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:
The Nuyorican Poets Café is planning a $10.9 million renovation that will more than double the size of its current location in New York City’s East Village neighborhood. Established in 1973, the venue has “long championed stripped-down, provocative and experimental work by Latinos and artists of color operating outside the cultural mainstream.” (Wall Street Journal)
Beginning September 15, the Italian government will give out €500 “culture bonuses” to teens on their eighteenth birthdays, which can be spent on books, theater tickets, museum tickets, and other cultural activities. Italian parliamentary undersecretary Tommaso Nannicini says that the initiative is meant to remind young people “how important cultural consumption is, both for enriching yourself as a person and strengthening the fabric of our society.” (Independent)
A new survey from the Pew Research Center reveals that American readers prefer print books to digital e-books. Sixty-five percent of Americans read a print book in the past year, compared to the 28 percent who read an e-book, and the 14 percent who listened to an audiobook.
The Poetry Foundation has announced the winners of its 2016 Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Poetry Fellowships, given annually to five poets between the ages of twenty-one and thirty-one to study and write poetry. The winners, who each receive $25,800, are Kaveh Akbar, Jos Charles, Angel Nafis, Alison C. Rollins, and Javier Zamora.
Jonathan Safran Foer speaks with the Bookseller about his new novel, Here I Am, and how he hopes readers engage with his writing: “It doesn’t have to be a happy communion—it’s not what I prefer, but I have no problem with people taking issue with what I write. I’m looking forward to those kinds of engagements which aren’t really people’s opinion, about praise or criticism, but are about this intimate communion and dialogue.”
Peter Taylor-Gooby, a British social-science professor at the University of Kent, has written a novel that he hopes will have more real-world impact than his work as an academic. “Social science needs to tap the imagination as well as cold reason,” says Taylor-Gooby, whose novel, The Baby Auction, illustrates the subjects of his academic research: market-driven inequality and exploitation. (Times Higher Education)
Former presidential candidate Ralph Nader is opening an independent bookstore in his hometown of Winsted, Connecticut. The store will open next week for a six-month test run to determine community demand. (Shelf Awareness)
