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:
Today marks the first international “Dylan Day,” which commemorates Welsh poet Dylan Thomas’s first staged reading of Under Milk Wood at New York City’s 92nd Street Y Unterberg Poetry Center in 1953. People around the world are encouraged to celebrate the poet by attending readings, walking tours, and other Dylan Thomas–inspired events. Gillian Clarke, the national poet of Wales, shares her thoughts on why Dylan Thomas is rightfully owed this international holiday. (GalleyCat, Guardian)
As part of Dylan Day, an exhibit in Dylan Thomas’s hometown of Swansea, Wales, will display the poet’s “lost” notebook from the 1930s. The notebook, which Swansea University purchased last year for £104,500, features some of Thomas’s teenage writings. Swansea University professor John Goodby noted that the discovery is the “holy grail” for Thomas scholars. (BBC News)
Simon & Schuster has partnered with digital content platform Foli to launch an e-book sampling app that offers titles based on a user’s location. Foli’s geo-location technology allows customers to read samples of titles while at specific locations such as museums, train stations, and airports. (Shelf Awareness)
Henry Folger, the namesake of the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., is the subject of Andrea E. Mays’s new book, The Millionaire and the Bard. At NPR, Mays discusses Folger’s obsessive search to own Shakespeare’s first folios. The Folger Shakespeare Library still houses all eighty-two of the first folios purchased by Henry Folger.
LéaLA, the country’s largest Spanish-language literary festival, will take place this weekend in Los Angeles. The festival features more than ninety readings and other book events, and a trade show with more than three hundred publishing imprints represented. (Los Angeles Times)
The New York Times, BuzzFeed, and other media publishers have joined a program called Instant Articles that allows the outlets to publish articles directly onto Facebook’s news feed. (USA Today)
At Literary Hub, Jim Ruland considers the reasons writers are reluctant to “think like a merchant” when trying to sell their finished works.
