Every day Poets & Writers Magazine scans the headlines—from publishing reports to academic announcements to literary dispatches—for all the news that creative writers need to know. Here are today's stories:
After well over two centuries, the Encyclopaedia Britannica will no longer be printed. (New York Times)
In light of the success of E. L. James erotic novel, Fifty Shades of Grey, the Wall Street Journal reports that "electronic readers, and the reading privacy they provide, are fueling a boom in sales of sexy romance novels."
Indiana authors are working together to help a small town, Henryville, Indiana, which was recently hit by a tornado. (GalleyCat)
With Jack Gilbert's Collected Poems released yesterday by Knopf, critic Dwight Garner looks at the poet's life and work. Garner writes that Gilbert is both "known and unknown," that he "steers clear of America’s poetry scenes, seminars, cocktail parties and séances." (New York Times)
L Magazine features the popular Franklin Park Reading Series in New York City, which recently celebrated its third birthday with a reading by Shalom Auslander, Melissa Broder, Adam Wilson, and others.
In case you're short of excuses, novelist Pamela Redmond Satran lists twenty-two reasons to stop writing. (Daily Beast)
The Guardian reports scientists are using Henry David Thoreau's journals to help track climate change. Aside from authoring Walden, Thoreau was a naturalist, and noted the dates over five hundred species of wildflowers bloomed. Comparing Thoreau's meticulous entries to modern data, scientists discovered those same plants now bloom ten days earlier than in the 1850s.
Former poet laureate Billy Collins discusses Leigh Hunt's staring contest with a fish. (Slate)
If you missed Jonathan Safran Foer speaking about the New American Haggadah with Stephen Colbert, the Los Angeles Times has the video.
