A year before I was born, the poet Lewis Hydetaxonomized that vital and delicate distinction between work and labor in his eternally givingbook The Gift: How the Creative Spirit Transforms the World (public library) — a timeless inquiry into what it takes to harmonize “the inner gift that we accept as the object of our labor, and the outer gift that has become a vehicle of culture.”
Jean Valtin’s 1941 autobiography was a sensation. But just how truthful was his account of life in the German underground? ... IT IS UNLIKELY that anyone reading this essay will recognize the title of the 1941 autobiography Out of the Night or the name Jan Valtin, which appeared on its spine, but in the months following that book’s release it would have been challenging to remain ignorant of either more »
What the Longest Study on Human Happiness Found Is the Key to a Good Life The Atlantic – “The Harvard Study of Adult Development has established a strong correlation between deep relationships and well-being. The question is, how does a person nurture those deep relationships?
Since 1938, the Harvard Study of Adult Development has been investigating what makes people flourish. After starting with 724 participants—boys from disadvantaged and troubled families in Boston, and Harvard undergraduates—the study incorporated the spouses of the original men and, more recently, more than 1,300 descendants of the initial group. Researchers periodically interview participants, ask them to fill out questionnaires, and collect information about their physical health. As the study’s director (Bob) and associate director (Marc), we’ve been able to watch participants fall in and out of relationships, find success and failure at their jobs, become mothers and fathers. It’s the longest in-depth longitudinal study on human life ever done, and it’s brought us to a simple and profound conclusion: Good relationships lead to health and happiness. The trick is that those relationships must be nurtured…”
Ross Benjamin Q & A
Ross Benjamin's new uncensored translation of The Diaries of Franz Kafka is just out -- see the Schocken publicity page -- and at Slate Rebecca Schuman has a Q & A with him, in Kafka Gone Wild.
J.K. Rowling confirms what I wrote a year ago: “living in the truth” is the way to defeat wokeness
Bret Easton Ellis Q & A
Bret Easton Ellis' first novel in over a decade, The Shards, is just out, and at The Guardian Anthony Cummins has a Q & A with him, in Bret Easton Ellis: ‘James and the Giant Peach changed my life’.
Among the points of interest: he switched UK publishers, from longtime publisher Picador (UK):
They didn’t want it! I’d been with them since I was 21 but something felt broken. They made a lowball offer and my agency made this decision to take a risk trying a new kind of deal [with Swift Press]. There is this antiquated notion in traditional publishing: “Give the big fat advance! Never make it back ! Promote a book that will never make anyone any money once that advance is given up!” What if you partner with a publisher, don’t take an advance and work together selling the product ? Start making money for the house and yourself from book one.
Of course, he's hedging his bets with this one -- no doubt, there was a nice fat advance from the US publisher of this one (Knopf). But maybe it'll pay off for him .....
