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What’s On at Flavorpill: The Links That Made the Rounds in Our Office

By Alison Nastasi on

Today at Flavorpill, we explored Kristen Stewart’s evolving style. We spotted 15 ridiculous trends from Fashion Month. We reviewed the top 10 challenged titles of the year with Huff Post Books. We watched 10 foreign movies every guy should see. We dug into a guide to… Read More

Books

The First Edition Covers of 25 Classic Books

By Emily Temple on

We try not to judge books by their covers — both proverbially and literally — but sometimes we just can’t help it. After all, the cover is your first impression of a book, and can inform the way you approach it. Plus, at least in our experience, any avid reader who carries a book wherever she goes has memories and feelings attached to it that can be instantly dredged up by a peek at the cover art. But of course, most book covers change over the years, whether minimally, correcting for modern fonts and colors, or maximally, going through radical change after radical change, each generation connecting (or not connecting) to a different design. With that in mind, after the jump, we’ve collected a few first edition covers of classic books, some of which may be familiar to you — a certain blue masterpiece will perhaps never fall out of favor — though some have been replaced by much more iconic imagery or fallen out of favor. Click through to reminisce over (or discover) 25 covers of classic books, and let us know if we missed your favorite in the comments. … Read More

Books

One More Reason to Love Flannery O’Connor

By Caroline Stanley on

Most people consider Flannery O’Connor the master of all things grotesque, but the Southern author always felt like her work was misunderstood by those who failed to recognize its religious themes. “I am tired of reading reviews that call A Good Man brutal and sarcastic,” she once wrote. “The stories are hard but… Read More

Books

The Books That Make Guys Swoon

By Daniel Roberts on

A couple weeks ago we posted about the books that might make you undateable — at least in the eyes of those who might, perhaps, yes, judge your romantic appeal based on the book you’re reading. (Sorry, but this is a thing that happens.) We were inspired by a Paris Review blog post about the books guys should read to attract girls. But what about the inverse? What kind of books might make a girl appealing to guys? Culled from a number of anecdotal conversations with young men that read, collated by us, here’s a sampling of books the ladies might consider sticking their noses into if they’re hoping to catch that special literary fly guy’s eye on the subway, at the bus station, in the library or around the copier room. … Read More

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What’s On at Flavorpill: The Links That Made the Rounds in Our Office

By Alison Nastasi on

Today at Flavorpill, we learned about 10 products and services to help us face the end of the world. We watched The Frogs’ Bollocks and Other Assorted Bollocks by Stephen Ong — emphasis on the bollocks. We felt old looking at every item inside the 1992 Nickelodeon time capsule. We found out… Read More

Books

30 Books Everyone Should Read Before Turning 30

By Emily Temple on

Earlier this week, we stumbled across a list over at Divine Caroline of thirty books everyone should read before they’re thirty. While we totally agreed with some of the picks, we thought there were some essential reads missing, so we decided to put together a list of our own. We stuck to fiction for simplicity’s sake, and chose the books below on a variety of criteria, selecting enduring classics that have been informing new literature since their first printing, stories that speak specifically or most powerfully to younger readers, and books we simply couldn’t imagine reaching thirty without having read. Of course, we hope that you read more than thirty books by the time you hit your fourth decade, so this list is incomplete — but we had to stop somewhere. Click through to read the books we think everyone should read before their thirtieth birthday, and let us know which ones you would add in the comments. … Read More

Books

10 Wonderful Short Films Based on Famous Short Stories

By Emily Temple on

Here at Flavorpill, we’re total suckers for short stories — in any form. The idea of short stories being used as source material for films — even feature films — is nothing new (hello, Brokeback Mountain), but this week, PWxyz pointed us towards a gorgeous short film we had never seen before, based on one of our favorite short stories, Franz Kafka’s “A Country Doctor.” Inspired, we dug up a few more wonderful short films based on short stories, both professional and amateur, which could serve either to accent your understanding of a story, or, you know, let you off easy. After all, there’s nothing lower-effort than kicking back and watching videos online. Even if they’re literary. Click through to check out the films, and let us know which short story you’d love to see in short film form in the comments. … Read More

Books

10 Famous Authors Whose Lives Would Make Awesome Books

By Emily Temple on

Here at Flavorpill, we love a good story. And while we generally get our fix from novels and short stories, sometimes the lives of the authors are just as fascinating as the lives of the characters they create (some of them even have biopics — or more than one — to prove it). After all, artists are prone to eccentricities, creative problem solving and, let’s face it, tragedy, all qualities that make great protagonists as well as interesting people. Click through to check out our list of authors whose true life stories we think would make fantastic novels (we’ve focused on those who haven’t written autobiographies or exact novelizations of their own lives), and then be sure to add to our list in the comments! … Read More

Books

Classic Novels and the Filmmakers Who Were Born to Direct Them

By Emily Temple on

This week, we found out that Guy Ritchie is on board to helm a Warner Brothers adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson’s literary classic Treasure Island, a pairing that — given Ritchie’s gift for madcap, stylized adventure movies — we think is going to be pretty awesome. Inspired by this news, and given that we’re rather unsatisfied with many of the cinematic adaptations of classic novels that actually exist, we’ve come up with a dream list of some of our favorite classic novels and the filmmakers we think would be perfect to direct them. Click through to check out our list of book-director pairings that were totally meant to be, and let us know who you think should direct your own favorite classic novel in the comments. … Read More

Books

Contemporary Writers and Their Old School Counterparts

By Emily Temple on

This week, we read an article over at The Guardian which suggested that the “anxiety of influence” is waning — that is, that writers publishing today are no longer as closely influenced by the literary canon as they once were, and instead look to their contemporaries. Well, considering that this conclusion was the result of a mathematical study based on the number of “content-free” words like ‘of’, ‘at’ and ‘by,’ we’re not sure how much water it holds, but it inspired us to think about some modern writers who do seem to be carrying the torch for their old school counterparts, whether in topic, thematic style, or character. After all, the past never really goes away — especially in… Read More