AP Style Guide Adds “They” as Singular Pronoun, Writer Automatons, and More
Penguin Random House sales down in 2016; William McPherson has died; fourteen women essayists to read right now; and other news.
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Penguin Random House sales down in 2016; William McPherson has died; fourteen women essayists to read right now; and other news.
Rigoberto González on the life of the poet outside of publications and awards; a survey of literary nonprofits fighting to protect free speech and the arts; the reality-bending writing of Julio Cortázar; and other news.
Applications are currently open for the Whiting Foundation’s second annual Creative Nonfiction Grant. Individual awards of $40,000 are given to up to six writers in the process of completing a book of creative nonfiction.
Creative nonfiction writers currently under contract with a U.S. publisher and at least two years into their contract are eligible to apply. Using the online submission system, submit up to three chapters of a manuscript-in-progress, a signed and dated contract, a progress statement, a letter of reference from the publisher, and two additional letters of reference by May 1. A panel of five anonymous judges will select the winners; the grantees will be announced in the fall. For complete guidelines and eligibility requirements, visit the website or e-mail nonfiction@whiting.org.
Established in 2015, the Whiting Foundation Creative Nonfiction Grant provides support for multiyear book projects that require large amounts of research. The grant’s chief objective is to “foster original, ambitious projects that bring writing to the highest possible standard.” The inaugural grantees were Deborah Baker, Sarah M. Broom, Timothy N. Golden, Joshua Roebke, Sarah Elizabeth Ruden, and John Jeremiah Sullivan.
Tournament of Books semifinals start today; Patti Smith purchases Arthur Rimbaud’s childhood home in France; KPMG gives away ten thousand books; and other news.
San Francisco Renaissance poet Joanne Kyger has died; 2017 Anisfield-Wolf Awards announced; what makes poetry poetry; and more.
The Cleveland Foundation has announced the winners of the 82nd annual Anisfield-Wolf Awards, given annually for books of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction published in the previous year that “confront racism and examine diversity.” The winners will be honored at a ceremony in Cleveland on September 7.
The winners are Tyehimba Jess in poetry for Olio (Wave Books), Margot Lee Shetterly in nonfiction for Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race (William Morrow), and Peter Ho Davies and Karan Mahajan in fiction for The Fortunes (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) and The Association of Small Bombs (Penguin), respectively. Isabel Allende received the Lifetime Achievement Award. Jess, Shetterly, and Allende will each receive $10,000; Davies and Mahajan will split the $10,000 fiction prize.
“The new Anisfield-Wolf winners broaden our insights on race and diversity,” said Henry Louis Gates Jr., who chairs the jury. “This year, we honor a breakthrough history of black women mathematicians powering NASA, a riveting novel of the Asian American experience, a mesmerizing, poetic exploration of forgotten black musical performance and a spellbinding story of violence and its consequences. All is capped by the lifetime achievement of Isabel Allende, an unparalleled writer and philanthropist.” Gates, along with Rita Dove, Joyce Carol Oates, Steven Pinker, and Simon Schama, judged the prize.
Established in 1935, the Anisfield-Wolf Book Awards have honored 236 writers, including Nobel laureates Gunnar Myrdal, Nadine Gordimer, Martin Luther King Jr., Toni Morrison, and Derek Walcott.
Whiting Award winners announced; Fonograf Editions releases vinyl records of poetry readings; inside the Merriam-Webster dictionary; and other news.
In a 2010 panel discussion at the Paley Center, Chinese activist and artist Ai Weiwei spoke about his extensive use of Twitter to share about his art and activism. Pressuring Twitter cofounder Jack Dorsey to make Twitter’s web interface available in Chinese, Ai stated how well suited it is to the Chinese language, in which each character constitutes an entire word: “With 140 characters in Chinese you really can write a novel.” Taking inspiration from this discussion, write a series of flash creative nonfiction pieces about art, human rights, or the use of social media, each 140 words long. Later, you may want to decide whether the essays function as standalone pieces or a connected series.
Amazon’s new ratings-based bookstore in Chicago; the mystery of the steak-sauce bottles in the library; the rise in aliteracy, or “reader’s block”; and more.