Archive
The complete Open Letters Monthly Archive.
The lurid pathology of Patrick McGrath's fiction - its endless procession of madmen, derelicts, and misguided psychiatrists - can often blind us to the fact that he is first of all a historical novelist - and a great one.
Read MoreWhy, asks James Meek's latest novel, should the rich get smoother, easier lives than their less well-paid fellow men? And what can an innovative novelist do with the oft-visited 'immoral rich versus honorable poor' premise?
Read MoreElie Wiesel once claimed “a novel about Treblinka is either not a novel or not about Treblinka.” How does Steve Sem-Sandberg grapple with representing the unrepresentable in his sweeping chronicle of the Łódź ghetto, The Emperor of Lies? A review from our archives.
Read MoreAfter fictionalizing his experiences in his previous four books, Aleksandar Hemon revisits his memories in a new collection of essays.
Read MoreYes, we know Sam Lipsyte's stories are laugh-out-loud funny. But all that low comedy--the pratfalls, the dirty jokes--serves as the ballast for some of the darkest stories in contemporary fiction. Steve Danziger elaborates.
Read MoreTo make something we must first unmake or take apart something else. Why, then, in a novel preoccupied with acts of destruction and reconstruction, does Pat Barker not offer a corresponding deformation of form? Has her critique of Modernism led her to disavow art altogether?
Read More"He said he would have Crispin Glover play him in a movie"--Alejandro Ventura's image-rich and always funny poetry is on full display in Puerto Rico. Joe Betz reviews.
Read MoreCar crashes, suburban swingers' societies, accidental prostitution, Nixon enthusiasts, and a cameo performance by Don DeLillo - in her latest novel, A.M. Homes maintains her equilibrium
Read MoreIn M. John Harrison's lyrical Viriconium trilogy, the high science of quantum physics meets the low art of fighting giant locusts. Justin Hickey finds a quiet spot to watch the chitin fly.
Read MorePoet Laureate Natasha Tretheway mines American history--the early colonies, slavery, the Civil War--for the material of her poetry. Teow Lim Goh visits with the figures she's brought back to life.
Read MoreJoseph Epstein has a cult following as a sharp-tongued critic and essayist. His latest collection showcases his love of words and ideas as well as his caustic wit.
Read More"The proper function of a critic is to save a tale from the artist who created it" wrote D. H. Lawrence, but sometimes - most of the time - despite the best efforts of the best critics, both tale and artist disappear. What do we do with the criti-cal darlings of yesteryear, now filling the library bargain sale? And what of the critics, who called them imperishable?
Read MoreIn 2011, Aleksandar Hemon chooses his favorite short fiction from all across Europe. From our archives, Kevin Frazier celebrated these bracing imports.
Read MoreIt is said that Thomas Hardy fell deeply in love with his wife, Emma, only after she died. Stephen Akey revisits the stunning, elegiac poetry he wrote in her memory.
Read MoreSay “Evgeny Onegin” to any educated Russian and you will trigger the first stanza or two of Pushkin's great novel in verse. Now Russia's national poet is finally coming into his own in the West as well.
Read MoreThe Hemingway Library has given us a variorum edition of A Farewell to Arms with 39 alternate endings. But how might Hemingway himself have felt about the resulting collage?
Read MoreWhat do Christopher Marlowe and the newly discovered Higgs boson particle have in common? Anthony Lock explores the connection, by way of unified fields.
Read MoreEuropa Editions has reprinted Anthony Burgess' masterpiece Earthly Powers. Our editors talk about that seminal volume which has inspired an issue wide celebration of Burgess and his work.
Read MoreRespectable novelists are solemn, meditative, and deliberate--they certainly don't churn out book reviews every week. Anthony Burgess smashed that fussy mold and left us a lifetime's work of brilliant, omnivorous literary journalism.
Read MoreAnthony Burgess' first novels were a series of dark comedies set in colonial Malaya. Did he fall prey to Edward Said's Orientalist crtitique, or did he anticipate it?
Read More
Powered by Squarespace.