If you went to the Museum of Modern Art in San Francisco this spring you could see a big small thing, a model that imagines what Manhattan will look like in 400 years. Actually Man-Nahāta is not one model but four, which hang in a square. Starting at the bottom left and walking clockwise you see a version of the city every hundred years, beginning in 2100. Emergence, the first in the series, is a grid of streets and skyscrapers, except for where an organic glassy form appears in Central Park, black and yellow and blue lit from below, awful. In Growth (set in 2200) the form expands in concentric and overlapping spirograph shapes, an almost periwinkle blue at the edges, rippling amber toward the center, where it calcifies into hills. By Decay (2300) it flows back, leaving edges of buildings made soft, eroded into shapes like melted candles. In Rebirth (2400) the built environment is overgrown, peaks and valleys where a city used to be, made of white chalky photopolymers and fiberglass.

Man-Nahāta was commissioned by the director Francis Ford Coppola, who hired the architect Neri Oxman and the OXMAN group to create studies for Megalopolis, an epic set in a future New York City that starts production this year. Made for a movie that does not yet exist, the model has its own narrative, based in part on the projected mean global sea level and surface temperature rise in the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Most people walked around it the wrong way, or maybe not wrong but counterclockwise, changing the story. The glassy form recedes, buildings sharpen, streets reappear. You could circle the model again and again, speeding up or slowing down time, repeating the disaster or undoing it. Susan Stewart writes in On Longing that the miniature, “linked to nostalgic versions of childhood and history, presents a diminutive, and thereby manipulatable, version of experience, a version which is domesticated and protected from contamination. It marks the pure body, the organic body of the machine and its repetition of a death that is thereby not a death.”

***

Film has always tangled with architecture and invention. Brian R. Jacobson writes about this history in Studios Before the System. In 1888, Eadweard Muybridge took his pictures of horses in motion to the New Jersey laboratory of Thomas Edison. Soon after, Edison filed a patent for the kinetoscope, an early moving picture machine. William K. L. Dickson and William Heise made the first film for the Edison Manufacturing Company in 1892. Around this time Edison was bought out of General Electric and started the Edison Portland Cement Company. He made designs for concrete homes that could be built with a single pour, which Edison described as “the most wonderful advance in science and invention the world has ever known, or hoped for.” The houses would be affordable, fireproof, and made on site. There is a photograph of the inventor next to a two-story prototype with a covered porch and balcony, windows evenly spaced, and decorative molding. Edison wears a dark suit, his tie askew and his left hand in his front pocket. Man and his little house.

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From Stoner by John Williams:

And so he had his love affair.

And:

In his forty-third year William Stoner learned what others, much younger, had learned before him: that the person one loves at first is not the person one loves at last, and that love is not an end but a process through which one person attempts to know another.

I am a baker of pies and a believer in pleasures, but also the kind of killjoy who can’t take a rom-com in the spirit it’s intended. Hence my fraught relationship with Heartburn by Nora Ephron. I remember—from 1983, the year the book was published—it being marketed as a “hilarious” comedy about a woman cooking her way out of a broken heart at the end of a marriage. Heartburn was a cultural sensation in the suburbs of my youth, such that I recall my mother cackling over the film adaptation and criticizing Meryl Streep’s looks—not pretty enough! The story was said to be inspired by Ephron’s divorce from Carl Bernstein and has always been considered a delicious revenge plot by a spurned woman upon a cheating man.

Ephron had a dazzling career as a trailblazer for women in journalism, and she wrote many of the greatest movies of all time, including When Harry Met Sally. She was a master, so my cavils over Heartburn‘s myths about romance will be brief: I don’t think a woman who stays in a bad relationship is just a starry-eyed believer in true love, as the heroine, Rachel Samstat, is presented to be. Nor do I think that men are just dogs—which is the book’s explanation for her husband, Mark Feldman’s, behavior—or that the happiest ending is finding a new relationship. But Ephron, in Heartburn, wasn’t looking to soul-search—this was her revenge novel. At one point, Rachel, who is a food columnist, admits to her therapist that she tells stories about her life in order to “control” the narrative. Ephron, writing Heartburn, was controlling the narrative of her divorce while showing off her wit, and she did it wonderfully. The one-liners never cease, as when Rachel says that Mark celebrates the political dysfunction of Washington, D.C., because if the city worked, “something might actually be accomplished and then we’d really be in bad shape” and adds, “This is a very clever way of being cynical, but never mind.”

As the new school year kicks off — or is already in progress in many places — it’s worth taking a look at the states which have enacted laws that ban books. This guide is not comprehensive, but gives an overview of the legislation currently on the books that will impact how teachers and librarians select and share reading material in classrooms and libraries.

Before diving it, it is worth noting these are all “red” states. It is a popular and unhelpful narrative to simply write off these laws because of where they are being enacted. In many of these states, there is significant disenfranchisement of voters in addition to laws which make voting harder than it needs to be; this ensures a certain political persuasion remains in power. These systemic barriers to voting are the same ones which need to be considered in arguments that the people who can’t get these books from libraries thanks to these laws can “just get them at the bookstore.” We are in the business of dismantling hurdles, not leaving them where they are.

Further, as we’ve seen through these censorship roundups over the past year+, it does not matter where or how book bans begin. They trickle through each and every state in varying degrees, and what you see here could become models for future legislation elsewhere. Finally, writing off certain states does not help in ending book bans. Everyone, regardless of political affiliation or state of residence, deserves the right to access books, reading material, and information they want to. Fighting fire with fire helps no one.

Note that this list is not comprehensive. I’ve pulled out some of the biggest laws in several states that are having an immediate impact and that will likely influence further legislation within and beyond their jurisdictions.

Book Ban Bills Currently Enacted Across the US

Florida

There is not a wrong time to read some great witchy YA books. That said, there is something particularly good about reading new witchy YA books as the seasons begin to shift toward shorter days and nights. Lighting a candle and cracking open the windows to dig into a story about people who have magic powers, who often have cute or terrifying familiars, and who want to change their worlds? Count me in. We’re lucky, too, in that YA continues to offer more and more witchy books that are representative of the world at large. These books are queerer and more colorful than they ever have been before.

Whether you’re new to witchy books or are looking to add some more great options to your TBR, let’s dive into some outstanding new books that have hit shelves this year. Don’t like especially scary books or want more sweet witch stories? Never fear. Those are well represented here, too.

Bonus: Tirzah highlighted a ton more YA witch books publishing this year, and I’ve not repeated any below. Twice the witchy goodness!

One of the things I love the most about Star Wars is that there are so many stories in the galaxy. There are so many characters, so many stories, and such a rich history available that the possibilities are endless (I’m of the opinion that you can never have too many SW books, shows, or movies). Which makes me wonder why some of the most obvious books/series haven’t been made into TV shows yet.

This list focuses on canon books, mainly to avoid confusion. I’d love a Mara Jade TV show, and I’ve heard the rumors about her in Mandalorian season 3 and the rumors about a possible Disney+ Heir to the Empire movie, but forgive me if I’m skeptical. That being said, I would watch the hell out of a TV series based on Legends. Yes, I’m being purposely vague and sweeping: I’d watch any and all of it.

I’m behind on my Star Wars book reading and even further behind on my Star Wars comics reading (so many books, not enough hours in the day, and throw in single parenting a 6-year-old, and you’ve got your answer as to why that is), but I’ve come up with a list of Star Wars books and series that deserve their own shows. It goes without saying that this is not an exhaustive list by any means, and it barely scratches the surface. Let’s take a look!

The world, to say the very least, has been very challenging lately. And that won’t be changed by a fast and/or easy fix at all. So, I’ve been making it a point to find joy wherever I can because, yay, serotonin boosts. One thing that has always brought me happiness is music and I often listen to it while working, writing, or just relaxing with a game. And I have quite the eclectic collection of mixes.

When I was recently listening to my Madonna mix, it struck me that romance novels would pair up quite nicely with some of her songs. Now, I know that this may take some convincing but if you’ll allow me to expand on this, I’m confident you’ll be pleasantly surprised with my thought process. Because, with it being too hot to go out and do much of anything, I’ve had a lot of time to think about this.

With the June release of her latest album Finally Enough Love, the release of a limited series based on A League of Their Own based off the movie that featured Madonna on the screen and soundtrack alike, and August 16th being her birthday, now seemed the perfect time for a list.

So, without further delay, I present for your consideration, Madonna songs and romance novels match-ups!

If you’re someone who, like me, is an Elder born in the 1900s, you probably remember the early days of self-publishing. For those of you who don’t, it was a dark time. People were throwing their LiveJournals into .epub format and calling it a memoir, there was little-to-no editing, and anyone who wanted to write a book could do so without any oversight or input from another person. I am the first to agree that publishing gatekeeping is awful. It prioritizes voices of people who already have a platform, and it has a tendency to royally screw people whose voices would bring a new perspective to the table. And yes, that was a royalties pun, thank you for noticing.

These days, the Wild West-style wilderness of self-publishing still exists, and rightfully so. But there is also a “middle” layer, made up of authors who have decided to strike out on their own but also produce a more finished product. Kindle Unlimited is an offering of Amazon. For $10/month, you can borrow up to 20 titles on a rotating basis. It’s effectively an ebook library with no wait lists that’s funded by — and only accessible to — users. There is a wide offering of titles and genres available, so since I’ve been devouring mysteries lately, I’ve collected some of the top-rated and best Kindle Unlimited mysteries available.

I might be landlocked in the middle of Iowa but that doesn’t mean I don’t need a good bookish beach towel. Why, just a few weeks ago I went to a family get-together at a state park with a body of water in it. And as my brother-in-law said at the time, that body of water had what “could loosely be described as a beach.” Guess what we all had? Beach towels!

Unfortunately, my beach towel was a blue and white striped bore of a beach towel. Which got me to thinking: Surely there are bookish beach towels out there? So before I head on my next international vacation to lovely Iceland and its geothermal baths, I’m going to have to grab myself and my partner a couple of bookish beach towels.

Luckily, my fellow Book Riot contributors have written great articles about how to further perfect my bookish beachy day. I can follow this quiz to find out what brilliant beach read I should read this summer. I can get tips on how to achieve the ideal beach reading day. And if I want to just slap my new beach towel down on my front porch, I can even read one of these books that will transport me to the beach.

On the evening of August 9, the staff of The Paris Review welcomed a special guest: Loudon Wainwright III, who came with guitar and banjo in hand, ready to perform on a makeshift stage in front of our bookshelves and plants. (We rearranged the furniture a bit before he arrived, and ordered pizza.) Wainwright played both classics and songs from his new album, Lifetime Achievement, accompanied on occasion by his longtime friend and collaborator Joe Henry. His rendition of “New Paint,” first released in 1972, was especially striking. You can watch it in full here, along with a performance of the Lifetime Achievement highlight “How Old Is 75?”

There is something off about August. This part of the summer season brings about an atmospheric unease. The long light stops feeling languorous and starts to seem like it’s just a way of putting off the night. There is no position of the earth in relation to the sun that comes as a relief. Insomnia arrives in August; bedsheets become heavy under humidity. No good habits are possible in August, much less good decisions. All I do is think about my outfits and my commute, constantly trying to choose between my sweatiness and my vanity. People are not themselves. I go see the party girls and find them wistful. I meet up with the melancholics and find them wanting to stay out all night.

In August I cannot think, so I cannot work. This is not not-working in a restful or decadent way. This is not-working as certain doom. And I can’t not-work in peace either: if I leave in July I consider myself traveling but if I leave in August I am just leaving. The best I can hope for, in the absence of a purpose like business or pleasure, is an escape. Maybe a light excursion. In any case I am rarely in the place I can reasonably call my home in August, and instead stay in other people’s basements, in their living rooms, on their couches. I sleep on what was once a little brother’s bunk bed and wash my hair in his parents’ shower. I walk down the stairs and see their children’s fingerprint smudges on the banister. I stay in hotel rooms by myself and think: What a waste. (I am convinced that hotel rooms are designed for sex, even though I am not particularly into the quality they have—sealed, hermetic, identical. Hotels are to sex what time zones are to jet lag, I think. A change of interiors out of proportion with the body.)

I am against August. When I try to explain this position, some people instinctively want to argue. These people seem to love the beach beyond all reason, to have never suffered a yellowed pit stain on a favorite white T-shirt in their life, and to eagerly welcome all thirty-one days of August as though they are a reward for a year well-lived rather than a final trial before the beginning of another. These are people who vacation with peace of mind. To them, I say: Go away. To the people who agree with me, I say: Go on. 

In 1967, the Jornal do Brasil asked Clarice Lispector to write a Saturday newspaper column on any topic she wished. For nearly seven years she wrote weekly, covering a wide range of topics—humans and animals, bad dinner parties, the daily activities of her two sons—but the subject matter was often besides the point. These genre-defying missives are defined by a lyricism and strangeness that readers of her fiction will recognize, though they are a thing apart in their brevity and interiority. Too Much of Life: The Complete Crônicas, which collects these columns and others Lispector wrote throughout her career, will be published in English by New Directions this September. As Lispector’s son Paulo Gurgel Valente has written, “Enjoy the columns, I know of nothing quite like them.” Today, the Review is publishing a selection of these crônicas, the final installment in a series.

March 13, 1971

Animals (I)

Sometimes a shiver runs through me when I come into physical contact with animals, or even at the mere sight of them. I seem to have a certain fear and horror of those living beings that, though not human, share our instincts, although theirs are freer and less biddable. An animal never substitutes one thing for another, never sublimates as we are forced to do. And it moves, this living thing! It moves independently, by virtue of that nameless thing that is Life.

In August, I become regretful about everything that I haven’t squeezed into my summer and probably won’t. Here is an incomplete list of books I have started and not finished: First Love by Gwendoline Riley, At Freddie’s by Penelope Fitzgerald, The Palace Papers by Tina Brown, Sex in the Archives by Barry Reay, and—many times—Swann’s Way (the first few pages). I abandoned all these books at different points and for the usual reasons; I was busy, bored, or left my copy at the beach. It seems like they are no longer going to be my summer reading—maybe in September.

—Sophie Haigney, web editor

This week, I returned to one of my favorite explorations of the strange geometries of syntax: “Way down the deserted street, I thought I saw a bus which, with luck, might get me out of this sentence which might go on forever, knotting phrase onto phrase with fire hydrants and parking meters, and still not take me to my language waiting, surely, around some corner.” In Curves to the Apple, Rosmarie Waldrop’s sentences accelerate and swerve, reconfiguring the modern discourse on embodiment and subjectivity; there’s a spectacular volta lying in wait in each of these prose poems. “I learned about communication by twisting my legs around yours,” she writes, “as, in spinning a thought, we twist fiber on fiber.”

June 10

I wake up to three missed calls and matching voice mails from a blocked number that turns out to be FedEx Express Heavyweight informing me that since I was not around to receive my thousand-pound skid, it’s on its way to JFK. The delivery in question is Issue Seven of The Drift, the magazine I cofounded and co-run, and it was supposed to arrive next Monday or Tuesday in time for our launch party Thursday at the Public Hotel. Evidently it’s early … and sleeping in was a potentially multithousand-dollar mistake.

Kicking myself for how late I stayed out last night—there was a party at Russian Samovar for Joshua Cohen, whose novel The Netanyahus won this year’s Pulitzer in fiction—I dial FedEx and shoot an email to our printer. I got through most of The Netanyahus in a single sitting last summer, before I’d met its author. It’s mostly a satire based on an anecdote told to Cohen by the late literary critic Harold Bloom, but it’s also pointedly presentist, a self-conscious parable for liberalism in the Trump years. Early on it draws a dichotomy between history and theology that I’ve been mulling over since I encountered it.

While I’m on hold with FedEx I receive an email asking me to write a culture diary for this website, and I decide to start right away—no cherry-picking. Not that what I’m doing now is particularly “cultural”: I’m telling the automated system I’d like to “speak to a representative … speak to a representative,” getting transferred to incorrect extensions, hanging up, and dialing the line again. I haven’t even gotten out of bed. 

In French the word merle means blackbird, a dark bird of the thrush family. A blackbird’s song marks its territory. The male has black feathers and a yellow beak. It is in the same genus as the meadowlark. Forty years after first meeting James Merrill at my teacher David Kalstone’s Chelsea apartment, I am sitting at his desk in Stonington, Connecticut, with his large Petit Larousse open before me. Searching for the meanings of our names in French, I am distracted by a blackbird perched on the windowsill, drinking a little dew and then swaying on a nearby branch. It speaks in polished, rudimentary tones with a slow tempo.

Merrill’s big desk is in a small room—in an apartment of small rooms—behind a hinged bookcase that creates a very private space. Still, I can hear a train whistle, a foghorn, halyard lines clinking against the masts of sloops anchored in the harbor, church chimes, and bits of conversation from villagers below on Water Street. These must be the sounds Merrill heard, too, while working. He was an early riser and liked to give the first hours of the day to his poems, which reflect, mirrorlike, so many of my own feelings. Mirrors are also a motif in his poems—mirrors that remember us across the years, reflecting our beauty and dissolution alike. It has taken me some days to sit at his desk.

In French, my name means collar, and I think immediately of the metaphysical poet George Herbert’s poem “The Collar,” published in 1633, a poem in which the fervid speaker seeks more freedom in his life. It is a poem of strong feeling, almost like a rant. Like his friend Elizabeth Bishop, Merrill loved Herbert’s poems and could quote them by heart. During my twenties and thirties, perhaps there was no living poet I admired more than Merrill, and I am drawn still to this American poet, who was said to be writing even while needing oxygen on the night before his death more than twenty-five years ago.

I met the novelist Anuradha Roy in Delhi in the mid-nineties, when she was an editor at Oxford University Press and I had just published my first book. Not long after that, she moved to a Himalayan town to set up Permanent Black, now India’s premier intellectual publisher, with her husband, Rukun Advani. She also began to write fiction. Her fifth novel, The Earthspinner, which was released in the United States this summer, is about the war on reason and on imagination in a world consumed by political fanaticism.

Though I don’t remember what was said in our first meeting, I can recall a certain hopefulness in the air—there was a lot of that about, among publishers and writers, in India in the nineties. Writing in English was ceasing to be the furtive and poorly paid endeavor it long had been. There were greater opportunities to publish; new literary periodicals and networks of promotion seemed to be creating the infrastructure for more vigorous intellectual and artistic life. Indeed, the conventional wisdom of that decade, helped by the prominence of Salman Rushdie, Vikram Seth, and Arundhati Roy abroad, was that Indian writing in English was “arriving,” no less resoundingly than was India’s embrace of consumer capitalism at the end of history. One measure of this apparent progress was the respectful international attention such work elicited. Granta and The New Yorker devoted issues to Indian writing in 1997, the fiftieth year of India’s independence from British colonialism.

In 2022, there is something very forlorn about the seventy-fifth anniversary of India’s independence. Murderous Hindu supremacists rule the country, and lynch mobs—physical and digital—police its cultural and intellectual life. Educated Indians spend much of their time and energy trying to emigrate. Literature remains, for a tiny minority, the means to cognition in the darkness, and literary festivals project, briefly, the illusion of a community. But every writer seems terribly alone with herself. The sense of a meaningful shared space and a common language, the possibility of a broad literary flourishing—many of those fragile shoots of the nineties have been trampled into the ground by the ferocious invaders of private as well as public spheres.

Over twenty-five years of radical transformations, Anuradha and I have kept intermittently in touch. While emailing in recent months, I began to wonder if other readers should be invited to reflect on the fate of writers in India today. What follows is a conversation that explores some of the historical uniqueness of this fate.