Jay Gabler

Google image searching Emily Dickinson turned out to be a surprising journey. Who’s the target audience for that trucker hat?

emilybooks:

Jay: Right now, I think Minnesota is a great place for readers and writers, but it hasn’t necessarily always been that way. Three of our most famous writers—F. Scott Fitzgerald, Charles Schulz, and Garrison Keillor—all had deeply conflicted feelings about Minnesota. All three left Minnesota with the intention of never returning, though all three eventually came back for varying amounts of time.

In recent years, though, Minnesota’s literary center of gravity has moved from St. Paul (where Fitzgerald and Schulz were from, and where Keillor now lives and pontificates) to Minneapolis, and the Twin Cities are now home to a strong nexus of independent publishers (Graywolf Press, Milkweed Editions, Coffee House Press) and bookstores (Magers & Quinn, Keillor’s Common Good Books). The Open Book complex in downtown Minneapolis has become a central hub of literary life, and organizations like Paper Darts are supporting a very social literary culture that bridges online and IRL. The Twin Cities also have strong spoken word, storytelling, and hip-hop scenes, and there’s a very fluid boundary between being a “rapper” and an “author.”

Louise Erdrich doesn’t rap (yet), but her life and career illustrate what’s exciting about Minnesota’s literary scene today. She writes, she reads, she runs an independent bookstore, and she’s an inspiration to writers from all backgrounds, especially women writers and Native writers. She’s a hell of a lot happier here than F. Scott Fitzgerald ever was.

These comments from an interview with Emily Gould are germane to a piece I just wrote about The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald, and writers who got the hell out of Minnesota.

Twin Cities book lovers—especially Twin Cities lovers of books that inspire questions like “What is the status of the ‘queer novel’ today?” and “Do we really exist?”—join us!

I just bought the new Thought Catalog e-book by my friends (and Tangential co-bloggers) at PhiLOLZophy! Don’t you want to buy it too?

thetangential:

We are a runner up. We are still making our book though so keep an eye out for it!

staff:

Earlier this year, Chronicle Books and Tumblr collaborated on The Great Tumblr Book Search. There were 175 terrific book ideas pitched, and today’s Tumblr Tuesday features the winners!

Shit Rough Drafts
The grand-prize winner, by 22-year-old Creative Writing major Paul Laudiero, imagines early drafts of famous literary works and screenplays. The book is slated for publication in Spring 2014.

The Awkward Phase
Awkwardness is inevitable, so let’s celebrate it.

Activitorium by The Tangential
This proposed activity book for real-life adults will get you coloring, staging paper doll plays, and more.

Twitter: The Comic
Original art illustrating borrowed text in four brilliant panels.

For updates on what’s new, check the official New & Notable blog.

“Generation X,” 1991

emilygould:

emilybooks:

Sociologist and critic Jay Gabler was an early Emily Books adopter who was so enthusiastic out of the gate that he even founded a Minneapolis chapter of Emily Books that met in person and drank and discussed our books.

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We <3 Jay, even though he reads a lot of books by men.

I feel like book people on the Internet aren’t talking enough about inaugural poet Richard Blanco’s biceps.

seemstween:

i wrote a short story for unreality house

Excited to publish Gabby Gabby’s Unreality House debut, a new story about sex with a stranger.

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