NYRB NEWS
Event with Madeline G. Levine, translator of 'The Memoir of the Warsaw Uprising'
'After the Tall Timber' on shortlist for PEN/Diamonstein-Spielgvogel Award for the Art of the Essay
Helen Macdonald on 'Lolly Willowes' in 'The New York Times Sunday Book Review'
In the January 28, 2016 issue of The New York Times Sunday Book Review, Helen Macdonald, author of H is for Hawk, named Sylvia Townsend Warner's Lolly Willowes as one of the last great books she has read. Here's Macdonald on the book, published by NYRB Classics:
"It tells the story of a woman who rejects the life that society has fixed for her in favor of freedom and the most unexpected of alliances. It completely blindsided me: Starting as a straightforward, albeit beautifully written family saga, it tips suddenly into extraordinary, lucid wildness."
Read the rest of Helen Macdonald's "By the Book" interview here.
Leonard Gardner interviewed on Radio Open Source
Last month, Max Larkin interviewed Fat City author Leonard Gardner on Radio Open Source. Their conversation covered the similarities between boxing and writing, what makes a boxer, and more. Of Fat City, Larkin says:
“There’s something special about Fat City… It’s a book about boxing on its surface, but it’s a book that seems to sum up a whole world of American literature before it. Steinbeck’s books of field work—Grapes of Wrath, In Dubious Battle—it seems to capture a little bit of Hemingway, and the Hemingway hero… It’s got a lot of noir to it, a lot of hard-boiled fatalistic California stories, but there's also a little anticipation of Rocky. It’s not about champion boxing, it’s just about boxing as a way to get out the drudgery of Stockton, California. About trying to be somebody."
Listen to the full interview here.
Sasha Abramsky's 'The House of Twenty Thousand Books' is on the Longlist of the Jewish Quarterly’s Wingate Prize
We're pleased to announce that Sasha Abramsky's The House of Twenty Thousand Books has made the Longlist of the Jewish Quarterly’s Wingate Prize. The Wingate Prize is the only UK literary prize to honor a nonfiction or fiction book that "translates the idea of Jewishness to the general reader." The shortlist will be announced in February. For more information, visit the Jewish Quarterly's website.
Abramsky's memoir of his extraordinary polymath grandfather also received an honorable mention from the judges of the Sophie Brody Medal, awarded by the Reference and Users Association, a division of the American Library Association. Read more on ALA's website.
Magda Szabó's 'The Door' is one of 'The New York Times Book Review' "10 Best Books of 2015"
'Leon Garfield's Shakespeare Stories' in the WSJ's "Best Books to Give Children"
The Wall Street Journal named Leon Garfield's Shakespeare Stories, published by The New York Review Children's Collection, one of the “Best Books to Give Children." Meghan Cox Gurden writes:
"Leon Garfield’s Shakespeare Stories brings together sophisticated retellings of 21 plays, aimed at readers 10 and older, that Garfield (1921-96) originally published in two volumes. In these lively and evocative pages a child will hear Shakespeare’s poetry set in prose that will lay the groundwork for many a future enchanted evening at the theater."
Learn more about the book here. The New York Review Children's Collection also publishes Smith: The Story of a a Pickpocket and The Complete Bostock and Harris by Leon Garfield.
Upcoming events with Leonard Gardner in New York
Please join us for events in New York with Leonard Gardner, author of Fat City.
On Friday, November 20, at 7 p.m., Film Forum (209 W Houston St) will screen John Huston's 1972 film Fat City, adapted from Leonard Gardner's novel. The NYRB Classics edition of Fat City will be available at concession. After the film, Gardner will be in conversation with noir writer Eddie Muller about the novel, and there will be an audience Q&A. Fat City will screen at Film Forum through November 26th.
Leonard Gardner will discuss his novel with writer and critic Gary Giddins as a part of McNally Jackson Live, the bookstore's new series. The event will take place on Tuesday, November 17, at 7 p.m., at the bookstore (52 Prince St) and will also include a conversation between The Nation's Ari Berman and The New Yorker's Jelani Cobb on the modern struggle for voting rights, as well as David Shields and Philip Lopate on Shields' War Is Beautiful.