Sunday Content #5: September 6, 2015
A non-emailed newsletter curated by Sandra Allen
Stacy Schiff’s The Witches, about the Salem witch trials, will be out in October. The New Yorker ran a lengthy excerpt that has paragraphs like this:
So easy to complain about America now; what even was America then?
(Also how beautiful is this prose? Nonfiction is dry right? Right.)
In this Medium post, the International Rescue Committee asked Syrian refugees to show what is in each of their bags:
Related: New York Times Op-Ed on how the refugee crisis is not a European problem.
Unrelated but also: New York Times Editorial on Black Lives Matter.
A lot of folks in Iowa City are (appropriately) outraged at this appointment of a man to the office of University of Iowa president who has zero administrative (and extremely little academic) experience, despite intense opposition, to the tune of $590,000 a year:
Maybe read Deresiewicz new Harper’s cover story on how college sold its soul; I don’t know I agree with everything he has to say. I hope those kids get off his lawn. I’ll probably say a lot more about this later, but for now: When I was at Iowa a few years ago, they were shuttering academic departments and also building students a gagillion dollar climing wall that fell into a lazy river. Hopefully President Kraft-Tombstone harkens the long-awaited establishment of a Monsanto Studies major and an increase in the volume of students like Tara:
Sady Doyle’s Matter article about comedy and self-censorship and offense is worth reading:
David Simon was on Another Round talking in part about the representation of black men (women, er, less so) in writers rooms. He mentioned when Wyatt Cenac was on WTF — yes that episode. You should listen to that episode. It’s much better than the #hottakes about it were.
KQED’s “Bay Curious” series (which I adore) seeks to find the origins of the most iconic Bay Area word:
tl;dl: white people probably stole culture from black people. (?!?!)
You should follow Tig Notaro on Twitter; Tig Notaro never (wo)mans the account herself but gets others to.
This happened:
xo,
Sandra
p.s. This week I’m releasing the last ever issue of the magazine I’ve run for the last six and a half years. I’m bummed about it; I’m also happy about the creative energy I’m freeing up. Looking forward to having it out there, and seeing what y’all think.
p.p.s. Listen to Renata Adler was on the Longform podcast. And if you never read Speedboat, read Speedboat.
