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:
This morning, bestselling author James Patterson announced the launch of his new children’s imprint, jimmy patterson. The Hachette imprint will publish eight to twelve middle-grade and young adult titles per year, and proceeds will benefit teacher scholarships, bookstores, school libraries, and other pro-reading initiatives. In the announcement at BookExpo America this morning, Hachette CEO Michael Pietsch said, “This new imprint is an exciting way of combining [Patterson’s] force as the world’s best-selling author with his inspiring message about getting kids reading.” (Publishers Lunch)
“Each play seems to go on for a week. More drafts ensue. The scripts are like earthworms. You cut them in half but they regenerate. I think they write themselves by night.” At the New York Times, award-winning author Hilary Mantel discusses adapting her Wolf Hall novels for the theater.
Initials tests on Chilean poet Pablo Neruda’s body came back negative for signs of poisoning. Researchers exhumed Neruda’s body in January to investigate suspicions that the poet was murdered on orders from Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet in 1973. (NBC News)
On Wednesday, June 3, Poets House in New York City will host a birthday celebration for famed Beat poet Allen Ginsberg. The event will also celebrate the recent publication of The Essential Ginsberg (HarperCollins), and several contemporary poets will perform readings of Ginsberg’s work included in the collection. (Coldfront)
Many artistic adaptations of Virginia Woolf’s fiction focus more on the author’s tragic death than her work. This fixation on the author’s suicide, writes Holly Williams, undermines her talent, and “encourages an interpretation focusing on the gloomy aspects of Woolf’s fiction at the expense of the shimmering, inventive, life-affirming elements.” (Guardian)
British nonprofit Arts Council England has invested £1.2 million to support school creative writing programs for children ages eight to fourteen. The fund intends to enable socio-economically disadvantaged children to engage with and be inspired by the art of writing. (Bookseller)
Watch two clips from the forthcoming Macbeth film adaptation, which stars Michael Fassbender as Macbeth and Marion Cotillard as Lady Macbeth. (GalleyCat)
