Plath, clinging to the horse’s neck, was chiefly struck by her own “power”; not least, perhaps, to command an audience. “I feel,” she wrote, “like one human, avenging thunderbolt.” In her later poem, the speaker is cast in similarly lethal terms: “And I / Am the arrow.”
Harold Ross: Master Of Shadows - Digital Photo Pro
The explanation could have been tighter and more engaging, but it gets really interesting around the 6:40 mark when Whitman ventures out onto some ice and falls through it to demonstrate the self-rescue technique (and he’s not wearing a wetsuit). Watching him relax to mitigate the cold shock response in realtime is spellbinding. His calmness really drives home that if you don’t panic and think clearly, you actually have a lot of time and energy to get yourself out of trouble. From the Four Phases of Cold Water Immersion:
How to Self-Rescue If You Fall Through Thin Ice
Jennifer Robinson is used to dealing with negative stories about her most famous and controversial client. As Julian Assange’s longest serving lawyer, she’s watched as the founder of WikiLeaks, once feted as the future of investigative journalism, has made powerful enemies around the world — and fallen out with a succession of collaborators. But she insists that Assange has been misunderstood.
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Robinson says that she and Assange were followed on at least one occasion and people sat outside her house in parked cars. “He had information and that made him one of the most dangerous and powerful men in the world,” she says. I realise we have now been talking in the courtyard for about 30 minutes but no one has come to take our order. Robinson nips inside and reappears pointing to a QR-code sticker containing the menu that both of us have failed to spot on the table. When our waiter arrives we squint at Robinson’s phone as the menu pops up and we both order the same — artichoke soup followed by pumpkin gnocchi. I persuade her to have a glass of wine. “I can’t let you drink alone,” she says cheerfully.
Canada’s Non-Fiction Revolution
In Canada, the most trail-blazing contemporary nonfiction is being produced by writers of colour and Indigenous writers, many of whom are women or nonbinary. – The Walrus
Last things first. As the poet Ruth Fainlight put it, “Everyone / knows the story’s ending.” On the morning of 11th February, 1963, aged 30, Sylvia Plath taped herself into the kitchen of her London flat, switched on the gas and rested her head on the drop-down oven door.
Sylvia Plath is more than the way she died and the man she married. Her art transcends tragedy ...Story of Ending
Well, what an unprecedented year that was!*sigh* 2020 is not a great year for ledes, so let’s skip right to the chase: many books were published this year and some of them had great covers. Lit Hub has the best roundup, with a selection of 89 covers chosen by book cover designers. Mark Sinclair’s ten selections for Creative Revieware excellent as well. Electric Lit and Book Riot shared their cover picks as well.
I chose a few of my favorites and shared them above. From top to bottom: Zo by Xander Miller designed by Janet Hansen, the UK cover for Night. Sleep. Death. The Stars. by Joyce Carol Oates designed by Jamie Keenan (the US cover for comparison), Anger by Barbara H. Rosenwein designed by Alex Kirby, Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener designed by Rodrigo Corral, and Verge by Lidia Yuknavitchdesigned by Rachel Willey. Looking at great work like this always gets my “maybe I should have been a book cover designer” juices flowing…
See also The Best Books of 2020.
A Roman snack bar from 79 ACE was recently unearthed in Pompeii.
Much of the author’s work may have fallen into public ownership in the UK, but there are more restrictions on its use remaining than you might expect, explains his biographer
ON THE PAYROLL: All Major Western Media Outlets Take ‘Private Dinners’, ‘Sponsored Trips’ From Chinese Communist Propaganda Front.
COLLUSION: Communist influence? 14 profs busted for China connections in 2020.
