In the Media, February 2017

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 as traditional media are likely and the categories used are a guide, not definitives.

I’ve been a bit lax at compiling these while I’ve focused on my own work. It means this month’s is huge and I haven’t honed in on any topic in particular as the news moves so fast at that moment it feels like an impossible task. Back to fortnightly after this which hopefully will make it slightly easier to digest.

 

On or about books/writers/language:

• Helen Dunmore, ‘Facing mortality and what we leave behind‘ in The Guardian
• Rosalind Jana, ‘Making Space: A Brief History of Literary Salons, Past and Present‘ on Constellation
• George Saunders, ‘Grace Paley, the Saint of Seeing‘ in The New Yorker
• Peternelle van Arsdale, ‘How I Learned to Stop Worrying About the Market and Just Write‘ on Literary Hub
• Lauren Elkin, ‘Flâneuse: Women Walk the City in Paris, New York, Tokyo, Venice, and London‘ on Longreads
• Varaidzo, ‘From school books to publishing, black girls deserve better representation‘ in the New Statesman
• Ruth Gilligan, ‘Write Like a Girl‘ on Read it Forward
• Francesca Simon, ‘Why I’m writing for World Book Day’ in The Guardian
• Lily Dunn and Zoe Gilbert, ‘We’re given only a handful of these kinds of friendships‘ on Something Rhymed
• Karolina Ramqvist, ‘Writer as Public Figure Vs. The Writer Who Actually Writes‘ on Literary Hub
• Catherine Mayer, ‘on Writing Attack of the Fifty Foot Women‘ on Waterstones Blog
• Yoojin Grace Wuertz, ‘Failure and Patience: Lessons from the Garden for Writers‘ on Literary Hub
• Claudia Roth Pierpoint, ‘Elizabeth Bishop’s Art of Losing‘ in The New Yorker
• Thomas Arnow, ‘Who was Harriette Arnow?‘ on the Penguin Blog
• Anjali Enjeti, ‘The Life and Legacy of Bharati Mukherjee‘ on Literary Hub
• Wei Ming Kam, ‘On the Carnegie, Bookshops and Melinda Lo’s Ash‘ on Gal-dem
• Kerry Clare, ‘Rereading Fear of Flying: On Not Being Pregnant in Mid-Air With Isadora Wing‘ in The Toronto Review of Books
• Susan Hill, ‘Can I be a serious writer, keeping such casual hours?’ in The Guardian
• Nell Zink, ‘Writing for Rejection, And reading Doris Lessing‘ on n+1
• Craig Hubert, ‘On the Many Film Adaptations of the “Unfilmable” Wuthering Heights‘ on Literary Hub
• Ilana Masad, ‘Queer children’s books have a long history that’s only now being told‘ in The Guardian
• Heather O’Neill, ‘Leaving It All on the Page‘ on The Walrus
• Cameron Glover, ‘A Soulful Novel and Me: On Zora Neale Hurston‘ on Catapult
• Maggie Harcourt, ‘Pages in Common‘ on Waterstones Blog
• Rebecca Traister, ‘Rereading The Handmaid’s Tale, One Month Into the Trump Era‘ in The Cut
• Julie Buntin, ‘On Making Things Up: Some True Stories About Writing My Novel‘ on Catapult
• Sarah Perry, ‘In praise of readability‘ in The TLS
• Joanna Cannon, ‘The Story Behind The Trouble with Goats and Sheep‘ on WHSmith Blog
• Lionel Shriver, ‘Dystopia in the next room‘ in The TLS
• Rafia Zakaria, ‘Carson McCullers at 100: a century of American suffering‘ in The Guardian
• Jo Hogan, ‘The Carnegie Medal: Time for a Review‘ on her blog
• Salamisha Tillet, ‘Free Is and Free Ain’t‘ on Public Books
• Morgan Jerkins, ‘The Forgotten Work of Jessie Redmond Fauset‘ in The New Yorker
• Emma Garman, ‘Trilby, the Novel That Gave Us ‘Svengali’‘ on Longreads
• Emily Cooke, ‘Pay to Play: A chronicle of wealth and class in the literary world‘ on Book Forum
• Aminatta Forna, ‘We must take back our stories and reverse the gaze‘ in The Guardian
• Sam Jones, ‘Retrieving an untold story: voices of Spanish female artists finally heard‘ in The Guardian
• Ulka Anjaria, ‘The Goddess of Loss‘ on Boston Review
• Dr. Florence Hazrat, ‘From The Taming of the Shrew to 10 Things I Hate About you: Taming Wild Women in European Culture‘ on Women Are Boring
• Laura Pritchett, ‘The Middle Ages‘ on Bloom
• Fiona Cummins, ‘How I went from Ms Showbiz reporting on celebrity parties to writing a chilling crime thriller‘ in the Daily Mirror
• Katy Waldman, ‘Is My Novel Offensive?‘ on Slate
• Tracy Chevalier, ‘There’s a febrile debate in Trump’s rustbelt. I want to be part of it‘ in The Guardian
• Sarah Ladipo Manyika, ‘What Virginia Woolf Forgot To Say‘ on Thrive Global
• Georgia Hunter, ‘We Were The Lucky Ones‘ on Waterstones Blog
• Rowan Hisayo Buchanan, ‘A Dyslexic’s Guide to Infinity‘ on The Rumpus
• Maria Russo, ‘Finding America, Both Red and Blue, in the ‘Little House’ Books‘ in The New York Times
• Miranda Emmerson, ‘Mixed-up thinking‘ on Bookanista
• Marta Bausells, ‘Warsan Shire and Beyoncé: Superheroes for Our Time‘ on Literary Hub
• Lisa Williamson, ‘Writing NON-romantic Love for Teens‘ on Foyles
• Alex Clark, ‘I’m no pussy when it comes to swearing‘ in The Guardian
• Rahawa Haile, ‘How Black Books Lit My Way Along The Appalachian Trail‘ on Buzzfeed
• Kate Mosse, ‘It’s never been more important to champion women’s voices‘ on The Pool
• Eva Dolan, ‘The Hierarchy of Victims in Crime Writing‘ on Foyles
• Roxane Gay, ‘The Full Text of ‘Bad Feminist’ Author Roxane Gay’s WI12 Speech‘ on Publishers Weekly
• Claire Fuller, ‘on the Isle of Purbeck, Dorset‘ on The Literary Sofa
• Scott Eposito, ‘Understanding America Through Marilynne Robinson‘ on Literary Hub
• Edwidge Danticat, ‘Poetry in a Time of Protest‘ in The New Yorker
• Laura Pritchett, ‘The Great West Has More Than One Story to Tell‘ on Literary Hub
• Sarah Churchwell, ‘‘It will be called Americanism’: the US writers who imagined a fascist future‘ in The Guardian
• Lucinda Rosenfeld, ‘What Was Chick Lit? A Brief History from the Inside‘ on Literary Hub
• Ela Bittencourt, ‘Poetry Thieves: Translating Hanna Krall and Ewa Lipska‘ on Words Without Borders

Personal essays/memoir:

• Rowan Hisayo Buchanan, ‘How Postcards from My Mother Helped Me Survive My Childhood‘ on Literary Hub
• Leah Carroll, ‘My Mother’s Murder‘ on The Cut
• Melissa Febos, ‘When Pursuing True Love Means Breaking Up With Your Best Friend‘ on Refinery29
• Catherine LaSota, ‘Changing Body, Changing Perceptions‘ on Catapult
• Anne Kniggendorf, ‘Gracie Allen and John Denver in Boot Camp‘ on Electric Literature
• Christine Hyung-Oak Lee, ‘Saving Chickens, Saving Myself‘ on Catapult
• Arianna Rebolini, ‘Learning to Cook After Relearning to Eat‘ on Catapult
• Gwen Werner, ‘Daddy Issues‘ on The Rumpus
• Clover Stroud, ‘Travelling alone as a woman was a way of owning my trauma‘ on The Pool
• Lynn Enright, ‘I don’t always know who I am – but that’s OK ‘ on The Pool
• Karen Brown, ‘From Imbibing Spirits to Spiritualist Mediums‘ on Literary Hub
• Erin Corber, ‘Vocabulary Lessons in Bucharest‘ on The Rumpus
• Elisa Gabbert ‘My Grandmother’s Little Room and the Unreality of Memory‘ on Pacific Standard
• Kaitlyn Greenidge, ‘Sacred Space: On visiting the National Museum of African American History and Culture, and facing the present‘ on Lenny
• Claire Handscombe, ‘Dance: On Ballet and Impossible Love‘ on Catapult
• Melissa Febos, ‘Reconciliation‘ on Lenny
• Sara Yasin, ‘Muslims Shouldn’t Have To Be “Good” To Be Granted Human Rights‘ on Buzzfeed
• Jowita Bydlowska, ‘Nobody Died‘ on Lenny
• Cass Cross, ‘The Men in My Office‘ on Catapult
• Sophie Warnes, ‘On the unbearableness of existence‘ on Medium
• Megan Margulis, ‘My Daughter’s Suburban Childhood Looks Nothing Like My Urban One‘ on The Cut
• Jessica Grose, ‘The Wait‘ on Lenny
• Marie Phillips, ‘One woman’s attempt to learn the language of love‘ on The Pool
• Allison Grimaldi-Donahue, ‘Translation Beyond Metaphor‘ on Electric Literature
• Sara Noviç, ‘When Good Christian Girls Need Planned Parenthood‘ on The Cut
• Rachel Klein, ‘Losing My Voice and Finding It‘ on Catapult
• Amna Saleem, ‘This Is What I Learned From My Father’s Depression‘ on Buzzfeed
• Lara Williams, ‘Talk to Me Baby‘ on Some Such Stories
• Eleanor Margolis, ‘From unnerving normality to toilet humour: the stages of my mum’s cancer diagnosis‘ in the New Statesman
• Rebecca Varkoe, ‘Let’s Talk About The Immense Privilege (And Struggle) Of Doing What You Love‘ on Junkee
• Patricia Lockwood, ‘A Childhood in the Pro-Life Movement‘ in The New Yorker
• Lorraine Berry, ‘Walking in Memphis‘ on Catapult
• Kathryn Schultz, ‘When Things Go Missing‘ in The New Yorker
• Irina Dumitrescu, ‘Swan, Late‘ on Longreads
• So Sad Today, ‘What if I Never Live My Best Life?‘ on Vice
• Lacy M. Johnson, ‘Trigger‘ in Guernica
• Candice Norwood, ‘When ‘Good Hair’ Hurts‘ in The Atlantic
• Lisa Mecham, ‘Under the Stars: Remaking a Family‘ on Catapult
• Christine Hyung-Oak Lee, ‘What It’s Like to Lose Your Short-Term Memory‘ on Longreads
• Andie Park, ‘Lessons‘ on Medium
• Laine Bruzek, ‘What Happens When Nothing Happens‘ on West Magazine
• Elle Nash, ‘Grief Lozenge‘ on The Fanzine
• Kim Schultz, ‘I fell in love with a refugee – here’s what I learned when the world didn’t love him too‘ on the New Statesman
• Rebecca Schuman, ‘Hello, Lenin? (Berlin, 1997)‘ on Longreads
• Alana Massey, ‘The Rotten, Precious Land‘ on Hazlitt
• Jonatha Kottler, ‘Fat in Every Language‘ in The Cut
• Alexandra Burt, ‘What Remains When Your First Language Fades Away‘ on Literary Hub
• Jen Gann, ‘I Love My Ugly Old Hands‘ on The Cut
• Melissa Febos, ‘Wunderkammer‘ in Vogue
• Bonnie Nadzam, ‘Experts in the Field‘ on Tin House
• Imbolo Mbue, ‘‘With every inch, the challenge multiplies’: me and my afro‘ in The Guardian
• Yemisi Aribisala, ‘People try to squeeze Nigerian food into an all-encompassing African label‘ in The Guardian
• Eileen Myles, ‘Aging Is Feminizing Me and I Hate It‘ in The Cut
• Stacey Dugid, ‘The skirt that gave me back my mojo‘ on The Pool
• Laurie Frankel, ‘When my son became my daughter, the transition was more routine than dramatic‘ in The Sydney Morning Herald
• Jaya Saxena, ‘Explaining My Multiracial Identity (So Others Don’t Do It For Me)‘ on Catapult
• Catherine LaSota, ‘Becoming an Artist and a Parent in NYC‘ on Catapult
• Cat Marnell, ‘How to Murder Your Life‘ on The Cut
• Kayla Rae Whitaker, ‘How I Learned To Date After Drinking‘ on Buzzfeed
• Jia Tolentino, ‘The Most American Thing‘ in The New Yorker
• Kuba Shand Baptiste, ‘It took me 17 years to fall in love with my black hair. Why?‘ on The Pool
• Eva Tenuto, ‘Feeling Unsafe at Every Size‘ on Longreads
• Lori Jakiela, ‘A Portrait of the Artist as a Bingo Worker‘ on Electric Literature
• Patricia Bosworth, ‘The Men in My Life‘ on Literary Hub
• Meghan Tear Plummer, ‘Real Life: My Sister, My Brother‘ in Glamour
• Tracy O’Neill, ‘A Scar Is Not a Story‘ on Catapult
• Laila Lalami, ‘Love and Betrayal in America‘ in The New Yorker

Feminism:

• Dayna Tortorici, ‘While the Iron Is Hot‘ in n+1
• Michelle Darmody, ‘From the heart: One woman’s experience of abortion‘ in the Irish Examiner
• Riyan Fergins, ‘Follow the Oil Trail and You’ll Find the Girls‘ on Longreads
• Anita Bhagwandas, ‘The true meaning of beauty is to celebrate our imperfections‘ on The Pool
• Tobi Oredin, ‘As a black woman, I’ve had to unlearn what beauty means to me‘ on The Pool
• Jennilie Brewster, ‘Frozen Ground: On Reporting a Statutory Rape Twenty Years Later‘ on Catapult
• Zoe Samudsi, ‘Remy, Nicki, And The White Feminist Optics Of Black Women’s Beefs‘ on Equality for Her
• Katie Booth, ‘People Mountain, People Sea‘ on Vela
• Deborah Orr, ‘Helen Bailey and the lethal darkness behind this ‘middle-aged woman’ myth‘ in The Guardian
• Carmen Maria Machado, ‘The Trash Heap Has Spoken‘ on Guernica
• E.J. Dickson, ‘Why Did Everyone Act Like I Was Crazy When I Decided to Have a Baby in My 20s?‘ in The Cut
• Jendella Benson, ‘Feminist love will save men too‘ on Media Diversified
• Eve Ensler, ‘Female Fighters Series Re-examines Women’s Rage Around the World‘ on Guernica
• Abbie, ‘It’s Time to Trash Body Positivity‘ on Bullshitist
• Nimmi Gowrinathan, ‘Of Monsters & Women‘ on Guernica
• Yas Necati, ‘As a queer woman I will be marching against Donald Trump this weekend – but for my disabled friends it won’t be that easy‘ in The Independent
• Jessica Valenti, ‘Calling pregnant women ‘hosts’? We’re in an anti-choice Republican dystopia‘ in The Guardian
• Suzanne Moore, ‘Women in public life are now being openly bullied. How has this become normal?‘ in The Guardian
• Jessa Crispin, ‘The Failures of Mainstream Feminism‘ on New Republic
• Sara Ahmed, ‘Smile!‘ on Feminist Killjoys
• Shannon Keating, ‘Can Lesbian Identity Survive The Gender Revolution?‘ on Buzzfeed
• Melissa Denes, ‘‘It’s always high drama. It’s somebody’s life at stake’: inside British rape trials‘ in The Guardian
• Megan Nolan, ‘If British abortion providers turn away Irish women, it will be catastrophic‘ in The Pool
• Glosswitch, ‘What Would Happen if the World’s Women Went on Strike?‘ in the New Statesman
• Andrea Penman-Lomeli, ‘Consuming la Malinche, Destroying the Myth‘ on The New Inquiry
• Jia Tolentino, ‘The Case Against Contemporary Feminism‘ in The New Yorker
• Nadine Ajaka, ‘The Casualties of Women’s War on Body Hair‘ in The Atlantic
• Amanda Hess, ‘How a Fractious Women’s Movement Came to Lead the Left‘ in The New York Times
• Naomi Alderman, ‘Utopian thinking: how to build a truly feminist society‘ in The Guardian
• Rebecca Traister, ‘The Future of the Left Is Female‘ in The Cut
• Sadie Hassler, ‘Three abortions‘ on Standard Issue
• Caroline O’Donoghue, ‘I may never be ready to stop saying “dude”‘ on The Pool

Society and Politics:

• Dana Snitzky, ‘The Ban, The Wall, Bearing Witness‘ on Longreads
• Hannah Black, ‘New World Disorder‘ on Art Forum
• Gaby Hinsliff, ‘The government can’t pledge support for mental illness – and then backtrack‘ on The Pool
• Elizabeth Weil, ‘The Curse of the Bahia Emerald‘ on Wired
• Claire Heuchan, ‘The parallels between Scottish nationalism and racism are clear‘ in The Guardian
• Tasbeeh Herwees, ‘Resistance In The Time Of Protest Selfies‘ on Good
• Teow Lim Goh, ‘On Borders and Citizens‘ on Catapult
• Gaby Hinsliff, ‘Labour can’t keep returning to its roots empty handed‘ in The Guardian
• Mehreen Kasana, ‘The Meaning of Allahu Akbar‘ on Hazlitt
• Rumana Ahmed, ‘I Was a Muslim in Trump’s White House‘ on The Atlantic
• Gabrielle Bellot, ‘M*lo Might Be Done, But His Transphobia Lingers‘ on Literary Hub
• Sarah Larson, ‘The Librarian of Congress and the Greatness of Humility‘ in The New Yorker
• Rachel Cusk, ‘The Age of Rudeness‘ in The New York Times
• Gaby Hinsliff, ‘We are overdosing on empathy‘ in The Guardian
• Arifa Akbar, ‘The value we place on romantic love can feel tyrannical – especially if you’re a single woman‘ on The Pool
• Suzanne Moore, ‘It’s liking, not loving, that’s the true challenge in relationships‘ on The Pool
• Diane Abbott, ‘I fought racism and misogyny to become an MP. The fight is getting harder‘ in The Guardian
• Elizabeth Day, ‘What does true love really look like?‘ on The Pool
• Ruth Whippman, ‘Authentic? Try being polite instead‘ in The Guardian
• Deborah Cohen, ‘Before Straight and Gay‘ on The Atlantic
• Lizzie Presser, ‘Below Deck‘ in The California Sunday Magazine
• Tari Ngangura, ‘How Black History Month Reminds Me How Exhausting It Is To Be Black‘ on Vice
• Caitlin L. Chandler, ‘The Other World‘ on Guernica
• Helen Haft, ‘Telling Memories‘ on Aeon
• Andrea Pitzer, ‘Trump Revives a Shameful Tradition: Targeting a Minority Group with Crime Reports‘ on Longreads
• Ijeoma Oluo, ‘White People: I Don’t Want You To Understand Me Better, I Want You To Understand Yourselves‘ on The Establishment
• Lois Parshley, ‘Here Be Dragons: Finding the Blank Spaces in a Well-Mapped World‘ on VQR
• Hina Shamsi, ‘Flying Home From Abroad, a Border Agent Stopped and Questioned Me … About My Work for the ACLU‘ on ACLU
• Tina Nguyen, ‘Trump Grill Could Be the Worst Restaurant in America‘ in Vanity Fair
• Tamara Winfrey Harris, ‘The Real Work of Being an Ally‘ on The Cut
• Nesrine Malik, ‘Suddenly, Muslims are America’s pariahs‘ in The Guardian
• Margaret Simons, ‘The Karen road to Nhill‘ on SBS
• Fariah Roísín, ‘What Makes a Border Be?‘ on Hazlitt

Film, Television, Music, Art, Fashion and Sport:

• Anna Leszkiewicz, ‘From Hannah Horvath to Rory Gilmore: the problem with women writers on TV‘ in the New Statesman
• Eva Holland, ‘Bird Man‘ on Longreads
• Lynn Enright, ‘Twentysomething women often win Best Actress. Men in their twenties basically never win Best Actor‘ on The Pool
• Brittney Cooper, ‘Why It’s Important to Recognize That “Moonlight” Was Robbed Of Its Moment‘ in Cosmopolitan
• Jia Tolentino, ‘The Awkward Politics of the Oscars‘ in The New Yorker
• Megan Garber, ‘Why Are They ‘Stars’?‘ on The Atlantic
• Jess Goldschmidt, ‘Against La La Land‘ on Guernica
• Ann Powers, ‘The Problem With The Grammys Is Not A Problem We Can Fix‘ on NPR
• Helen O’Hara, ‘TV is better placed to tell love stories than cinema – and its writers have finally realised that‘ on The Pool
• Frances Ryan, ‘I, Daniel Blake is a realistic depiction of life on benefits. Isn’t it?‘ in The Guardian
• Emma Gray, ‘What White Women Can Learn From Adele’s Grammys Speech‘ on the Huffington Post
• Anindita Ghose, ‘What John Berger would say about Beyoncé‘ on Live Mint
• Hadley Freeman, ‘Oh, how I loved you, Johnny Depp. Now I see the purple-tinted truth‘ in The Guardian
• Laura Craik, ‘Why do we judge Victoria Beckham by her husband?‘ on The Pool
• Micha Frazer-Carroll, ‘Why We Should Celebrate Beyoncé’s Pregnancy in the Era of Trump‘ on Gal-Dem
• Danielle Dash, ‘Beyonce, Black Joy & White Women‘ on her website
• Jennifer Keshin Armstrong, ‘The Mary Tyler Moore Show’s Feminist Struggle‘ on Longreads
• Dayna Evans, ‘Why Would a Woman Want to Play Football?‘ on The Cut
• Véronique Hyland, ‘Why Won’t We Let Madonna Age the Way She Wants To?‘ on The Cut

The interviews/profiles:

• Susan Hill in The Guardian
• Cara Hoffman on Broadly
• Rowan Hisayo Buchanan on Literary Hub
• Kate Zambreno on The Creative Independent
• Yoojin Grace Wuertz on Electric Literature
• Melissa Febos on Guernica
• Masha Gessen on The Millions
• Zeba Talkhani and Laura Waddell on Minor Literature[s]
• Patty Yumi Cottrell in the Los Angeles Review of Books
• Ayòbámi Adébáyò in The Guardian
• Claudia Rankine in The Financial Times
• Claire Fuller in The Chicago Review of Books
• Ethel Rohan on The Millions and on Bustle
• Yiyun Li in The Guardian, on Five Books
• Jane Wong and Aditi Machado on Literary Hub
• Roxane Gay on Brooklyn
• Emily Ruskovich on Electric Literature
• Roshi Fernando on Short Story Award
• Jess Phillips on The Debrief
• Morgan Parker in The Cut
• Liane Moriarty in The Guardian
• Dreda Say Mitchell on Greenacre Writers
• Sara Baume in The Guardian
• Ola Nubi on Ankara Press
• Shappi Khorsandi in The Guardian
• Heather O’Neill on The Millions
• Rachel Cusk in BOMB
• Nina LaCour on The Booklist Reader
• Emma Donoghue on Literary Hub
• Ayelet Waldman in California
• Alice Broadway on Foyles, in The Guardian
• Amanda Owen in The Guardian
• Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie in The Guardian
• Margaret Atwood in The Guardian
• Ali Smith in The New York Times
• Lara Pawson on Rhys Tranter
• Christine Hyung-Oak Lee on NPR
• Jade Sharma in The Rumpus
• Alana Massey on Hello Giggles, Hazlitt
• Khairani Barokka on Disability Arts
• Adrian Shirk on Catapult
• Katie Kitamura on Literary Hub
• Camille Pagán in the Huffington Post
• Adania Shiboli on Literary Hub
• Naomi Jackson on The Rumpus
• Katie Khan on In the Words of
• Kyo Maclear on Mcleans
• Kim Hyesoon on Guernica
• Jessica Valenti on The Rumpus
• Elif Shafak in The Guardian, on Foyles
• Erica Ferencik on Electric Literature
• Eimear McBride on Electric Literature
• Sandra Cisneros on Literary Hub
• Shanthi Sekaran on Bookanista
• Ottessa Moshfegh on Lenny

The regular columnists:

• Lucy Mangan in Stylist
• Roxane Gay in The Guardian US
• 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
• Juno Dawson in Glamour
• Kashana Cauley on Catapult
• Louise O’Neill in the Irish Examiner
• Jendella Benson on Media Diversified
• Lola Okolosie in The Guardian
• Sarah Gerard, ‘Mouthful‘ on Hazlitt
• Books by Women We’d Love to See in English on Literary Hub

In the Media: October 2016, Part Two

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 as traditional media are likely and the categories used are a guide, not definitives.

A woman didn’t win The Man Booker Prize this year but there was still some interesting coverage of the prize and the shortlisted writers:

• Deborah Levy interviewed in the New Statesman
• Marta Bausells, ‘The Rise of the Small Press on the Man Booker Shortlist‘ on Literary Hub
• Ottessa Moshfegh interviewed on the Penguin Blog and in The New Yorker
• ‘How to write a Man Booker novel: six shortlisted authors share their secrets‘ in The Guardian
• Marta Bausells, ‘Inside the World of Judging the Man Booker Prize‘ on Literary Hub

The best of the rest:

On or about books/writers/language:

• Zadie Smith, ‘Dance lessons for writers‘ in The Guardian
• Dave McKenna, ‘The Writer Who Was Too Strong To Live‘ on Deadspin
• Jane Bernstein, ‘How I Helped Tell a Soldier’s Story‘ on Literary Hub
• Emily St. John Mandel, ‘The Gone Girl With The Dragon Tattoo On The Train‘ onFiveThirtyEight
• Megan Marshall, ‘Elizabeth and Alice‘ in The New Yorker
• Rachel Vorona Cote, ‘Are You an Anne Shirley or an Emily Starr?‘ on Literary Hub
• Seo Hee Im, ‘Sex, violence and The Vegetarian: the brutality of Han Kang’s Booker winner‘ in The Guardian
• Sara Nović, ‘Who Can Speak for the Deaf Community‘ on Literary Hub
• Rachael Nevins, ‘Fall to Pieces: On Elena Ferrante and My Own Frantumaglia‘ on Hazlitt
• Maddie Rodriguez ‘Anne Brontë, Anger, and the Resonance of Assault in the Tenant of Wildfell Hall‘ on BookRiot
• Shelley DeWees, ‘The Publisher Who Rejected Jane Austen‘ on Literary Hub
• Eleanor Brown, ‘‘I like the way he kisses my hand’: My grandmother’s life in jazz age Paris‘ in The Guardian
• M.L. Stedman, ‘On First Seeing Your Novel on the Big Screen‘ on Literary Hub
• Chloe Caldwell, ‘What I Think of the Fact That You Keep Asking Me What My Family Thinks of My Writing‘ on Catapult
• Sarah Schulman, ‘White Writer‘ in The New Yorker
• Sarah Hughes, ‘Shirley Jackson: the US queen of gothic horror claims her literary crown‘ in The Observer
• Ali Smith, ‘Ali Smith on the prime of pop artist Pauline Boty‘ in The Guardian
• Leah Schnelbach, ‘Imaginative Anthropology: In Celebration of Ursula K. Le Guin‘ on Tor.Com
• Nneka Okona, ‘On Travel Memoirs by Black Women Writers‘ on Literary Hub
• James Lasdun, ‘How Patricia Highsmith’s Mr Ripley Rises from Genre to Myth‘ on Literary Hub
• Wendy Jones, ‘What was really going on with English women?‘ in The Guardian
• MariNaomi, ‘The Making of a Comics Memoir‘ on Catapult
• Margaret Drabble, ‘I am not afraid of death. I worry about living’ in The Guardian
• Meg Elison, ‘If Women Wrote Men the Way Men Write Women‘ on McSweeney’s Internet Tendency

Personal essays/memoir:

• Sarah Thomas, ‘Inheritance and Time Travel‘ on Catapult
• Ciara O’Rourke, ‘The Other Sister‘ in Seattle Met
• Michelle Tea, ‘A Walking Tour Of The Places Where I Hit Rock Bottom‘ on Buzzfeed
• Dianca Potts, ‘Hallowed Hell House‘ on Lenny
• Alyssa Martino, ‘Vacancies‘ on Catapult
• Eli Goldstone, ‘Bad Dreams‘ on Granta
• Jodi Ettenberg, ‘Learning to Cope With Chronic Pain (And Why I’m Establishing a Home Base)‘ on Legal Nomads
• Mila Jaroniec, ‘Imprecise Magic‘ on Lenny
• Stephanie Land, ‘The Love of a Thousand Muskoxen: Grieving a Love Lost to Time and Sickness‘ on Longreads
• Sonia Weiser, ‘Scrabble With My Mum‘ on Catapult
• Nimko Ali, ‘What does it feel like to flee war as young child?‘ on The Pool
• Kelsey McKinney, ‘The Art of the Box Score‘ on Hazlitt
• Melissa Matthewson, ‘On Coupling: An Inventory‘ in Guernica
• Nadja Spiegelman, ‘When Beauty Makes You Vulnerable‘ on The Cut
• Emily Alford, ‘How Makeup Helped Me Reclaim My Face‘ on Buzzfeed
• Elizabeth Lindsey Rogers, ‘Learning to Embrace Guanxi: On Living Communally in China‘ on Literary Hub
• Niina Pollari, ‘Minor Gains‘ on Catapult
• Amani Al-Khatahtbeh, ‘On Being the Media’s Token Muslim Girl‘ on The Cut
• Lily Dunn, ‘The Fog and the Sea‘ on Granta
• Sonya Chung, ‘How I Learned That Beauty Doesn’t Have To Hurt‘ on Buzzfeed
• JD Ho, ‘Vegetables for a Dead President‘ on Catapult
• Rushaa Louise Hamid, ‘How I Found Myself When My Skin Changed Its Identity‘ on Buzzfeed

Feminism:

• Bibi Lynch, ‘Do not brand me a failure. I’m a survivor. All unhappily childless people are’ in The Guardian
• Heather Skyler, ‘The Boy Who Groped Me and the Flute Case That Saved Me‘ on Catapult
• Liz Meriwether, ‘Laughing Until We Cry: Conversations About Getting Flashed, Grabbed, and Groped‘ on The Cut
• Rachel Klein, ‘When the Body Breaks its Silence‘ on Catapult
• Andrea Bennett, ‘Chain Reaction‘ on Masionneuve
• Lynn Enright, ‘Why does it feel awkward to admit you’re on a diet?‘ on The Pool
• Sophie Wilkinson, ‘Addressing the toxic combination of misogyny and homophobia‘ on The Pool
• Laurie Penny, ‘Fear of a Feminist Future‘ on The Baffler
• Daisy Buchanan, ‘When women are surrounded by misogyny, they are going to internalise it‘ on The Pool

Society and Politics:

• Molly Ball, ‘Trump’s Graying Army‘ on The Atlantic
• Emma Bracy, ‘We Are Always Defined From a Distance‘ on Hazlitt
• Gaby Hinsliff, ‘Are we now persecuted for speaking up for the vulnerable?‘ on The Pool
• Ijeoma Oluo, ‘I’m not ready for the Obama era to end‘ in The Guardian
• Eimear McBride, ‘Brexit has disfigured the tolerant Britain I’ve known‘ in The Guardian
• Alex Wagner, ‘Marriage After Trump‘ on The Atlantic
• Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Gloria Steinem and Rashida Jones, ‘To the First Lady, With Love‘ in The New York Times
• Molly Ball, ‘In Ferguson, the Seeds of Trump’s Defeat‘ in The Atlantic

Film, Television, Music, Art, Fashion and Sport:

• Gabrielle Bellot, ‘Hayao Miyazaki and the Art of Being a Woman‘ on The Atlantic

The interviews/profiles:

• Naomi Alderman on The Writes of Woman and in The Guardian
• Vanessa Hua in The Los Angeles Review of Books
• Belle Boggs and Monica Youn on Literary Hub
• Toni Morrison on Literary Hub
• Emma Donoghue on Lenny
• Emily Witt on Literary Hub
• Therese Oneill on Salon
• Larissa Pham on Electric Literature
• Jess Kidd on Jo Hogan Writes
• Irenosen Okojie in 3:am Magazine
• Hannah Hart on Hello Giggles
• Claudia Rankine in The Guardian
• Joanna Kavenna on Literary Hub
• Britt Bennett on The Rumpus
• Zadie Smith in The New York Times

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
• Juno Dawson in Glamour
• Kashana Cauley on Catapult
• Louise O’Neill in the Irish Examiner
• Jendella Benson on Media Diversified
• Books by Women We’d Love to See in English on Literary Hub

London Lit Lab – Lily Dunn & Zoe Gilbert

I’m delighted to welcome London-based writers Lily Dunn and Zoe Gilbert to the blog.

Lily Dunn is an author, mentor, editor and creative writing teacher. She has written three novels (Portobello Books), and a handful of short stories (Matter magazine), and is currently working on a PhD in creative non-fiction. She is a trained editor and journalist and has written for Time Out magazine, the Guardian, the Telegraph and numerous other publications. She has experience teaching teenagers and adults in class and workshops. As chair of North London Writers, she has many years experience in critiquing novel manuscripts and short stories. She is co-director of London Lit Lab.

Zoe Gilbert is an author, creative writing teacher and mentor specialising in short fiction. Her stories have been published in anthologies and journals around the world, and have won prizes including the Costa Short Story Award 2014. She is working on a PhD in Fiction and Creative Writing, focusing on the influence of folk tales on contemporary short stories. As host of the Short Story Critique Group at Waterstones Piccadilly, and co-host the Short Story Club at the Word Factory (where she is Associate Editor), she has many years’ experience of critiquing fiction. She has also taught creative writing classes to adults and teenagers, and is co-director of London Lit Lab.

There are two reasons for hosting Lily and Zoe on the blog: the first is that I try to cover a variety of excellent writers from huge names to the lesser known and the second is that Lily and Zoe have set up London Lit Lab in order to support new writers. Herein lies another reason; before I applied to do an MA in Creative Writing, I went on a new writers’ course to see whether I could actually write or not. It gave me a huge amount of confidence and ideas and I was successful in being accepted on an MA so I’m pleased that Lily and Zoe have identified that there’s potential here for supporting people who might feel the same way. (I realise that not everyone can afford to go on a course, which is exactly why Kerry Hudson established The WoMentoring Project. Details on the link.)

Tell us a bit about London Lit Lab and why you decided to create it.

Lily: The idea for London Lit Lab came out of a conversation between, me, Zoe and Julia Bell, my PhD supervisor. Julia suggested there was a gap in the market for a friendly, affordable London-based writing course and reading/critiquing service. So, Zoe and I, who’d become friends through North London Writers, decided to have a go at setting up a mini business. We thought we’d start with a beginners’ course (which we’re leading in June) and follow with an intermediate course, which might appeal to those who can’t afford an MA, or have just finished an MA and have a body of work that they need help with developing. Both Zoe and I have experience in teaching, and saw this as a great way to develop our vocation.

Zoe: We’ve both spent so many years giving critical feedback on short stories and novels, teaching here and there, and mentoring fellow writers through projects, it seemed a natural step to put all that in one place and create a home for writers. I think we both feel we’ve benefitted so much from the help and inspiration other writers have given us as we’ve developed, we also wanted to give that back. Courses that get you thinking differently, or learning how to use feedback and editing advice, have been invaluable to me, and have kept me going and hopefully progressing. London Lit Lab aims to provide the same for London’s writers.

Why do you write? Are there any reoccurring themes or ideas in your work?

Lily: Writing for me is a kind of personal expression, and a way of understanding the world. I tend to write about whatever I am living at any given time. An idea for a book often starts with a moment or emotion that I might have experienced, and then through the process of thinking and developing it turns into its own story, hopefully with wider resonance. But there will be themes in there that relate to me, and my view of the world. There will definitely be complex family dynamics, a few disillusioned love affairs, an overriding sense of loss and longing…

Zoe: Most of my work in the last few years has been driven by my fascination with folk tales – not just their stories and fantastical worlds, but also their structures and styles. They have a flatness that is unlike what we look for in a novel, for example. I love experimenting with this. I keep writing because I feel funny if I don’t. Writing is scary but not writing is worse!

You’re both working towards PhDs in Creative Writing, Lily in Creative Non-Fiction and Zoe in short stories. Why did you decide to pursue a PhD and what affect do you think it’s having on your work?

Lily: I didn’t really pursue a PhD – it just kind of happened to me. Again, from a conversation with Julia Bell, when I told her about an idea I had for my next book and she suggested I apply to study with her. I had, of course, thought about it, mainly because I wanted to teach, and jobs in higher education, particularly, are so hard to get these days unless you have a PhD, but also because I welcomed the opportunity to go deeper into my interests and discipline. I also liked the idea of returning to an institution. The combination of writing and mothering can be isolating, and I saw the PhD as a way of stepping back out into the world. I remember when I did my Masters how good it felt to prioritize the writing, to take it seriously; and I suppose the PhD is the next level. It feels like a bit of a wonderful indulgence, but I’m going to enjoy it while it lasts.

Zoe: The appeal for me was similar – to make a commitment to my writing, and also to get such high level critical feedback from a supervisor for several years. I didn’t do a creative writing MA, so it was a plunge in at the deep end, but as soon as I found out you could even do a PhD in creative writing, it clicked. I went on an Arvon tutored retreat with Alison MacLeod, found out that she supervises PhDs, and approached her afterwards. I was lucky that she had a space and wanted to work with me. Doing the PhD helps me feel qualified to talk about short stories both academically and creatively, and hopefully also makes me a better teacher!

You’ve been posting a writing exercise on your website each week for people to have a go at. Can we see what you came up with for one of the exercises? (It doesn’t have to be the same one.)

We had a bit of fun with these exercises. We wanted people to get involved and be free to play around with them, not to take it too seriously. The main aim was to get people writing. We posted a brief exercise a while ago, and here is a rather silly London Lit Lab response:

Create a hybrid of a politician and a pop star, and then converse with them in a lift…

David Cameron and Lady GaGa. He-She is wearing a black leather jacket with studs, has a peroxide quiff and high-heeled brogues, pinstripe trousers (cropped).

CamGa says: ‘Yo!’
I smile.
CamGa: ‘I can see you staring there.’
I say: ‘What?’
CamGa: ‘From across the block with a smile on your mouth.’
I realise we’ve passed the second floor, and I’ve got four floors to go, I frown.
CamGa: ‘And with your hand on your huh?’
‘Ah,’ with a gracious smile.
CamGa: ‘So which way?’
I say: ‘The only way is up.’
CamGa: ‘The political system is broken, the economy is broken and so is society. That is why people are so depressed about the state of our country.’
I ask: ‘So you’ve found a better way?’
CamGa looks down at his spangled garb and say, ‘Garage Glam Baby.’
We ping to the sixth floor, and I say: ‘Ding dong.’

Zoe: here’s one I did, which involved attributing a magic power to a normal kitchen object, and writing the opening of a story about it. I decided my antique teapot could catch thunder and then pour it out when required:

It surprised me the first time. Looking from my window at the rain lashing the street into darkness, the gutters streaming, the drains gurgling, I saw a woman amble out from number 5. She stood, letting her clothes drench and her hair plaster to her head, while she stared up at the sky. Then she began to jog, awkwardly, because she held an object out in front of her. Just then the sky flashed with lightning, and a second later the thunder cracked from the West, somewhere over the industrial estate I guessed. The woman started running faster, towards the rumbling, and as she passed my house I saw that what she held was a teapot. Even through the squalling rain, I could see the pink rose pattern, the gold detailing. A nice teapot. I worried she might drop it. She put one hand on top of it, to steady it, I supposed. But no, she lifted the lid and as she ran she held the teapot high over her head. That was the first time. I love watching storms, but now there’s an extra reason to stand at the window, and watch the woman from number five come striding out with her teapot, tracking the thunder…

What can people expect if they enrol on one of your courses?

Lily: Above all, they can expect a warm and friendly atmosphere, which we hope will be conducive to the production of some good writing. We want people to feel comfortable and at home. Our classes will be challenging and informative, but also fun. In our beginners’ course we will use a mix of exercises and texts, and will be pulling together all the best bits Zoe and I have learned at various courses we’ve attended over the years, combined with our own wisdom from our quite different writing practices. We’ll also take inspiration from the lovely Leila’s Shop.

Zoe: Friendly and inspiring classes – deciding to go on a writing course at all when you’ve never been on one is a big deal, and I remember how I felt the first time I did that. Terrified! I thought, that’s not for me, they’ll all be writers, and I can’t even say that about myself in my head, let alone out loud… I had such a positive experience and that’s what I want to provide at London Lit Lab. The initial fear will disappear behind a great puff of new ideas, and ways to get your writing going. For the advanced course, I’m looking forward to both giving and guiding critique, and introducing writers to fantastic examples of novels and short stories as a way to learn what works.

My blog focuses on female writers; who are your favourite female writers?

Lily: I find it difficult to answer this question, as I’ve never been obsessed with certain authors and read all that they’ve ever produced; though, of course, there are plenty of writers out there who I’ve loved, been inspired by, have returned to again and again. Anne Enright’s fiction never fails to give me that tingling feeling. I found the Gathering a masterpiece in innovative storytelling and voice. I am also very interested in this new wave of critical memoir/autofiction, in the more idea-led works by Chris Kraus and Katherine Angel, and I’ve read quite a few of Rachel Cusk’s works, both fiction and non-fiction, a writer who intrigues me. I am also interested in Elena Ferrante’s early works and her unashamed bare-all tone. I think this is an exciting time for female writers. There are some very interesting books being published, which are asking important questions, pushing at the boundaries of fiction and genre.

Zoe: Helen Oyeyemi, Margaret Atwood and Angela Carter spring immediately to mind – they all have wild imaginations and voices which are impossible to imitate. I would add Scarlett Thomas for the same reasons. All of them get away with breaking the rules, and perhaps that’s why their fiction is so memorable. I admire George Eliot, too, for completely different reasons. I recently reread Middlemarch, and was blown away by her perceptions and expressions of human states. I hadn’t remembered that at all from reading it as a teenager! It was like having a light shone on the human mind at intervals throughout the book. I wish I could do that.

Thanks to Lily and Zoe for their responses. You can find out more about London Lit Lab here.

In the Media: 30th November 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.

Friday night saw the winner of this year’s The Green Carnation Prize revealed. Congratulations to Anneliese Mackintosh whose book Any Other Mouth came top of a very strong shortlist. You can read about the decision on The Green Carnation Prize blog. Anneliese’s reaction is on her blog. It’s interesting to see Mackintosh’s book described as a fiction, memoir, short story hybrid, particularly as there’s been a focus on women writing memoirs this week.

Susanna Rustin is in The Guardian talking about ‘Why women are the masters of the memoir‘; Ceridwen Dovey writes ‘The Pencil and the Damage Done: The perverse attraction of autobiographical fiction‘ in The monthly; Lydia Kiesling writes ‘Meghan Daum won’t apologise: How she forged a new generation of confessional writing‘ on Salon, while Hannah Gersen writes on Meghan Daum, ‘Her Well-Spent Adulthood‘ on The Millions.

If you want to read some memoir essays, Lucinda Rosenfeld has ‘The Battle Hynm of the Papier-Mâché Mother‘ in The New Yorker; Sunny Singh writes, ‘To Become a Woman and a Writer, One Must Cast Aside Modesty‘ on her blog; Soniah Kamal writes, ‘Girls from Good Families‘ on The Butter; there’s an excerpt from Viv Albertine’s Clothes Clothes Clothes Music Music Music Boys Boys Boys on Vulture, while Sam Baker lists her pick of the best biographies and memoirs of 2014 in Harpers Bazaar.

Sadly, this week saw the death of crime writer, PD James. Ruth Rendall talked about their 40-year friendship in The Guardian. Linda Semple took a different angle on Slate looking at James’ homophobia.

The Scottish Book Trust chose Book Week Scotland to celebrate libraries. Many writers penned love letters to their chosen libraries, you can read letters from A.L Kennedy and Jacqueline Wilson in The Guardian and Alison Irvine, Anne Donovan, Francesca Simon, Helen Grant, Joanne Harris, Kate Tough, Lari Don, Lesley McDowell, Lin Anderson, Maggie Craig, Shari Low and Zoe Venditozzi on the Scottish Book Trust site. Rosie Garland also wrote about her passion for libraries to celebrate The Feminist Library on their blog.

And finally, The Guardian reported on a Goodreads survey in which they discovered that readers prefer authors of their own sex. Before anyone tells me we don’t need #readwomen2014 or this blog anymore, wait until this year’s VIDA statistics are published.

The best of the rest essays/articles:

• Tatyana Movshevich, ‘I Am From Dzerzhink‘ in Litro
• Anya A.H. Jamieson, ‘Black Blessings: Toni Cade Bambara and Octavia E. Butler‘ on The Feminist Wire
• Sam Baker, ‘What happens to your wardrobe when you leave life on the front rows‘ in The Telegraph
• Alex Engebretson, ‘Marilynne Robinson’s Singular Vision‘ on The Millions
• Daniel E. Pritchard, ‘To Revive the Lyric: Hoa Nguyen‘ in The Critical Flame
• Charlotte Seager, ‘When characters are difficult to get on with‘ in The Guardian
• Robin Stevens, ‘Murder Most Unladylike and diversity in children’s fiction‘ on Author Allsorts
• Josephine Livingstone, ‘Leslie Feinberg’s Stone Butch Blues Isn’t Just for Queers’ on Slate
• Alicia Lutes on Doctor Who hiring it’s first female writer in six years on Nerdist
• Roxane Gay, ‘Only Words‘ on Michael Brown on The Butter
• Edwidge Danticat, ‘Enough Is Enough‘ also on Michael Brown in The New Yorker
• Stephanie Young, ‘Waterline, Part 1‘ on Drunken Boat
• Eleanor Updale, ‘Helping Miss Worthington‘ on The History Girls
• Sadie Stein, ‘Head Cases‘ on migraines in The Paris Review
• Sabrina Khan, ‘The Importance of Diversity in YA Fiction‘ on Women Writers, Women’s books
• Tuula Karjalainen, ‘Tove Jansson’s Moominland: What was the inspiration for Finland’s most famous family?‘ in The Independent
• Beluah Maud Devaney, ‘Little Women’s Unfortunate Brothers‘ in The Guardian
• Beverly Lyon Clark, ‘Why Louisa May Alcott’s Morality Still Resonates with Readers‘ on Huffington Post
• Claire Fuller, ‘And the winner is…‘ on her blog
• Rachel Holmes, ‘How Eleanor Marx Changed the World‘ on the New Statesman
• Valeria Costa-Kostritsky, ‘Letter from: the heart of Chechnya‘ in The Calvert Journal
• Rachel Donadio, ‘Italy’s Great, Mysterious Storyteller‘ (Guess who that is…) in The New York Review of Books
• Rivka Galchen, ‘What Kind of Funny Is He?‘ on Kafka in the LRB
• Kate Mayfield, ‘My Terrifying Thanksgiving‘ on her blog
• Mary Lécuyer, ‘The Puzzle of Puzzles/And that we call Being‘ in The Stockholm Review
• Marcia Lynx Qualey, ‘Small World: Impac prize’s version of global literature is distinctly parochial‘ in The Guardian
• Lily Dunn, ‘Writing Motherhood‘ on Mslexia
• Antonia Honeywell, ‘Three Months till Publication‘ on her blog
• Hilary Mantel on judging the Hilary Mantel Prize in The Guardian (Yes, it’s real.)
• Felicia R. Lee on Claudia Rankine in The New York Times

Photo by Dan Hansson

The interviews:

• Deborah Levy on Short Story Masterclass
• Tessa Hadley on Short Story Masterclass
• Sandra Ozzolo Ferri and Sandro Ferri, the husband and wife team who founded Europa Editions and discovered Elena Ferrante on Publishers Weekly
• Tena Štivičić on the National Theatre’s Soundcloud
• Fiona McCrae, Publisher of Graywolf Press on their blog via Guernica
• Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie via Brittle Paper
• Jacqueline Woodson in The Guardian
• Jane Smiley on The Millions
• Shelly Oria in The Paris Review
• J.C. Todd on Bloom
• Sarah Koenig talking about Serial on Slate
• Ali Smith in The New York Times
• Ava Chin on Bloom
• Megan Amran on Flavorwire
• Jodi Picoult in The Telegraph
• Marilynne Robinson on the New Statesman
• Joanne Harris in The Herald
• Celese Ng on The Writes of Woman (yes, I linked to my own blog)
• Catherine Hall on The Writes of Woman (and again)

If you want some fiction/poetry to read:

• ‘The Untelling‘ by Claire Fuller on Bookanista
• ‘Canada‘ by Katherine Stansfield in The Guardian
• Claudia Rankine reads from Citizen on Lemon Hound
• ‘Engineer‘ by Helen Mort in the TLS
• Contemporary Irish Women Poets on Poethead (links to several poems)
• ‘Leaving Her‘ by Deborah Pintonelli on Literary Orphans
• Two Sentence Thanksgiving Stories on Salon (45 of them!)
• An extract from ‘The Crooked House‘ by Christobel Kent on The Crime Vault
• ‘The Price’ and other poems by Jane Clarke on Poethead

Or some non-fiction:

• Claire-Louise Bennett reading from her essay ‘I Am Love‘ at the launch of Gorse Journal No. 2

The lists:

• The 10 Best Books of 2014 in Time Out New York
• The 15 Best Non-fiction Books by Black Authors in 2014 on The Root
• 10 Obscure Non-Fiction Books by Your Favorite Fiction Writers on Flavorwire
• 5 Must-Read Poetry Collections by Women on Ravishly
• 10 Reasons to Love Marilynne Robinson on For Books’ Sake
• 9 PD James Quotes Every Writer Needs to Read on Buzzfeed
• Five African Novels to Read Before You Die on The Conversation

And the best pieces I’ve read this week:

• Amina Gautier, ‘On Male Verbal Privilege‘ on Read Her Like an Open Book
• Shannon Barber, ‘We Deserve It‘ in Nailed (reposted following the Michael Brown decision this week)
• Eva Stalker on ‘The TBR20 Project: Taking a Break from Too Many Books‘ on her blog
• Isabel Rogers, ‘In my beginning is my end‘ – Friday QuickFic on her blog
• Lynsey White, on ageing and writing on her blog. White has blogged every day of NaNoWriMo and written almost 75,000 words on her WIP. All of the blogs are worth reading.
• Gaby Wood on Fairytales in The Telegraph (starts with Neil Gaiman but covers many others too)

How Should a Person Be? – Sheila Heti

How should a person be?

For years and years I asked it of everyone I met. I was always watching to see what they were going to do in any situation, so I could do it too. I was always listening to their answers, so if I liked them, I could make them my answers too. I noticed the way people dressed, the way they treated their lovers – in everyone, there was something to envy. You can admire anyone for being themselves. It’s hard not to, when everyone’s so good at it. But when you think of them all together like that, how can you choose?

Sheila Heti has written a book about a woman called Sheila who has recently divorced her husband and is working out how she should live. During it she’s cultivating a friendship with a female artist named Margaux:

…I realized I’d never had a woman either [for a friend]. I supposed I didn’t trust them. What was a woman for? Two women was an alchemy I didn’t understand. I hadn’t been close to a girl since Angela broke my heart and told all of my secrets to everyone.

The book uses emails and transcripts between Sheila and several characters that, we are led to believe in the introductory notes, are real. Sheila Heti is divorced and is friends with the artist Margaux Williamson. So far, so meta.

I should probably point out here that I am a huge fan of metafiction. Lily Dunn tweeted a Michael Cunningham quote from A Home at the End of the World yesterday: We become the stories we tell ourselves. And essentially, Heti is creating a story from events that have happened recently in her own life. She turns them into a narrative using two devices: one, a competition between Margaux and their friend their friend Sholem as to who can create the ugliest painting and two, Sheila’s attempt to write a play for a feminist theatre company:

“Does it have to be a feminist play?”

“No,” they said, “but it has to be about women.”

I didn’t know anything about women! And yet I hoped to be able to write it, being a woman myself.

So, through female friendship, art, working in a hair salon and sex with an unsuitable man, Sheila sets about trying to work out how a person should be. If it sounds like something that should be followed with a hashtag of firstworldproblems, you’re probably right but Heti balances her angst with humour.

In a scene set in Miami where Sheila and Margaux have gone to attend an art fair at which some of Margaux’s paintings will be displayed, they return to their hotel room after dinner and watch a video in which ‘an heiress gave her boyfriend a hand job’. Sheila thinks to herself:

Consider all the warriors down through time, without great brains – like you! – who nevertheless struck the enemy right through the breast. They just kept their wrists steady and struck.

Then I glanced at the painting of the Statue of Liberty on the wall behind us and wondered, Where would all of America be – and wouldn’t the flame long be extinguished in the sea – if not for the tall girl’s steady wrist?

I won’t spoil the end of the book, where Margaux and Sholem try to decide who’s won the Ugliest Painting Competition and Sheila finally realises how a person should be, but I will say that it’s probably perfect.

I loved this book and the more time I’ve spent thinking about it, the greater I think it is. I’m planning to re-read it soon.

Thanks to Harvill Secker/Vintage Books for the review copy.