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:
Barnes & Noble reported sales of its Nook e-reader are strong, yet there are rumors the company is considering selling the Nook division. (Los Angeles Times)
Critic Stephen Burt reviews recent books of poetry by Noah Eli Gordon, Anna Moschovakis, Kathleen Ossip, and Juliana Spahr for the Nation.
The late Christopher Hitchens's final article for Vanity Fair has been published, plumbing the life and work of Charles Dickens.
Meanwhile, Booker prize-winning author Howard Jacobson states the BBC has ruined Charles Dickens. (Guardian)
Partly in response to Laura Miller's essay in Salon on the significance of endings of novels, book critic Lev Grossman defends the all-important middle. (Time)
The Christian Science Monitor lists six new books all should read in 2012, including Antigonick, Anne Carson's new translation of Sophocles's Antigone, illustrated by Bianca Stone.
Damian Bullen, an amateur literary archaeologist in the United Kingdom, believes he's discovered the final resting place of King Arthur. (Deadline via Largehearted Boy)
New York City independent bookstore McNally Jackson lists its 2011 bestsellers, with Patti Smith's Just Kids leading all, Jennifer Egan's A Visit from the Goon Squad at the number two spot, and The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides edging out Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games.
A photography exhibit created by artist Laylah Barrayn, Her Word as Witness: Women Writers of the African Diaspora, is currently on display in Brooklyn, New York, at Restoration Plaza’s Skylight Gallery. (Black Enterprise)
And for fun to kickoff the weekend: "Sexting Ice Breakers for English Grad Students." (McSweeney’s)
