Today marks the US release of Skagboys, Irvine Welsh’s long-awaited prequel to his cult classic Trainspotting. Though in general we think the world has way too many prequels and sequels, we have to admit that we’re a little bit psyched to find out the origin stories of our favorite crew of tortured junkies. Welsh’s new book got us thinking about other classic and modern texts that we think could use a prequel — sure, it might be only to answer our own selfish lingering questions, but what else are prequels for? Click through to see the books we chose, and add your own suggestions in the comments — you never know, you just might get your wish. … Read More
Herman Melville
Listen to ‘Moby-Dick’ as Read by Tilda Swinton, John Waters, David Cameron, and More
Moby-Dick is without a doubt one of the greatest works of American literature — but, being intimidatingly long and detailed, it is not read as widely as it should be. However, if you’ve been putting off the Great White Whale since you shirked the reading in college, you’re in luck – author Philip Hoare and artist Angela… Read More
19th Century Writers Who Are Even More Relevant Today
Mary Shelley has some serious staying power. The author was born a whopping 215 years ago today, and her work is more relevant now than ever. Not only is Frankenstein, which Shelley began writing when she was eighteen years old, still ubiquitous in classrooms, but the cultural phenomenon of the cobbled-together monster has and continues to inspire and inform artists of every stripe (Tim Burton’s rebooted Frankenweenie is only the most recent example, we think you’ve probably heard of a few more). To celebrate the life and legacy of this fantastic author, we’ve but together a list of a few 19th century writers who are continually — and sometimes exponentially — culturally relevant in our time. Though some of these authors did garner some amount of acclaim during their own lifetimes, we’d venture that they’re all much more famous and more important to the culture at large today. Click through to check out our list, and as always, add any writers you think we’ve missed in the comments. … Read More
A Brief Survey of Unlikely Literary Friendships
It’s a well known fact that, like any contemporaries in a wide artistic field, authors like to hang out together. It makes sense — who else could a writer gripe to, swap critiques with, and steal ideas from? But sometimes we’re a little surprised as to the pairs that pop up in literary history — whether because of huge age differences, disparate personalities, or just issues of accessibility. Click through to see a few pairs of famous unlikely literary friendships that blossomed nonetheless, and if we’ve missed your favorite odd couple, let us know about it in the comments. … Read More
The Future of American Fiction: An Interview with Claire Vaye Watkins
If you haven’t noticed, we spend a lot of time thinking about literature here in the Flavorpill offices, digging through its past, weighing its current state, and imagining its future. Take a look at our bookshelves and you’ll find us reading everything from Nobel Prize winners to age-old classics to paperbacks printed at the bookstore down the street. Call it Chick-Lit, Hysterical Realism, Ethnic-Lit, or Translit — if it’s good fiction, we’ll be talking about it. So this summer, we’re launching The Future of American Fiction: an interview series expanding on that endless conversation about books we love, and yes, the direction of American fiction, from the people who’d know. Every Tuesday from now through August, we’ll bring you a short interview with one of the writers we think is instrumental in defining that direction. … Read More
10 Books to Put Hair On Your Chest
Of all the emblems of masculinity in pop culture, one of the most enduring also happens to be one of our favorite writers: the big game hunting, gruff talking, bullfighting enthusiast war hero, Ernest Hemingway. Today being the 113th anniversary of the author’s birth, we decided to honor him with a little list of books that might help you live up to the Hemingway memory by putting a little hair on your chest — totally metaphoric hair, that is (well, probably). Click through to see our reading list for tough guys and gals of all persuasions, and let us know which books you’d add in the comments. … Read More
Meet the Modern Descendants of Your Favorite Authors
As you probably know, here at Flavorpill, we’re fascinated by just about every aspect of the lives of our favorite authors — including what happened after them. This week saw the release of Tigers in Red Weather, a sultry, pitch-perfect literary thriller penned by Liza Klaussmann, the great-great-great-granddaughter of Herman Melville. Though her novel reminds us more of Fitzgerald’s gilded sneaking than Melville’s brutal sea voyage, we were inspired by her success to look up a few more of our favorite authors’ modern-day descendants. Just, you know, to check in. If you’re as addicted to prying as we are, see what they’re all up to after the jump. … Read More
Open Thread: Is ‘Moby-Dick’ the Great American Novel?
Everyone knows that one of a father’s greatest joys is to pass on the things that he loves to his children (a mother’s too, for that matter, but it’s Father’s Day season). In “Trust Me on This,” a great essay series at Salon running through Father’s Day, writers, musicians, athletes and actors answer the question: ”What… Read More
Classic Novels and the Filmmakers Who Were Born to Direct Them
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
A Peek Inside the Notebooks of Famous Authors, Artists and Visionaries
It’s no secret that we at Flavorpill are fascinated by the marginalia of our favorite artists’ lives — we swoon over their doodles, dig through their sketchbooks, and posthumously ogle their beach photos. Recently, aided by one of our favorite Tumblr destinations for literary ephemera, Fuck Yeah, Manuscripts!, we’ve indulged in a little more snooping, and put together this collection of a few of the notebooks, journals and diaries of some of our favorite creative minds — authors, artists, actors, musicians, scientists — so as to better get to know their inner selves. Click through to page through the notebooks of a few famous creatives, and let us know which one looks the most like your own in the comments. … Read More
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