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:
At Deadline, Stephen King discusses his many film adaptations—his favorites and those he dislikes—and how much input writers deserve after they entrust Hollywood to turning their books into movies.
“Lowell nonetheless believed that women were his intellectual and artistic equals. He spent most of his life behaving accordingly even as he treated his wives and mistresses so terribly, in romantic terms, that it was almost operatic.” Writer Michelle Dean considers poet Robert Lowell’s often difficult and puzzling relationships with women, and in particular his second wife, the novelist Elizabeth Hardwick. (New Republic)
The National Book Foundation has partnered with Lambda Literary to launch a new program for LGBTQ teens called BookUp LGBTQ. The program will be held at New York City’s Hetrick-Martin Institute, and will provide activities and books curated for LGBTQ youth. Poet and Cave Canem fellow t’ai freedom ford will teach the program. (Shelf Awareness)
A letter sent from the Chinese police to the Hong Kong police on Thursday confirmed for the first time that three of the five Hong Kong booksellers who have been reported missing since last November are being investigated for “illegal activities.” The three men worked at the Causeway Bay Bookshop in Hong Kong, but no specifics were given in the letter on the men’s alleged crimes. (Guardian)
“Do you want a book with that?” Fast food chain McDonald’s is offering children’s books instead of toys with its Happy Meals until February 15. The chain began distributing books with its Happy Meals in 2013, and will have given away more than fifty million books by the end of this year. (USA Today)
The brackets for the 2016 edition of the Morning News Tournament of Books are now posted and available for download. The opening round begins March 9, with Lauren Groff’s Fates and Furies up against Zachary Thomas Dodson’s Bats of the Republic.
If you decide not to actually communicate with another person this weekend (Hey, it’s okay!) you can relax and communicate vicariously by reading one of these epistolary novels, recommended by Paste.
