CATEGORIES

Dead Storms and Literature's New Horizon: The 2020 Neustadt Prize Lecture

During the Neustadt Prize ceremony on October 21, 2020, David Bellos read the English language version of Kadare’s prize lecture to a worldwide Zoom audience.

Ismail Kadare: Winner of the 2020 Neustadt International Prize for Literature

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, World Literature Today presented the 2020 Neustadt Festival 100 percent online. In the lead-up to the festival, U.S. Ambassador Yuri Kim officially presented the award to Kadare at a ceremony in Tirana in late August, attended by members of Kadare’s family; Elva Margariti, the Albanian minister of culture; and Besiana Kadare, Albania’s ambassador to the United Nations.

How to Adopt a Cat

Hoping battles knowing in this three-act seduction (spoiler alert: there’s a cat in the story).

Chicken Soup: The Story of a Jewish Family

Chickens, from Bessarabia to New York City, provide a generational through-line in these four vignettes.

Awl

“Awl” is from a series titled “Words I Did Not Understand.” Through memory—“the first screen of nostalgia”—and language, a writer pieces together her story of home.

Apocalyptic Scenarios and Inner Worlds

A Conversation with Gloria Susana Esquivel

Marie's Proof of Love

People believe, Marie thinks, even when there’s no proof. You believe because you imagine. But is imagination enough to live by?

A Portrait of an Intuitive Artist

Art has long been a personal outlet for Bull’s Jaime Lee Kirchner. Now she’s sharing it with the world and using her sixth sense to help others.

Living the Scheme

Born into poverty, a young man claws his way into the gilded class.

Let Sharon Mashihi Whisper in Your Ear

Her strange, intimate podcast, Appearances, feels like a breakthrough for the form.

Morfydd Clark – A Star in Waiting

Morfydd Clark’s breakout moment was supposed to come last year. She’s been too busy shooting The Lord of the Rings to worry about it.

Mike Nichols's Heartburn

The celebrated director was at the top of his game when friend Nora Ephron trusted him to direct the movie based on his her messy breakup with Carl Bernstein. His own breakup—and breakdown—turned out to be right around the corner.

Grammy Awards Shift To March Due To Pandemic Conditions

The 2021 Grammy Awards will no longer take place this month in Los Angeles and will broadcast in March due to a recent surge in coronavirus cases and deaths.

Who Did J.K. Rowling Become?

Deciphering the most beloved, most reviled children’s book author in history.

Daniel Dae Kim – Actor and Producer

“I’ve spent about two and a half months in quarantine .”

A Punk Drummer's Life Upendended In 'Sound of Metal'

The film “Sound of Metal” starts with the uncomfortably loud noises of guitar feedback and ends two hours later with absolute silence. The trip through those extremes is a worthy one, if sometimes exasperating.

Living Her Life Like It's Golden

The luminous Tichina Arnold brings laughter and love to The Neighborhood.

Hannibal Who?

Superstar showrunner and producer Jenny Lumet is creating a whole new Clarice.

Hello, Kitty

Grudge, the Maine Coon cat on Star Trek: Discovery, is ready for her close-up.

The Existential Despair of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

Revisiting the most disturbing Christmas special

Baja Fresh

How a monied gearhead rebel beat Ford—and will sell you the buggy that did it.

Nerding Out With David Fincher

The director talks about the decades-long journey behind Mank, his dense, bitter look at Hollywood history, political power, and the creative act.

The Primary Substance

Stuck in traffic during a downpour, a driver faces a peculiar dilemma.

Translating Toshiko Hirata's Ars Poetica

TRANSLATOR'S NOTE

When I Left “Karl Liebknecht” (an excerpt)

In the Karl Liebknecht House in Leipzig, Germany, thirty people of various nationalities are seated around an improvised table on the stage in the Events Hall, interpreters behind them, some with texts in front of them, some without, and while it looks as if they’re at an ordinary meeting, they are, in fact, at an exceptional one, one that could be called a performance.

Sofa

A sofa, the site of a family’s history, receives and gives a second life.

Pittsburgh's August Wilson African American Cultural Center

LOCATED IN THE HEART of downtown Pittsburgh, on Liberty Avenue close to Union Station and the David Lawrence Convention Center, the sleek and elegant but unpretentious August Wilson African American Cultural Center (awaacc) cannot fail to capture the eye and the imagination of anybody who is visiting Pittsburgh or, for that matter, of anybody who lives in the city.

Liquid History

Scuba-diving in the Black Sea, a writer contemplates Lenin in the Crimean seabed, the watery landfall from which historical figures are never meant to rise again.

Diversifying Bookshelves From Trend to Norm

IN THE WAKE of the murders of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and George Floyd, America woke up to find itself in the midst of a national reckoning over race. Calls for justice and dismantling white supremacy began to touch every aspect of American life—including the literary world.

Catania, Sicily

LAST OCTOBER, I chose to use Catania as a base for exploring the towns of southeastern Sicily I had yet to discover.