne Smolinski, ‘The Funny Thing About Abusive Relationships‘ on The Cut
• Jean Hannah Edelstein, ‘I’m a Previvor‘ on Catapult
• Nicole Chung, ‘What Goes Through Your Mind: On Nice Parties and Casual Racism‘ in The Toast
• Lauren McKeon, ‘As Women Scorned‘ on Hazlitt
• Kim Brooks, ‘I’m Having a Friendship Affair‘ in The Cut
• Claire Jimenez, ‘Spanish Lessons: On Language Loss and Recovery‘ in The Toast

Feminism:

• Amy Swales, ‘A Story of a Fuck Off Fund‘ on Medium
• Cade Lebron, ‘Liar, Liar: On Writing About Rape Online‘ on Electric Literature
• Jane Marie, ‘On Going Off My Depression Medication During Pregnancy‘ in Cosmopolitan
• Rosamund Urwin, ‘Why do crimes against women always have the same, sad ending?‘ on The Pool
• Kathy Dobie, ‘To Catch a Rapist‘ in The New York Times
• Ann Friedman, ‘The 2015 renaissance of the agony aunt‘ on The Pool
• Nadia Atia, ‘Your fascination with Muslim women’s bodies has a long misogynistic history‘ on Media Diversified

Society and Politics:

• Chimene Suleyman, ‘‘Integration’ or ‘Assimilation’ is a Two-sided Negotiation‘ on Media Diversified
• Afroze Zaidi-Jivraj, ‘What It’s Like Being Muslim In 2016‘ on Media Diversified
• Leena Habiballa, ‘Too Black to be Arab, too Arab to be Black‘ on Media Diversified
• Alicia Eler and Eve Peyser, ‘Tinderization of Feeling‘ on The New Inquiry
• Harriet Alida Lye, ‘The Myth of the Myth of the City of Love‘ on Hazlitt
• Emer O’Toole, ‘How to be a moderately successful person‘ in The Guardian
• Kavita Bhanot, ‘Decolonise, not Diversify‘ on Media Diversified
• Stacia L. Brown, ‘The ugly history of comparing black athletes and animals‘ in The Washington Post

Film, Television, Music, Art and Fashion:

• Lynn Enright, ‘The brilliant feminism of Transparent and Jill Soloway‘ on The Pool
• Jude Rogers, ‘Why we’re wired to love pop music‘ on The Pool
• Hannah McGill, ‘Nora Ephron: queen of hearts‘ on the BFI website
• Michelle Smith, ‘Suffragette reminds us why it’s a lie that feminists need men’s approval‘ in The Guardian
• Sarah Maria Griffin, ‘Girls Explain Star Wars to You‘ on Scannain
• Robin James, ‘Hello From the Same Side‘ in The New Inquiry

The interviews:

• Joyce Carol Oates on Electric Literature and in The Guardian
• Lisa Williamson in The Guardian and on Scottish Book Trust
• Amy Gustine on Electric Literature
• Helen Ellis in The New York Times
• Mira Ptacin on Flavorwire
• Chelsea Hodson in Hobart
• Tara Guha on Chouett
• Elizabeth Evans on Guernica
• Diane Williams in The Los Angeles Review of Books
• Ann Goldstein (Elena Ferrante’s translator) on Guernica
• Chaitali Sen on The Rumpus
• Valerie Martin in The Guardian
• Eileen Myles in The New York Times
• Liz Lochhead in The Guardian
• Margaret Atwood on Electric Literature
• Emma Donoghue on The Pool
• Sandra Cisneros on The Rumpus
• Lidia Yuknavitch and Anakana Schofield on Electric Literature
• Marlene Van Niekerk in The White Review
• Helen McClory on The Skinny
• Caitlin Moran in Stylist
• Roxane Gay on Sky Blue Window
• Tessa Hadley in the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times
• Ayisha Malik in The New Statesman
• Samantha Hunt on The Millions
• Claire Fuller on Sarah Jasmon’s blog
• Claudia Rankine in The Guardian
• Amy Poehler in The Guardian

The regular columnists:

• Laurie Penny in The New Statesman
• Lucy Mangan in Stylist
• Roxane Gay in The Guardian US
• Yasmin Alibhai-Brown in The Independent
• Caitlin Moran in The Times
• Lauren Laverne in The Pool
• Ella Risbridger in The Pool
• Sali Hughes in The Pool
• Bim Adewunmi in The Guardian
• Sophie Heawood in The Guardian
• Eva Wiseman in The Observer
• Tracey Thorn in The New Statesman
• Chimene Suleyman and Maya Goodfellow on Media Diversified
• Josie Pickens on Ebony
• Bridget Christie in The Guardian
• Lizzy Kremer on Publishing for Humans

In the Media: 10th May 2015

In the media is a weekly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous week and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as traditional media are likely and the categories used are a guide, not definitives.

It’s Mother’s Day in 80 countries around the world today. Not surprisingly, there has been a whole range of articles, from a whole range of view points, about mothers and motherhood this week. The Hairpin ran a series including  ‘Mommy Queerest‘ by Sarah Liss; ‘Thoroughly Modern Murdering Mothers; or, Women Who Kill for Their Children‘ by Meredith Haggerty; ‘A Joke, A Story‘ by Naomi Skwarna; ‘Going for the Burn: Revisiting Jane Fonda’s Workouts‘ by Alison Hamm’ ‘Mothers and Moms‘ by Haley Mlotek, and Randi Bergman, ‘The Weirdest Beauty Tips I Learned From My Mom‘.

Tameka Cage-Conley wrote, ‘Motherhood, Art, And Police Brutality‘ on VSB; Amy Shouse wrote ‘My mom never wanted kids‘ on Salon; Anne Enright wrote, ‘When Mother Leaves the Room‘ in The New York Times; Cheryl Strayed wrote, ‘The ‘Painful Personal Toll Lung Cancer Has Taken on My Life’‘ on The Huffington Post; Monica Hessler, ‘The long drive to end a pregnancy‘ in The Washington Post; Mary HK Choi, ‘The Dicks Of Our Lives‘ on Buzzfeed; Mary Elizabeth Williams, ‘Sorry about Mother’s Day, my childfree girlfriends: Moms aren’t any more special (or unselfish) than you‘ on Salon; Edwidge Danticat, ‘A Prayer Before Dying‘ on Literary Hub; Brogan Driscoll, ‘I Refuse to Celebrate ‘Dad Bod’, Until We Appreciate the ‘Mum Bod’ Too‘ on the Huffington Post

Catherine Bennett wrote in The Guardian, ‘It’s dehumanising to be ‘an oven’ for someone else’s baby‘; Jessica Roake wrote, ‘An Ode to the “Mom’s Night Out”‘ on Slate; Rebecca Mead wrote, ‘A Woman’s Place Is on the Internet‘ in The New Yorker; Sophie Heawood wrote, ‘I’ve read all the advice, but I still don’t know – am I raising a serial killer?‘ in The Guardian; Laila K wrote, ‘Up with the kids‘ in The Pool; Dahlia Lithwick, ‘“Bye-Bye, Normal Mommy”‘ on Slate; Christie Watson, ‘The Joy and Pain of Trans-Racial Adoption‘ on Literary Hub; Meagan O’Connell, ‘It’s My First Mother’s Day As a Mom. Now What?‘ in The Cut; Kate Spencer, ‘How I Finally Let Go Of Grief For My Dead Mom‘ on Buzzfeed; Domenica Ruta, ‘Can Having a Child Help Me Get Over My Abusive Mom?‘ in The Cut.

Danah Boyd, ‘I Miss Not Being Scared‘ on Medium; Melissa Duclos, ‘To the Doctor Who Reported Me to Child Protective Services‘ on The Offing; Christopher Frizzelle, ‘The Day Virginia Woolf Brought Her Mom Back to Life‘ on Literary Hub; Lauren Laverne, ‘“Mum” as a diss‘ in The Pool.

And if you’d rather read a book instead, Literary Hub suggests, ‘Five Intense Books for Mother’s Day‘ and the Huffington Post recommends, ‘Mother’s Day Reads: Eight Great Mother Characters in Literature‘.

Photograph by Idil Sukan

In the UK, there was a general election. 3AM Magazine ran a whole series of reactions including, Lauren Elkin, ‘an open letter to mark-francis vandelli‘; Juliet Jacques, ‘london – 2015‘; Eley Williams, ‘rosette manufacture: a catalogue and spotters’ guide‘, and Rachel Genn, ‘you wouldn’t like me when i’m disappointed‘. Other reactions included: Laurie Penny, ‘Don’t give in: an angry population is hard to govern; a depressed population is easy‘ in the New Statesman; Joan Smith, ‘Almost a third of all MPs are now women – a milestone has been reached‘ in The Guardian; Janice Turner, ‘Why the north is in revolt against Labour‘ in The Times; Beluah Maud Devaney, ‘Unfriending Tories on Facebook Is Not the Answer‘ on the Huffington Post

And there were a few pieces written prior to the result that I still think are worth reading: Sam Baker, ‘When voting doesn’t make you feel good‘ in The Pool; Suzanne Moore, ‘By Friday we’ll be reduced to bystanders at a revoltingly macho political stare-off‘ in The Guardian; Concepta Cassar, ‘Food For Thought: Hazlitt, Malthus and the Tragedy of Food Banks‘ in Litro; Katy Guest, ‘Sandi Toksvig’s Women’s Equality Party is a movement for which time has come‘ in The Independent; Salena Godden, ‘Colour-blind: What colour are you?‘ on her blog, and Isabel Rogers’ poem ‘The truth about political correctness‘ on her blog.

I promised myself I wouldn’t mention it but there have been a few good pieces written about the birth of THAT baby: Sian Norris, ‘She’s not like other girls…‘ on Sian and Crooked Rib; Heather Havrilesky, ‘Royal Baby Girl Fated to Lead International Mob of Fake Princesses?‘ in The Cut, and Viv Groskop, ‘She’s a tiny baby, not a Kardashian‘ in The Pool.

Congratulations to Gill Lewis who won the Little Rebels children’s book award with Scarlet Ibis this week; to Emily St. John Mandel who won the Authur C Clarke award, and to Alice Notley who won the Ruth Lilly Poetry Foundation Prize. A gender balanced shortlist was announced for the RSL Ondaatje Prize 2015 and a female dominated one for the Branford Boase Award 2015. The ALS Longlist and NSW Premier’s Literary Awards Shortlists were also announced.

The best of the rest:

On or about books/writers/language:

• Katy Derbyshire, some stats about Women in Translation on Women in Translation
• Voula Grand, ‘on The next Gone Girl (The spells stories cast – or don’t)’ on Isabel Costello’s Literary Sofa
• Lois Leveen, ‘All the Years Ahead: On Committing Literary Suicide‘ on The Millions
• Joanna Biggs, ‘My hero: Shulamith Firestone‘ in The Guardian
• Various, ‘‘Get your head out of that book!’ – the children’s stories that inspired leading writers‘ in The Guardian
• Anne Enright, ‘A return to the western shore: on yielding to the Irish tradition‘ in The Guardian]
• Jill Kronstadt, ‘A God in Ruins: Kate Atkinson After Kate Atkinson‘ on Bloom
• Diane Watt, ‘Rethinking the Medieval Canon‘ on The University of Surrey: Women’s Literary Culture and the Medieval Canon
• Jeanette Winterson, ‘Ruth Rendell: memories of a friend who stood by me‘ in The Guardian
• Alison Flood, ‘Archive find shows medieval mystic Margery Kempe’s autobiography ‘doesn’t lie’‘ in The Guardian
• Jordan Kinsley, ‘Rewriting Fairy Tales‘ on Rewriting Mary Sue
• ‘Like Madame Bovary blasted by lightning’: By Grand Central Station I Sat Down And Wept on the 4th Estate Blog
• Jill Lepore, ‘Looking at Female Superheroes with 10-year-old Boys‘ in The New Yorker
• Vanessa Lafaye, ‘The Breath of Creativity‘ on Random Things Through My Letterbox
• Josephine Livingstone, ‘Ban Men from Literary Readings‘ in the Gawker Review of Books
• Aminatta Forna, ‘Where Are the West’s Political Novelists?‘ on Literary Hub
• Emma Claire Sweeney, ‘Elizabeth Bishop and Marianne Moore‘ on Something Rhymed
• Kirsty Logan, ‘Made-up worlds (and a worldie maid)‘ on Bookanista
• Robert McCrum, ‘The 100 best novels: No 85 – The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath (1966)‘ in The Guardian
• Lori Lansens, ‘Living with authoritis‘ on Bookanista
• Lizzy Kremer, ‘Living Life Through Metaphor: the Necessity of Fiction‘ on Publishing for Humans
• Sarah Seltzer, ‘Why We Should All Be Spinsters: Writers Take on a New Feminine Mystique‘ on Flavorwire
• Jason McBride, ‘Losing Control of the Language‘ (on Kathy Acker) on Slate
• Marsha Lederman, ‘Breaking up the Canadian theatre boys’ club: New plays fight the gender gap with all-female casts‘ in The Globe and The Mail
• Caroline Criado-Perez, ‘We deserve to know about the women who show us what can be done and how to do it’ in The Observer
• Jo Walton, ‘A Great Castle Made of Sea: Why Hasn’t Susanna Clarke’s Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell Been More Influential?‘ on Tor
• M. J. Carter, ‘on Edgar Allan Poe‘ on Raven Crime Reads
• Marie Phillips, ‘In defence of Amy March‘ in The Pool
• Katherine May, ‘Happily Never After‘ on Aeon
• Jamie Fisher, ‘High Style and Desperate Love: On the Life and Work of Eileen Chang‘ on The Millions
• Mallory Ortberg, ‘Dirtbag Tess Of The D’Urbervilles‘ in The Toast
• Leah Ferguson, ‘It’s Like Having An Alter Ego, But Harder‘ on Women Writers, Women’s Books
• Alex Clark, ‘25 years of the Encore award: a cure for second-novel syndrome‘ in The Observer
• Kate Taylor, ‘We need to speak up about sexism in the arts‘ in The Globe and The Mail

Personal essays/memoir:

• Lucy Grealy, ‘Autobiography of a Body‘ on Nerve
• Masooma Hussain, ‘Symmetry in Our Misshapenness‘ in The Butter
• Sharisse T. Smith, ‘Hair Trajectory‘ in The Los Angeles Review
• Jenny Zhang, ‘Far Away from Me‘ in Rookie
• Tovah Burnstein, ‘A Woman Like Water‘ in The Butter
• Clarissa Wei, ‘Why I Will Always Love My Ex-Boyfriends‘ on XOJane
• Suzanne Joinson, ‘Dirty Talk and Dostoyevsky on the Night Shift‘ in The New York Times
• Leah Reich, ‘The Tin Woodman‘ on Medium
• Vickie Vertiz, ‘Kissing‘ in The Offing
• Anupa Mistry, ‘That Home Feeling‘ on Hazlitt
• Sali Hughes, ‘Proud to be a prude‘ in The Pool
• Melissa Hughes, ‘Starting Over at 35‘ on Medium
• Jenny Diski, ‘In Gratitude‘ in the London Review of Books (£)
• Jennifer S. Cheng, ‘Hikikomori: Salt Constellations‘ on LIterary Hub
• Mary J. Breen, ‘Childhood: Dollhouses, Solitude, and the Souls in Purgatory‘ in The Toast
• Amelia Gray, ‘Tsujita LA Artisan Noodle‘ on The Morning News
• Sonya Lee, ‘Daisy Duke and the Manosphere‘ on The Rumpus
• Mackenzie Mays, ‘Your Dad is Still Your Dad: On Family and Alcoholism‘ in The Toast
• Thea Goodman, ‘The Elevator Ride‘ on The Rumpus
• Abhilasha Kumar, ‘A Capital Affair‘ in Kindle
• Steph, ‘In celebration of discovering feminism, Caitlin Moran, and chips with curry sauce‘ on Reimagining My Reality
• Leesa Cross-Smith, ‘Kentucky Decadent & Derby Depraved‘ on Real Pants
• Sarah Lepiciger, ‘How do you cure homesickness?‘ in The Guardian
• Sarah Franklin, ‘How could I not guess that my son would love football?‘ in The Guardian

Feminism:

• Ann Friedman, ‘Let’s do this. Let’s talk about periods‘ in The Pool
• Rebecca Carroll, ‘The Police Hit Black Women With Both Racism and Sexism At Once‘ in The Guardian
• Guilaine Kinouani, ‘The language of distress: Black women’s mental health and invisibility‘ on Media Diversified
• Juniper Fitzgerald, ‘The Price of Knowledge: Discrimination Against Sex Workers In Academia‘ on Tits and Sass
• Katy Waldman, ‘Bitch, I’ll Tell You Why This Sentence Construction Is So Effective‘ on Slate
• Meg Zulch, ‘Why Calling Someone A “Tomboy” Is Hugely Problematic And Reifies Unnecessary Gender Roles‘ on Bustle
• Sayan Bhattacharya, ‘A Room of Her Own‘ in Kindle
• Koli Mitra, ‘Fault(y) Lines‘ in Kindle
• Deepa Bhasthi, ‘The Pakoda-Frying Feminist‘ in Kindle
• Tracy Moore, ‘The Best Time I Left a Used Tampon in a Dude’s Shower‘ in Jezebel
• Maxine Builder, ‘How The Lack Of Asian Models In The Fashion Industry Created A Divide Between My Racial Identity And My Body‘ on Bustle
• Megan Nolan, ‘Why is it so hard to get away from the powerful-man-loves-sweet-young-woman dynamic?‘ in The Pool

Society and Politics:

• Eva Wiseman, ‘Where have all the ghosts gone?‘ in The Observer
• Sarah Maslin, ‘The Price of Nice Nails‘ in The New York Times
• Kate Fagan, ‘Split Image‘ on ESPN
• Sarah Miller, ‘Death to the Maxi Dress: A Manifesto‘ on Jezebel
• Jessica Pressler, ‘Bullsh*t. The art of the sell, a half century after Mad Men‘ in New York Magazine
• Kera Bolonik, ‘America’s ugly whitesplaining epidemic: Baltimore, Freddie Gray and the media’s utter cluelessness‘ on Salon
• Aamina Shakur, ‘Who Are the Rightful Owners of Artifacts of Oppression?‘ on Hyperallergic
• Elisa Veini, ‘Doing Nothing Is an Art‘ in Berfrois
• Megan Garber, ‘Aisle Be Seeing You: The Rise of the Totally Transparent Bridal Gown‘ in The Atlantic
• Viv Groskop, ‘You’re never going to retire‘ in The Pool
• Keiko Lane, ‘Intersections, on the Anniversary of the Rodney King Rebellion‘ on The Rumpus
• Jamilah King, ‘#blacklivesmatter: How three friends turned a spontaneous Facebook post into a global phenomenon‘ in The California Sunday Magazine
• Noor Alnaqeeb, ‘My Middle East: ‘We should go out there and represent ourselves’‘ on Media Diversified
• Leslie Berlin, ‘Silicon Valley Then and Now: To Invent the Future, You Must Understand the Past‘ on Medium
• Stacia L. Brown, ‘Looking While Black‘ in The New Republic

The interviews:

• Mary Talbot on Escape Books
• Caroline Criado-Perez in The Pool and in The Observer
• Alice Notely on The Poetry Foundation
• Kate Mosse on One Book Lane
• Minette Walters in The Guardian
• Joanna Walsh on The Fem
• Maggie Nelson on Salon on The Rumpus, on Literary Hub, on Tin House
• Toni Morrison at Politics and Prose on Slate and in United Hemispheres Magazine
• Heidi Julavits in The Paris Review
• Deborah Install (and Ben and Tang) on Sitting on a Cornflake
• Joanna Biggs on the Guardian Books’ Podcast
• Lauren Olivier in The Guardian
• Kate Atkinson on Front Row on BBC Radio 4
• Jillian Tamaki on Publishers Weekly
• Catherine Lacey in The White Review
• Claire Fuller on Word Mothers
• Anne Marie Macari on The Rumpus
• Sarah Dessen on Bustle
• Ananda Devi in The Los Angeles Review of Books
• Amelia Gray on Midnight Breakfast
• Leslie Jamison on Salon
• Sara Novic on BookPage
• Sherry Simon on Drunken Boat
• Mia Alvar on Publishers Weekly
• Collier Nogues on Drunken Boat
• Zoe Pilger on PEN American Centre
• Tasha Kavanagh in The Independent
• Elisa Albert on For Books’ Sake
• Alison Sampson on Broken Frontier
• Lauren Beukes and Joelle Taylor on the For Books’ Sake Podcast
• Lindsay Parnell on Linen Press
• Abi Hynes on The Fem
• Anne Enright on Open Book, BBC Radio 4
• Mona Eltahawy in The Observer
• Mary Norris in The Observer
• Katherine Clements on Rebecca Mascull’s Blog
• Lydia Syson on Rebecca Mascull’s Blog

If you want some fiction to read:

• ‘The Boy Is Dead‘ by Kathryn Mockler in The Butter
• ‘Hyperbolics‘ an excerpt from The Story of My Teeth by Valeria Luiselli in BOMB Magazine
• ‘Infinite Cortex‘ by Clare Archibald in Visual Verse
• An extract from From a Distance by Raffaella Barker on Bloomsbury Publishing
• ‘The Creature‘ by Edna O’Brien on Literary Hub
• ‘From the Paint Stains‘ by Rachel Charlene Lewis in Plenitude
• ‘odds & evens‘ by Candy Sue Ellison in 3:AM Magazine
• Extracts from all the shortlisted novels for the Bailey’s Fiction Prize for Women on We Love This Book
• An extract from Sphinx by Anne Garréta in The Believer
• ‘Bad Sex‘ by Jowita Bydlowska on Numero Cinq
• ‘Mother Wit‘ by Nitasha Kaul in Kindle
• ‘My Life Is a Joke‘ by Sheila Heti in The New Yorker
• ‘CONTINUE? Y/N‘ by Kendra Fortmeyer in The Toast
• ‘Amazing‘ by Erin Fitzgerald in Okey-Panky
• An extract from Girl at War by Sara Novic on Literary Hub
• ‘I’ll Die and Be Right There‘ by Anna Mateeva (tr. Ellen Litman) on Guernica

If you want some poetry to read:

• ‘Glass, Ceiling‘ by C.E. Hyun in The Offing
• Three Micros by Caits Meissner in The Offing
• ‘The Mission‘ by Rita Ann Higgins on Poethead
• ‘The Cake‘ by Krystin Gollihue on Blunderbuss
• ‘The Door‘ by Nomi Stone on Guernica
• ‘Selling His Soul‘ by Sophie Hannah in The Guardian
• ‘Dear Dorothy‘ by Suzi F. Garcia in The Offing
• Two Poems by Lauren Gordon on Up the Staircase
• ‘This Was Ugly‘ by Lauren Gordon in Hermeneutic Staircase

If you want some non-fiction to read:

• ‘Scratching Out the City‘ from City Spaces: Filling in Berlin’s Gaps by Annett Groeschner (tr. Katy Derbyshire) in The Offing
• An extract from Between You and Me – Confessions of a Comma Queen by Mary Norris in The Observer

Photograph by Cybele Knowles

The lists:

• 19 Great Mysteries for Summer (with 19 Great Plot Twists) on The Oyster Review
• PW Picks: Books of the Week, May 11, 2015 on Publishers Weekly
• 32 Essential Asian-American Writers You Need To Be Reading on Buzzfeed
• 7 Moving, Must-Read Memoirs Coming Out This Year on the Huffington Post
• The Best Graphic Novels I’ve Ever Read on Electric Literature
• 5 Books to Take on Vacation in the Huffington Post
• Here’s the Non-Trashy Summer Books You Need to Be Reading This Year on The Debrief
• 10 (insane) things I learned about the world reading Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged” on Salon
• 18 Brilliant Books You Won’t Want To Miss This Summer on the Huffington Post
• The 22 Best F-Bombs From Female Authors in the Huffington Post

In the Media: 5th April 2015

In the media is a weekly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous week and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. Also, just a note to make it clear that I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as traditional media are likely.

As In the Media seems to be growing by the week, I’ve divided it into more categories. Comments welcome on what you think of the change and whether you’d prefer different/more section headings.

The big news this week is the launch of The Pool, a free, online resource written by women, for women. Writer and broadcaster, Lauren Laverne and writer and former Red magazine editor, Sam Baker are the women behind it, The Guardian ran a piece about the site earlier in the week. ‘Drops’ of content are released during the day; each piece tells you approximately how long it will take you to read/listen to/watch, and you can search by content or by time if you’ve only got a few minutes.  You can also sign up for an account which allows you to save articles to your ‘scrapbook’ either to read later or refer back to.

I’ve dipped in a few times this week and I love it; it’s clearly organised with some great contributors. My picks so far would be the book section (of course), where you can read the opening of Caitlin Moran’s How to Be a Girl and the opening of Hausfrau by Jill Alexander Essbaum. There’s also an interview with Essbaum and 10 Things You Need to Know About Anne Tyler as well as an article by Baker about why good books often end up making bad films.

Elsewhere on the site, I’ve enjoyed Sam Baker’s ‘Does this mean I’m not allowed to be a LEGO any more?‘; Lauren Laverne’s blog, ‘Is being a teenager harder than ever before?‘; Sali Hughes’ ‘Why every woman needs a solo playdate‘ and ‘Is it ever OK to commit liticide?‘ (although I winced through the whole of that one); Holly Smale’s ‘Why can’t we just get over Cinderella?‘; Gaby Hinsliff’s ‘What would happen if men didn’t have the vote?‘; Stacey Duguid’s ‘Flares if you care‘ where Duguid goes around high street shops trying flares on like you do when you’re shopping (as opposed to raiding the magazine’s fashion cupboard); an extract from Lynsey Addario’s It’s What I Do: A Photographer’s Life of Love and War, and Laurene Laverne’s interviews with Caitlin Moran and Kim Gordon.

In Harper Lee news, ‘Harper Lee elder abuse allegations declared ‘unfounded’ by Alabama‘ says The Guardian.

The best of the rest:

On or about books/writers:

• Hannah Rosefield, ‘Barbara Pym and the New Spinster‘ in The New Yorker
• Amy Jenkins, ‘Waving or drowning? On her debt to Stevie Smith‘ in The Guardian
• Kimberley Francisco, ‘On (Not) Reading Science Fiction as a Teenage Girl‘ on Stacked Books
• Jenny McAuley, ‘Jane Austen invented #RealisticYA fiction‘ in The Guardian
• Joanna Walsh, ‘Man Booker International Prize draws together variety of best from literature world‘ in The National
• Lucy K. Shaw, ‘April Mixtape‘ on Electric Literature
• Jill Alexander Essbaum, ‘Writers on Location: on Zürich‘ on Isabel Costello’s Literary Sofa
• Laxmi Hariharan, ‘Why the hero of my YA dystopian novel had to be an angry young Indian girl‘ in The Guardian
• Hannah Cuthbertson, ‘How Assumedly White Characters are a Disservice to, well, Everyone‘ in The Missouri Review
• Alison Flood, ‘The Girl on the Train racks up express sales of 2m in three months‘ in The Guardian
• Bim Adewunmi, ‘How “The Girls’ Guide To Hunting And Fishing” Shaped My Twenties‘ on Buzzfeed
• Sarah Gilmartin, ‘The rise of the short Irish Story‘ in The Irish Times
• Molly McGrann, ‘Prostitution in post-war London: a different kind of independence‘ on Picador Blog
• Sarah Hilary, Shelley Harris and Sinéad Moriarty, ‘Richard & Judy Book Club Authors: What Are They Up To Now?‘ on WHSmith Blog
• Christine Dwyer Hickey, ‘My Life in Books‘ on Atlantic Books’ Pinterest
• Sonya Vatomsky and Kia Groom, ‘Saving “Saving Anne Sexton”: In Which Dead Women are Used as Props (Again)‘ in Quaint Magazine
• Sarah Seltzer, ‘Does Magic Stand for Privilege in Harry Potter?‘ on Flavorwire
• Eve Johnson, ‘Sonnets And Unrealities: Björk And ee cummings‘ on Queen Mob’s Teahouse
• Val McDermid, ‘Why crime fiction is leftwing and thrillers are rightwing‘ in The Guardian
• Alexander McCall Smith, ‘The Secret of the Jane Austen Industry‘ in the Wall Street Journal
• Roopa Farooki, ‘Monsters in Caves‘ on Royal Literary Fund
• Suzannah Gillman, ‘Will the Real Cheryl Strayed Please Stand Up?‘ on The Gloria Sirens
• Edan Lepucki, ‘Beyond Binaries: On ‘Selfish, Shallow and Self-Absorbed: Sixteen Writers on the Decision Not to Have Kids’‘ on The Millions
• Sarah Pinborough, ‘6 Fairy Tales That Need A Shakeup‘ on the Huffington Post
• Chris Ayers, ‘Extinctathon‘ ‘a new series, drawn from Margaret Atwood’s MaddAdam trilogy, that illustrates the corporate horrors of the trilogy’s fictional dystopia’
• Lindy West, ‘Herland: the forgotten feminist classic about a civilisation without men‘ in The Guardian
• Madhvi Pankhania, ‘Miles Franklin award longlist 2015: eight out of 10 nominees are women‘ in The Guardian
• Ron Charles, ‘Marilynne Robinson confident about a fourth Gilead novel‘ in The Washington Post
• Joshua Farrington, ‘Three debut novels on Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize shortlist‘ (all by women) in The Bookseller
• Keija Parssinen, ‘Writing Out of Rage (How Sexual Politics Inspired “The Unraveling of Mercy Louis”)‘ on Read Her Like an Open Book
• Laura Sook Duncombe, ‘Literary Ladies Cage Fight: Coming to America‘ in The Butter
• Kristi York Wooten, ‘How 1980s Atlanta Became the Backdrop for the Future‘ in The Atlantic
• Byddi Lee, ‘How to get ahead in self-publishing: No 1 – you need a lot of hats‘ in The Irish Times
• Leslie Jamison And Catherine Lacey’s E-mail Conversation About Narcissism, Emotional Writing And Memoir-Novels on the Huffington Post
• Victoria Finan, ‘Independent Bookshop Week book awards 2015 shortlist announced‘ in The Guardian
• Rachel Cooke, ‘The pleasure and pain of being a Folio prize judge‘ in The Guardian
• Dorthe Nors, ‘A form close to home‘ on English PEN
• Emily Midorikawa & Emma Claire Sweeney, ‘Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers‘ on Something Rhymed

Personal essays/memoir:

• Eva Wiseman, ‘Living with your parents when you are a parent yourself‘ in The Guardian
• Sophie Heawood, ‘It’s midnight. Dare I open the sealed trapdoor in my house?‘ in The Guardian
• Dani True, ‘True Romantic #5: The Hope Chest‘ on The Rumpus
• Mary H.K. Choi, ‘Eat Pray Roll‘ on Matter *Flashing images throughout
• Sierra-Crane Murdoch, ‘Sugar Days‘ in VQR Online
• Marika Seigel, ‘On Being the Mom of “the Foreign Kid”‘ in The Butter
• Shan Wang, ‘“Happy Birthday” and Other Things My Mom and I Don’t Say‘ in The Toast
• Ashley C. Ford, ‘A Queer Hoosier on Still Loving Indiana‘ on Talking Points Memo
• Rebecca Riley, ‘How I Learned The Meaning Of Ableism‘ in The Fem
• Saudamini Deo, ‘My Name Is Red‘ in Kindle
• Lauren Apfel, ‘I called him pathetic, he accused me of ruining his life: What children did to our marriage‘ in Salon
• Roxane Gay, ‘Having a Heart, Being Alive‘ in The Butter
• Ashley Ford, ‘Disrupting Domesticity: Open Heart, Open Sky‘ in The Butter
• Alexis Paige, ‘The Right to Remain‘ on The Rumpus
• Lindsay Tapscott, ‘Letter from Montreal: The City Undressed‘ on Maisonneuve
• Shannon Fandler, ‘Unprepared In Appalachia‘ on Vela
• Elisa Gabbert, ‘Variations on Crying‘ in The Butter
• Ruth Dawkins, ‘Now You Are Six‘ on Dorkymum
• Deepti Kapoor, ‘Driving in Greater Noida‘ in Granta
• Jennifer Weiner, ‘All Grown Up and In Charge of the Seder‘ in The New York Times
• Kristen Hanley Cardozo, ‘Three Months Without Breathing‘ on Archipelago
• Lavinia Greenlaw, ‘On Not Totally Seeing a Total Solar Eclipse‘ in The New Yorker
• Chelsea Biondolillo, ‘Not Travel Writing‘ on Vela

Feminism:

• Stephanie St. John, ‘“Mad Men” eulogies: Peggy Olson, feminist hero‘ on Salon
• Lili Loofbourow, ‘The Many Faces of Tatiana Maslany‘ in The New York Times
• Sybil Baker, ‘The DrunkenBoat Fiction Count for 2013‘ in DrunkenBoat
• Sarah Ditum, ‘Why I changed my mind about porn‘ in the New Statesman
• Sabine Heinlein, ‘The Answer Is Never‘ on Longreads
• Anna Cafolla, ‘I’m a girl and I have periods, whether Instagram likes it or not‘ in The Independent
• Cate Burlington, ‘Things My Male Tech Colleagues Have Actually Said to Me, Annotated‘ in The Toast
• Doreen St Felix, ‘The Prosperity Gospel of Rihanna‘ in Pitchfork
• Lucy-Anne Holmes, ‘If you want to write about feminism online, be ready to take on the haters‘ in The Guardian
• Jessica Valenti, ‘Don’t stress out. Our kids are just fine when their mothers work late‘ in The Guardian
• Shannon Reed, ‘The Historical Feminist Roundtable, Bucket List Edition‘ on Buzzfeed
• Susan Cox, ‘Of course men want children more than women do‘ on Feminist Current
• Snigdha Poonam, ‘Kidnap, rape and ‘honour’ killings: on the road with a female reporter in rural India‘ in The Guardian
• Julie Bindel, ‘What Andrea Dworkin, the feminist I knew, can teach young women‘ in The Guardian
• Jessica Valenti, ‘Social media is protecting men from periods, breast milk and body hair‘ in The Guardian
• Sarah Ditum, ‘Why rape suspects should not remain anonymous‘ in the New Statesman
• Ann Friedman, ‘Can a New Law Really Change the Way College Students Hook Up?‘ in Cosmopolitan

Society:

• Katy Reckdahl, ‘The Lost Children of Katrina‘ in The Atlantic
• Linda Vaccariello, ‘This Is How We Lose Them‘ in Cincinnati Magazine
• Helen Lewis, ‘Life is full of people with bad ideas and awful opinions. Try to meet as many at university as you can‘ in the New Statesman
• Sophie McBain, ‘Why are so many people using food banks?‘ in the New Statesman
• Gaby Hinsliff, ‘Dear Nigel Farage – children will play if we close roads, not borders‘ in The Guardian
• Germaine Greer, ‘At the centenary of Gallipoli; an interrogation of the myth of Australian nationhood‘ in the New Statesman
• Samantha Ellis, ‘Theatre should reflect society – and boldly imagine ways for it to change‘ in The Guardian
• Grace Dent, ‘In case you were wondering what it’s like to not always look down at your phone, I can tell you‘ in The Independent
• L.V. Anderson, ‘We Should Have a Better Condom by Now. Here’s Why We Don’t.‘ on Slate
• Meredith Talusan, ‘Being transgender in a transphobic society leads to moments of sheer desperation‘ in The Guardian
• Elif Batuman, ‘Electrified‘ in The New Yorker
• Olivia Laing, ‘The future of loneliness‘ in The Guardian
• Brittney Cooper, ‘The right’s made-up God: How bigots invented a white supremacist Jesus‘ on Salon
• Lily Lynch, ‘Forgetting Resistance In The Balkans‘ on Balkanist
• Laura Trethewey, ‘Collective Independents‘ on Maisonneuve
• Eleanor Margolis, ‘Films about queer women rarely stray from “lesbian drama” clichés – but things are improving‘ in the New Statesman
• ER Truitt, ‘Preternatural Machines‘ on Aeon
• Glosswitch, ‘How can a memoir convey the damage done by eating disorders, without passing it on?‘ in the New Statesman
• Rebecca Harris, ‘The loneliness epidemic: We’re more connected than ever – but are we feeling more alone?‘ in The Independent
• Momtazza Mehri, ‘Black, British & Muslim; We’re not just a “Complication”‘ on Media Diversified
• Jennifer Hensley, ‘Pills, Pills, Pills – There Is No Medicine‘ on Queen Mobs Teahouse
• Vanessa Hua, ‘The Dim Sum Revolution‘ in San Francisco Magazine
• Bella Qvist, ‘So Ruby Tandoh came out? It won’t be the last time‘ in The Guardian
• Jetta Rae, ‘What ‘Passing’ Says About Our Expectations of Women – And Why This Trans Woman’s Getting It Wrong on Purpose‘ on Everyday Feminism

Music:

• Cath Bore, ‘In Defence of the Smash Hits Centerfold‘ on her blog
• Linda Grant, ‘It’s not always easy to be a Joni Mitchell fan, but her illness devastates me‘ in The Guardian
• Lisa Peet, ‘Viv Albertine, Side One and Side Two‘ on Bloom
• Elizabeth Minkel, ‘Why do we mock teenage girls who love One Direction when Top Gear fans are just the same?‘ in the New Statesman
• Leesa Cross-Smith, ‘A Love Song & Some Stubbornness‘ on Real Pants

The interviews:

• Lynsey Addario in The Guardian
• Kim Gordon in The Irish Times
• Barbara Klein Moss on Bloom
• Jessica Valenti in The Cut
• Trish Hopkinson in The Fem
• Amy Butcher in The Fem
• Meghan Daum on the Los Angeles Review of Books Radio Hour and the Huffington Post and Jezebel
• Lydia Davis in The New York Times
• Fatima Bhutto on NPR
• Johanna Basford on NPR
• Alexandra Sokoloff on Grab This Book
• Teri Terry in The Guardian
• Amber Tamblyn on the Huffington Post
• Margret Aldrich on Publishers Weekly
• Caitlin Moran on Vice
• Alice Stevenson on Bookanista
• Renée Knight in The Telegraph
• Lauren Van Den Berg on Paul McVeigh’s Blog
• Paula Hawkins on Booktopia
• Xiaolu Guo on Penguin Blog
• Teresa K. Miller on Queen Mobs Teahouse
• Cush Jumbo in The Guardian
• Hollie Poetry in The Guardian
• Hanya Yanagihara in Vogue

If you want some fiction to read:

• ‘The First Meeting of the People of Unintentional Color Support Group‘ by Gayle Brandeis
• An extract from The Long Weekend by Veronica Henry
• ‘Fall From Oysters‘ by Susan Sanford Blades on Little Fiction
• ‘Small Stories #8‘ by Madeline Witt on The Rumpus
• An extract from Under a Painted Sky by Stacey Lee
• Mallory Ortberg, ‘Children’s Stories Made Horrific: The Little Red Hen‘ in The Toast
• An extract from The Country of Ice Cream Star by Sandra Newman
• ‘Escape, Release, and Return‘ by Leslie Baum on Guernica
• ‘Voyage of the Coral Princess‘ by Kasia Juno in Guts Magazine
• ‘Me and the Devil‘ by Eimear McBride on BBC Radio 4
• An extract from Sphinx by Anne Garréta in 3:AM Magazine
• An extract from The Language of Paradise by Barbara Klein Moss
• ‘The Slanted Life of Emily Dickinson‘ by Rosanna Bruno
• ‘Dirty Thirties’ and ‘Rugby‘ by Terese Svoboda in Numéro Cinq

Photograph by Jane Feng

 

If you want some poetry to read:

• from The Devastation by Melissa Buzzeo in Trickhouse
• ‘It Must Have Got Lost In The Mail‘ by Susannah Betts on Vagabond City Journal
• Two Poems by Khadijah Queen in The Offing
• ‘Beat Poem‘ by Leslie Maxwell in Blunderbuss Magazine
• ‘—moLt shEd‘ by Rebecca Y. Lee in Vagabond City Journal
• ‘What Breaks First‘ by Jynne Dilling Martin in The New York Review of Books
• ‘To Proceed You Must First Understand‘ by Barbara Jane Reyes on The Rumpus
• ‘Carousel‘ by Gabrielle Bates
• ‘The Medium‘ by Elaine Feinstein in the TLS
• ‘April Fools’ Day‘ by Elaine Feinstein in The Guardian

If you want some non-fiction to read:

• An extract from This Changes Everything by Naomi Klein on Penguin Books Blog
• An extract from Girls Will Be Girls: Dressing Up, Playing Parts and Daring to Act Differently by Emer O’Toole on the Irish Post
• An extract from A Day’s Work by Joanna Biggs in the London Review of Books (£)

The lists:

• 5 Great Books To Read In April on Buzzfeed
• 10 Must-Read Books for April on Flavorwire
• Diane Pickett’s The 10 Commandments of Southern Writers on Women Writers, Women’s Books
• 7 Books About Friendship That Prove This Relationship Is The Most Important One You’ll Have in Your Lifetime on Bustle
• Here are the the most magical things JK Rowling has ever done in The Independent
• 12 Writers On The Women Authors Who Inspired Them on Buzzfeed
• The Very Best LGBT Books You Need to Read Right Now on The Debrief
• JK Rowling’s life advice: ten quotes on the lessons of failure in The Guardian
• Molly McGrann’s Top 10 things I learned while writing The Ladies of the House on Female First
• 24 books for a year of reading only work by women in The Washington Post
• 14 Illuminating Quotes From “The Girls’ Guide To Hunting And Fishing” on Buzzfeed

In the Media: 19th October 2014

In the media is a weekly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous week and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought-provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. Also, just a note to make it clear that I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as traditional media are likely.

Two things seem to have dominated this week: essays and people not being very nice to each other. Let’s start with the former:

Essays have been a talking point although most of the pieces I link to aren’t new. The resurgence of interest seems to have come from Is This a Golden Age for Women Essayists? which ran in the The New York Times a couple of weeks ago. The difference in opinions between Cheryl Strayed and Benjamin Moser is fascinating. Meghan Daum’s about to publish her second essay collection. There’s a great interview with her on her website (and how much do I want to read Selfish, Shallow and Self-Absorbed?). One of this year’s most talked about essay collections is Leslie Jamison’s The Empathy Exams, the final essay of which ‘Grand Unified Theory of Female Pain‘ is available to read on VRQ Online. Amongst others, the essay discusses Lucy Grearly. If you’re new to her (as I am), there’s an essay on her in New York Magazine by Ann Patchett. I can’t mention essays without mentioning Roxane Gay, here’s a piece in The New Inquiry by Patricia A. Matthew on why Gay’s a new feminist icon.

Not being very nice to each other then. Well, this very odd piece by Katherine Hale ran in The Guardian yesterday, in which she admits to ‘stalking’ a book blogger who gave her a bad review on Goodreads. Bibliodaze posted this response to the article. Kate McDonough on Salon was the latest person to defend Lena Dunham, this time against Kevin D. Williamson of the National Review who questioned whether Dunham is telling the truth about a sexual assault which she writes about in her book. Emily Gould wrote on Buzzfeed about her experience of online trolls and why we should fight them, while Helen Lewis in the New Statesman talked about more experiences high profile women have had of trolls and what can be done to try and stop them. Caitlin Moran in The Times (paywalled) asked ‘Should We All Quit Twitter?‘ and how it’s easy to think it’s not real, thoughts prompted by her viewing the leaked Jennifer Lawrence photographs.

Other overtly feminist piece this week are Chris Kraus’ essay ‘The New Universal‘ – on feminism and publishing in The Sydney Review of Books; ‘Women as Supporting Characters Is a Problem‘, Alison Herman reports from Comic Con for Flavorwire; Johann Thorsson tells us ‘2 Things I Learned Reading Only Books by Women for a Month‘; Jacqueline Rose, ‘We Need a Bold Scandalous Feminism‘ in The Guardian; Lorraine Berry and Martha Nichols, ‘ “Women and Power”: How Much Clout do Female Writers Have‘ in the New York Times, and philly.com asks ‘Where are the women?‘ on the National Book Awards list (which all sounds very familiar).

And Sali Hughes, writer of ‘Pretty Honest’, is the woman with the most press this week, she’s interviewed in Standard Issue and on the Boden blog and there’s an new extract (audio, this time) from the book on the 4th Estate website.

Other noteworthy essays/articles:

• Roxane Gay on being hospitalised following an accident, written in the hospital
• Colin Dickey on Time in Virginia Woolf’s Orlando in Lapham’s Quarterly
• Neil Gaiman on ‘My Hero: Mary Shelley‘
• Bim Adewunmi’s Crush of the Week is on Claudia Winkleman’s Fringe
• Sarah Churchill on ‘The Joys of Judging the Man Booker Prize‘ (I should probably point out, lest anyone’s new to the blog, that I was one of the people to openly criticise the lack of gender parity on the longlist.)
• Elizabeth Minkel in the New Statesman on ‘Why It Doesn’t Matter what Benedict Cumberbatch thinks of Sherlock Fan Fiction‘
• Elizabeth Minkel again in the New Statesman on whether adults should read Young Adult novels
• Corrine Duyvis ‘on the decline of “issue” books‘ in The Guardian and this response to it from Caroline Clark on Queer YA.
• Members of the 4th Estate team on their favourite female characters from 4th Estate publications – Aunty Ifeoma from Purple Hibiscus; Flora 717 from The Bees
• ‘We Should All Be Feminists’, behind the cover of Adichie’s latest publication on the 4th Estate blog
• Kate Mosse on trying taxidermy in The Guardian
• Laura van den Berg ‘Natasha: On a Storyteller Raised by a Wolf‘ in The Millions
• Laura June in praise of the Amazon Reviews Anne Rice writes (yes, you read that correctly) on Vulture
• Alice Furse on ‘How to Make 48 Scotch Eggs‘ or what to do when your life changes dramatically
• Rowan Williams on Marilynne Robinson’s moral world in the New Statesman
• James Wood in the New Yorker on Rediscovering Elizabeth Harrower (late to this)
• Alison Kinney on Frankenstein as a metaphor for revision in Avidly (late to this too)
• A variety of writers on Alice Munroe in the New Yorker
• Rupert Pirie-Hunter on Agnes Owens in Overland
• Louisa Treger on Dorothy Richardson: The Forgotten Virginia Woolf on Women Writers, Women’s Books
• Kate Christensen on her favourite bar in Electric Literature
• Natalie Ferris on Christine Brooke-Rose in Frieze (published in 2012 but I’ve only just discovered her)
• Helen Pidd on Emma Jane Unsworth at Manchester Literature Festival in The Guardian
• Darcey Steinke on Barry Hannah and I on The Millions
• Elif Batuman ‘Marriage Is an Abduction‘ on Gone Girl in the New Yorker
• Antonia Honeywell, ‘Four Months till Publication‘ and tragedy strikes
• Kristiana Willsey ‘Hunger Is the Beginning of Every Folk Tale‘ on The Toast
• Catherine Lacey ‘The Question of Fate‘ in Granta
• Jessie Burton on the difficult of writing a second novel after such huge success with the first on her blog
• Emma Warren continues her series ‘A Year in Oxleas Woods‘ on Caught By the River

And the interviews:

• Margaret Atwood on why Ursula K. Le Guin’s A Wizard of Earthsea is a masterpiece on ion
• Diane Cook on Electric Literature and in conversation with Sam Lipsyte in Granta
• Shelley Harris, Abigail Tarttelin and Essie Fox on One Book Lane
• Rebecca Mascull on jaffareadstoo
• Women In Clothes aka Heti, Shapton and Julavits on The Rumpus
• Qaisra Shahraz on Woman Writers, Women’s Books
• S.E. Hinton in the New Yorker
• Emily St. John Mandel on the Adventures with Words podcast
• Meike Ziervogel on Female First

On translation:

• ‘Concept and Form‘ – Poet and translator Sophie Collins interviewed in Review 31
• And in case you’re not fed up of it yet, Zeljka Marosevic, MD of Melville House UK, wrote about Elena Ferrante and whether writers should reveal their real identities following this article by Lizzy Davies in The Guardian.

If you’d like some fiction to read/listen to:

• Tender, quarterly journal made by women
• An all-female edition of Right Hand Pointing – Short Poetry, Short Fiction and Short Art
• ‘Exquisite Corpse‘, fifteen writers including Zadie Smith and Jenny Offill co-write a story for the New York Times
• Kirstin Valdez Quade ‘Ordinary Sins‘ in The New Yorker (Quade talks about the writing of the story here)
• Kirsty Logan ‘The Elephant Dance‘ in Ambit
• Tanya Ray ‘Zoriada‘ in Granta
• Paul Theroux reading Elizabeth Taylor’s ‘The Letter Writers‘ on The New Yorker podcast
• Anne Carson ‘Krapp Hour‘ in Granta
• Jackie Kay’s ‘Dear Library‘ poems on Scottish Book Trust
• Katherine Stansfield, ‘There’s No Such Thing as Pandas‘ and three other poems on the Seren Books blog
• Kate Tempest reads her poem ‘The woman the boy became‘ on the Picador Blog
• Sylvia Plath reading ‘Daddy’

Or some non-fiction:

• An extract from India Knight’s In Your Prime: Older, Wiser, Happier in The Times (paywalled)
• Extract from The Iceberg by Marion Coutts, shortlisted for the Samuel Johnson Prize (Warning: this made me sob)

This week’s lists:

• Louise Treger’s Top Five Feminist Characters in We Love This Book
• Val McDermid’s Top Five Crime Novels Everyone Should Read Before They Die in the Big Issue
• Lynn Kanter’s 30 Women Novelists You Should Know is up to number 13: Caroline Leavitt
• The 10 Best Short Story Collections according to Elizabeth Day in The Guardian
• Six Life Lessons from Amy Poehler in Good Housekeeping
• Judith Kinghorn’s Ten Favourite Novels by Women Writers
• Five books Jojo Moyes recommends on her blog
• Lena Dunham’s bookshelf for Strand Bookshop
• 28 Feminist Writers Recommend Books Every Man Should Read on Flavorwire
• The 50 Best Culturally Diverse Children’s Books in The Guardian

And my favourite pieces this week:

• Ursula K. Le Guin on Being a Man on Brain Pickings
• Monica Heisey’s ‘A Cool Book Review By a Hip Writer Who Has Definitely Had Sex‘ on The Hairpin
• Moira Redmond on ‘How Nylons Changed Literature‘, in The Guardian
• Mallory Ortberg, ‘Fictional Characters whose Lives Would Have Been Vastly Improved By An Abortion‘ on The Toast
• Alison Bechdel’s one panel graphic review of The Paying Guests
• Antonia Honeywell’s spoof interview of Richard Flanagan as if he was a female writer

In the Media: 28th September 2014

In the media is a weekly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous week and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought-provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. Also, just a note to make it clear that I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as traditional media are likely.

I don’t know if it’s just me but there seems to be a lot of writing about bodies this week. The Observer have a whole section on our attitudes to sex, including this piece by Helen Lewis which looks at teenage girls and cites Lena Dunham, Caitlin Moran and Bryony Gordon, amongst others.

Caitlin Moran is also interviewed on the Longreads blog on ‘Working Class, Masturbation and Writing a Novel‘. While Sam Baker focused her Harper’s Bazaar column on two excellent, just published, fashion and beauty books. They are Women in Clothes by Sheila Heti, Heidi Julavits and Leanne Shapton (I bought it this week and it looks fantastic), which you can hear more about on The Arcade podcast and Pretty Honest by Sali Hughes, who you can read an interview with on Get the Gloss.

And as for other points in life and bodies, Megham Daum has written about different types of parenting in the New Yorker and in the Paris Review, the New York Times obituary writer, Margalit Fox is interviewed about her work.

Feminism was headline news again thanks to Emma Watson’s speech to the UN and the launch of He for She. Joanne Harris wrote on her blog about feminism and why it doesn’t need a name change. Alison Mercer wrote about women’s silence on her blog. While Elena Adler, wrote this on banned books and women.

#Readwomen2014 is still going strong. It’s creator Joanna Walsh gave this fantastic interview to LeftLion (I’m not just saying that because I get a mention, either!); Belinda Farrell wrote this on her year of reading women, and Daily Life published this piece by Aviva Tuffield, Stella Prize executive director on why men need to read more books written by women. While VIDA ran a piece on the marginalisation of female writers, focusing on Mavis Gallant.

In writers who are very much in the spotlight, you can listen to all the BBC National Short Story Award shortlisted stories. Alison Bechdel spoke to Buzzfeed about what she’s doing next. Hilary Mantel was on the Culture Show while Sarah Ditum wrote seriously about her in the New Statesman and the Daily Mash took the piss. Ali Smith did The Guardian webchat and Elena Ferrante did the Financial Times Q&A.

Speaking of women in translation, translator Kate Derbyshire wrote this about why she wants to establish a prize for women in translation.

This week’s other noteworthy articles are:

• A translation of one of Russian writer Nadezhda Lokhvitskaya aka Teffi’s stories in the New Yorker.
• Debut author, Claire Fuller on how she got an agent.
• Claire McGowan says goodbye to Guilty Pleasures on The Conversation.
• Two pieces on Virgina Woolf – Rachel de Moravia on Woolf, Feminism and Modern Architecture in Edge Condition Vol. 3 (you’ll need to download the PDF) and this on Kabe Wilson rearranging ‘A Room of One’s Own’ to create a new story ‘Of Woman or So’.
• A profile of Lynne Tillman by Colm Tóbín in the New Yorker. (Late to this but still great.)
• Nadine Gordimer remembered by Tony Eprile in The Nation.
• Val McDermid on The Grisly History of Forensics in The Guardian.

And the interviews:

• Gillian Flynn in the Telegraph.
• Cary Bray in the New Humanist.
• Catherine Lacey on Electric Literature.
• Caroline Kepnes on Bolo Books.

And this week’s lists:

• Emily Gould’s Top Ten Fall Must-Reads.
• Ten Indie Titles the National Book Awards Overlooked on Electric Literature.
• The Best British Words for Rain by Melissa Harrison in the Financial Times. (Late to this but it’s wonderful.)
• An African Reading List on Bookriot.
• The Most Feminist Moments in Sci-Fi History on The Cut.
• Four Brilliant Memoirs by Female Musicians on Emerald Street.