literature | The Smart Set

Read like a guest, not like a tourist!

ENG 310 — Fri, 30 Aug 2024 01:20:09 +0000

Every time you pick up a novel from another country, you open the door to a new journey. You might discover new (to you!) foods and customs, pick up a few phrases in a foreign language, or gain a new perspective on something you thought you understood. If you are fluent in English — a […]

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1984 in 2024

Matt Hanson — Thu, 11 Jul 2024 11:30:00 +0000

Like existentialism, surreal, and (sorry, Alanis Morisette) ironic, the term “Orwellian” is ubiquitous and often misused. It’s typically applied to government surveillance or totalitarianism in general. This is understandable, given that British author Eric Arthur Blair, better known by his pen name, George Orwell, is likely best known for his novel 1984, which generations of […]

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Town and Country

Richard Klin — Thu, 11 Apr 2024 11:30:00 +0000

Some time ago, I embarked on a personal reading project: An informal survey of books that once had been widely read — so widely read, in fact, that they had earned their place in the literary lexicon. The criteria for my project did have certain strictures. The operative word was once. The contents of these […]

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A Travesty of Justice

Daniel A. Hill — Thu, 15 Feb 2024 12:30:00 +0000

Given the headlines, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the injudicious behavior of U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Clarence Thomas. I know the man unusually well. In 2012, the editors of The Wall Street Journal’s law blog asked me to weigh in on the question of whether the Supremes would uphold or invalidate Obamacare. […]

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In Search of Proust’s Genius

Paula Marantz Cohen — Mon, 13 Nov 2023 12:30:00 +0000

Can a work of art be deeply flawed and still be great? One of the reasons that some once-revered works in the Western canon have been treated so shabbily in recent years is that, once a new lens is introduced that illuminates their flaws, critics have been exceptionally severe. But great things need a certain […]

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slaying the cruelty of life

James Ladd Thomas — Mon, 12 Dec 2022 12:30:00 +0000

A few weeks ago, I contacted an old friend, Patricia, to inform her that my new novel, Lester Lies Down, was about to be published. I’ve known Patricia since the summer of 2005 when we attended the Southampton Writers’ Conference and were in the same fiction workshop led by Melissa Bank. A few days later […]

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Another day at the (Cl)Office

Stan Tymorek — Thu, 22 Sep 2022 12:36:12 +0000

Have you heard of the new blend word “cloffice”? It’s a room that you create by turning a large closet into an office, usually in a house that doesn’t have such a room for solitary work. If your work is writing, I suggest that you keep some of the clothes hanging in there when you […]

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We Tell Stories in Order to Die

David Stromberg — Thu, 01 Sep 2022 11:30:00 +0000

I turned 39 not long after my first daughter was born. When she was about five months old, I saw the big four-oh on the horizon, and started to think about what I was going to leave behind when I was gone, at least from a literary perspective. So I looked at the bookshelf of […]

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Point of Entry

Leslie Lindsay — Thu, 25 Aug 2022 11:25:00 +0000

I am standing on a concrete-and-glass balcony, watching my peers, on a yoga platform in a writing circle, when the thought comes to me. I am so done with writing. I close my eyes and can see the words spelled out, letter by letter, on the dark backs of my lids. There’s an ache in […]

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Walking Words, Words Walking

Colin Fleming — Mon, 13 Jun 2022 11:30:00 +0000

Everyone recognizes that guy who specializes in fake cerebral-ness. He’s all about the pose. You’ll encounter him at the café on a Sunday afternoon when you’re powering through your hot chocolate, and there he’ll be, sliding his copy of Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita ever-closer to the woman seated at his side, as if […]

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