The three works that lost out on this year’s Pulitzer Fiction Prize: the dazzling debut Swamplandia! By Karen Russell; posthumously published The Pale King by David Foster Wallace; and noteworthy novella Train Dreams by Denis Johnson. A rare occurrence in Pulitzer history took place this week, with the panel electing not to award…
Read More "Close, But No Pulitzer: How Three Novels Lost Out on This Year’s Fiction Prize"
Last October, Peruvian author Mario Vargas Llosa was awarded the Nobel Prize for his writing about the political power struggles of Latin America. In an article following the award, The New York Times called Vargas Llosa an "anti-totalitarian intellectual whose work covers the range of human experience, whether it is ideology or eros." This week,…
For me, books are like crack. I cannot have enough. I cannot read enough. When I got my Kindle for Christmas, I told myself, "Hey, self! Look! Everything in public domain is free! You won't fall victim to the latest New York Times book review, or the engrossing interview on NPR's Fresh Air. No sirree! There…
The University of Alabama is pleased to announce a new award for legal fiction in honor of one of its most famous residents and former students, novelist Harper Lee. In 1960, Lee's first (and only) novel To Kill a Mockingbird was published, to both popular and critical acclaim. Since that time, TKAM has become of…
Read More "The First Annual Harper Lee Prize for Legal Fiction"
This past Saturday, the finalists for the National Book Critics Circle Awards were announced. Among the finalists are Johnathan Franzen for Freedom and Siddhartha Mukharjee for The Emperor of All Maladies. Along with the Pulitzer Prize (2010 winner, Tinkers by Paul Harding) and the Man Booker Prize (2010 winner, The Finkler Question by Harold Jacobson), the NBCC…
Read More "National Book Critics Circle Award Finalists Announced"
One of the reasons for the endurance of the works of William Shakespeare is their ability to be adapted in many different ways. Romeo and Juliet has been set in during the Civil War and in Chicago's ganglands of the 1920s. The Comedy of Errors got the 1970s disco treatment. Richard III was once produced…
Read More "The Tempest With a Twist and the Nobel in Literature"
Congrats to Mario Vargas Llosa, who was awarded this year's Nobel Prize in Literature. It was announced this morning at a ceremony in Sweden. Considered one of Latin America's greatest authors, the 74-year-old Llosa has penned numerous novels, plays, and essays. His most famous works are Conversation in the Cathedral and The Green House, both of…
