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:
Jellybooks, a London-based reader analytics company, wants to transform how publishers “acquire, edit, and market books,” much like how Billy Beane used analytics in Moneyball to reshape baseball. Jellybooks tracks e-reading behavior, including when people read, for how long, how quickly, and how far they get in an e-book, among other details. (New York Times)
A petition launched on March 9 urges the White House to end the Cuban embargo for books, which has been in effect for fifty years. Many publishing industry executives from companies including Penguin Random House, Hachette Book Group, and Simon & Schuster have signed the petition, which states: “The U.S. trade embargo is harmful to book culture and runs counter to American ideals of free expression,” and, “Books are catalysts for greater cross-cultural understanding, economic development, free expression, and positive social change.” (Publishers Weekly)
“Begin it where warm waters halt / And take it in the canyon down, / Not far, but too far to walk. / Put in below the home of Brown.” This cryptic stanza is part of a poem that could help lead the way to a treasure chest filled with gold! A millionaire named Forrest Fenn hid the treasure somewhere in the Rocky Mountains and left clues to its whereabouts in his self-published book, The Thrill of the Chase. (NPR)
The best way to beat writer’s block, it seems, is to just get anything down, free from external and internal judgment. Prolific novelist Graham Greene jotted his silly dreams to overcome his blockage. Give it a try the next time you’re stuck. (New Yorker)
At the Guardian, several booksellers and the executive director of the iconic San Francisco City Lights Bookstore talk about the store’s beginnings, and its “commitment to creativity as a potent form of revolutionary thinking and action.”
In an interview at Elle, poet and essayist Melissa Broder talks about anxiety, Twitter confessions, and her new essay collection, So Sad Today. Listen to Broder read an excerpt from So Sad Today for Poets & Writers’ Page One podcast series.
For the first time in eighteen years, Ireland has banned a book. The Censorship of Publications Board of Ireland has banned Jean Martin’s The Raped Little Runaway for obscenity. According to censorship board chairman Shane McCarthy, book banning in Ireland is an “extreme and rare occurrence.” (Independent)
