“Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant?”

In 2014, The New Yorker showcased “Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant?,” an excerpt from Chast’s illustrated memoir about her parents’ challenging final years. Well into their nineties, the elder Chasts, a pair of retired Brooklyn teachers, resisted any acknowledgment of their own mortality, as well as efforts to prepare. With tenderness and humor, irritation and dismay, Chast captures a difficult stage of the child-parent relationship in a manner that will resonate with anyone who has cared for aging relatives, and with those who haven’t. The full-length version won the National Book Critics Circle Award for autobiography, and exemplifies one of Chast’s many gifts: what her colleague Adam Gopnik describes as the “weight beneath apparent whimsy” of her work. Roz Chast, The New Yorker

sempre piacevole (ri)leggere Roz Chast. 

Story Killers

 

Killing the journalist won’t kill the story. We are a network of journalists whose mission is to protect, pursue and publish the work of other journalists facing threats, prison, or murder. It is the only existing program with this mission. Story Killers

si tratta di un sito molto interessante e inquietante che presenta le indagini di un centinaio di giornalisti provenienti da tutto il mondo sulla disinformazione  e l'uso che se ne fa in politica, finanza e altri settori. 

The Defiance of Salman Rushdie

Recalling his first few months in New York, Rushdie told me, “People were scared to be around me. I thought, The only way I can stop that is to behave as if I’m not scared. I have to show them there’s nothing to be scared about.” One night, he went out to dinner with Andrew Wylie, his agent and friend, at Nick & Toni’s, an extravagantly conspicuous restaurant in East Hampton. The painter Eric Fischl stopped by their table and said, “Shouldn’t we all be afraid and leave the restaurant?”

“Well, I’m having dinner,” Rushdie replied. “You can do what you like.” David Remnick, The New Yorker

la prima intervista che Rushdie rilascia dopo l'attacco della scorsa estate

The Miraculous Salman Rushdie

Salman Rushdie’s new novel, Victory City, purports to be the summary of a long-lost, 24,000-verse epic poem from 14th-century India. The hero and author of the poem is Pampa Kampana, who as a girl becomes the conduit for a goddess, channeling her oracular pronouncements and wielding her magical powers.  Judith Shulevitz. The Atlantic 

del nuovo libro di Rushdie Judith Shulevitz dice che è "enchanting" e anche che è un trionfo. Mi sembra una bellissima notizia, dopo tutto quel che Rushdie ha passato. Su un piano più frivolo, eccovi la storia dei tote bags e di come un'umile borsa di tela sia diventata uno status symbol:

In the 1880s, a newspaper owner named Jasper Meek was looking out the window of his print shop in Coshocton, Ohio, when he saw a young girl drop her school books. As the story now goes, the sight inspired him to fashion a burlap bag in which people could carry books. But Meek also had an entrepreneurial mind, and he figured out a way to maximize his profit: he’d charge local businesses to print their names on the bags, which then served as tiny billboards as they were carried across town. Maija Kappler, The Walrus