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 summer actor Kristen Stewart will write and direct a film adaptation of Lidia Yuknavitch’s memoir, The Chronology of Water. “[Yuknavitch] is in my blood and I knew that before I met her,” she said. “I'm going to write the best fucking female role.” (Cannes Film Festival)
Essence highlights five ways Zora Neale Hurston influenced black literature and black womanhood, from her portrayal of independent women protagonists to her early promotion of intersectionality.
“He had, in the best sense, an ad man’s gift for the pregnant phrase.” Adam Gopnick remembers writer Tom Wolfe, who died Monday at the age of eighty-eight. (New Yorker)
Meanwhile, the New York Times features a primer on Wolfe’s fiction and nonfiction, including The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, The Bonfire of the Vanities, and The Right Stuff.
David L. Ulin talks to fiction writer Lynne Tillman about the eight years she spent writing her new novel, Men and Apparitions. (Barnes & Noble Review)
Twenty-six authors and academics have signed an open letter opposing the media’s treatment of writer Junot Díaz following recent sexual and verbal harassment allegations made against the author. (Chronicle of Higher Education)
Three Percent has announced the finalists for the 2018 Best Translated Book Awards. Prizes of $5,000 each are given annually to the author and translator of a book of poetry and fiction translated from any language into English.
Poet and essayist Kim Stafford has been named the ninth poet laureate of Oregon. Over the next two years Stafford will give up to twenty public readings across the state to promote the value of poetry and creative expression. (Portland Tribune)
