Well, we can never get enough of poking fun at the unduly critical, can we? Last week, we shared fifteen scathing early reviews of classic novels, and some of you pitched in with some of your own favorites. We took a few of your suggestions, both here and at Metafilter, added a few more of our own, and put together a second list of a few more critics who got it wrong, this time hating on Hemingway, Tolkien, Steinbeck and more. Now don’t get us wrong — everyone’s entitled to their own opinion, but that doesn’t make it any less fun to judge the past from the future. Click through to read ten more scathing early reviews of books we now consider to be classics, and chuckle over how you know better (or admit that you secretly agree) in the comments. … Read More
John Steinbeck
Kathryn Macnaughton’s Witty Book Covers and Pop-Culture Illustrations
The work of illustrator and graphic artist Kathryn Macnaughton is full of famous faces and classic titles. In book covers commissioned by Penguin UK, her textured, collage aesthetic brings Lolita and the work of John Steinbeck into the 21st century. Remixed cultural icons are at the center of Macnaughton’s other projects; she irreverently stamps an inverted Campbell’s soup can over Andy Warhol’s melting face and slaps a David Bowie T-shirt on a Warhol-esque trio of faceless Patti Smiths. Click through to see a selection of her work, which we discovered via BLDGWLF, and then visit her website for more. … Read More
Banned Book Trading Cards: Collect ‘Em All
Libraries across the country are celebrating Banned Books Week, which lasts through this Saturday, but Lawrence Public Library in Kansas has taken a rather (forgive us) novel approach to the festivities. The library put out a call for submissions for local artists to create “trading cards” inspired by banned books, the best of which they’re handing out at the library all week. Since we’re pretty covetous of all things collectable (and all things book-related), this seems like a genius idea to us — not to mention the fact that a lot of the resultant artwork is pretty wonderful. Click through to see some of our favorites from the submitted artworks, and then be sure to head here to check out the full collection. … Read More
A Collection of Original Vintage Advertisements for Classic Books
Recently, we stumbled across this great original advertisement for “Scott Fitzgerald’s new novel The Great Gatsby” that was discovered in a 1925 copy of the Princetonian. Though printed ads for books aren’t very common anymore — at least outside of paper book reviews — they used to be all the rage. In fact, the first-ever print ad was actually an ad for a book entitled Perfect Occurrences of Every Daie journall in Parliament, and Other Moderate Intelligence. Now that’s a mouthful. Charmed by the pencil sketch of Fitzgerald, and by the whole idea of book ads in general interest publications, we dug around for a few more vintage advertisements for classic books. Now if only we could see some of these on a Times Square billboard, that would really make our day. … Read More
10 of the Greatest Underdogs in Literature
This weekend, we were saddened to hear of the death of Jean Merrill, one of our all-time favorite children’s book authors, whose 1964 novel The Pushcart War still informs our thinking today. The literary queen of the underdogs, Merrill’s books nearly all concern the disadvantaged, the weak, the outcasts rising up against their oppressors (be it Corporate Toothpaste or trucking companies) and, of course, winning the day. To celebrate her life and her body of work, we’ve put together a list of our all-time favorite underdogs in literature. Read through our selections below, and let us know which characters you’d add in the comments. … Read More
Watch John Steinbeck’s ‘East of Eden’ Hilariously Spoofed by Penn Badgley and Zachary Quinto
John Steinbeck was a pretty serious fellow — all that dust and death and hard labor and family conflict — so we’re not sure how he might have felt about this hilarious short film adaptation of East of Eden. We know how we feel about it though, and we think it’s pretty great — produced by Zachary Quinto and starring Gossip Girl‘s Penn Badgley, it’s the best kind of just-for-fun side project: Badgley’s acting and comedic timing are spot on, and the whole thing, full of dick jokes as it may be, is just the right amount of cheeky. Click through to watch, and let us know how you think the short holds up to the book (or if it finally makes you want to read it) in the comments. … Read More
A Google Maps Tour of Famous Authors’ Homes
Awhile back we took a virtual tour of Old Hollywood film locations from last year’s Best Picture-winner, The Artist. Because there’s nothing we love more than virtual globetrotting and literary legends, we thought we’d take a gander at some of the more notable places that our favorite authors have lived. Hey, why not? From Joan Didion’s sprawling sun drenched estate that was her beloved Quintana Roo’s first home to the narrow passage where Ernest Hemingway lived while writing his ode to Paris, click through to check out Google’s rendition of significant literary locations around the world. Then, let us know in the comments which you’d most like to visit! … Read More
10 Quintessentially American Novels
In case you missed all the cookouts and night-time explosions, yesterday was the fourth of July, and we hope you all spent it wearing red, white, and blue and eating hot dogs on a grassy lawn. We also hope you’re not too sick of American pride, however, because in honor of our country’s birthday, we’ve compiled a list of books that we think are quintessentially American to add to your reading list. Each of these books is wonderfully representative of some slice of the American experience, though of course no country can be the same for all people at all times. Click through to check out our ultra-patriotic reading list, and since a list of ten novels doesn’t even begin to cover it, let us know which books you’d add in the comments. … Read More
The Fictional 99%: 10 of Pop Culture's Poorest Characters
Earlier this week, Forbes released its annual list of the 15 richest fictional characters, topped by Tolkien’s legendary dragon Smaug and featuring other one percenters like Tywin Lannister, Tony Stark and Robert Crawley. Well, that’s all very well and good, but the list got us to thinking about the other end of the stick — the poorest fictional characters across pop culture, from street urchins to hobos to a very special monster who lives in a trash can. Click through to check out our list, and since we obviously couldn’t hit them all, let us know if we’ve missed your favorite impoverished fictional figure in the comments. … Read More
Gorgeous Illustrations Uniting People with Their Favorite Book
Any bookworm can tell you that our favorite novels play an enormous part in making us who we are and shaping our relationships. Germany-based illustrator Simon Prades brings that formative influence into the physical plane in Our Books, a series of pencil drawings that represent both great works of literature and the people Prades feels connected to through them. Taking inspiration from J.D. Salinger, Albert Camus, Gabriel García Márquez, and more, the illustrations are deeply personal, driven more by what the artist associates with his subjects than the concrete details of the books themselves. See the series after the jump, and visit Prades’ Behance page to see more of his work. … Read More
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