The Writer’s News
The Writer’s News keeps you informed about new developments in the writing world, including award and publication announcements, news from AWP and the field, and updates about important literary figures.
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June 9, 2014
Anne Carson, Brenda Hillman Win the 2014 Griffin Poetry Prize
Conferred in Toronto on June 5, the 2014 International and Canadian winners of Canada’s Griffin Poetry Prize are, respectively, Brenda Hillman, for her collection Seasonal Works with Letters on Fire, and Anne Carson, for Red Doc>, a follow-up-of-sorts to her 1998 novel-in-verse Autobiography of Red. Read more...
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June 9, 2014
Major Magazine Distributor Goes Under
Amid waning newsstand sales and falling print readerships of periodical publications, Source Interlink Distribution announced last week it would end “substantially all” of its operations, which would entail the laying off of approximately 6,000 employees (including 1,200 full-time employees). Read more...
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June 4, 2014
The New Technology That Can Double or Triple Your Reading Speed
In a time when the number of non-book readers has tripled since the ’70s, a startup company hopes to revolutionize the way readers interact with books. Read more...
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June 4, 2014
Reality TV Show Awards Poet Over One Million Dollars
In the United Arab Emirates, Saif Al Mansouri won the sixth season of reality TV show Million’s Poet and was awarded the prize of nearly $1.4 million. Read more...
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June 4, 2014
Resistance by Reading: Thai Protesters Read Books in Public in Defiance of Coup
About a dozen people gathered in a busy elevated walkway connecting several of Bangkok’s shopping malls to sit and read openly, defying the May 22 seizure of power and the repression that followed. Read more...
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June 2, 2014
British “Ban” of U.S. Writers from Curriculum Causes Controversy
Michael Gove, education minister in Britain, has removed works by John Steinbeck, Harper Lee, and Arthur Miller from the General Certificate of Secondary Education test, a key standardized test for high school students. Read more...
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June 2, 2014
Philip Roth to Appear on The Colbert Report After Announcing His Retirement
Though Philip Roth recently announced his retirement not only from writing but also from interviews and all other things related to his writing career, he is scheduled to appear in July on The Colbert Report as a part of the “cOlbert Book Club” (though a specific date has not yet been set). Read more...
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May 28, 2014
Maya Angelou, Legendary Author, has Died
Extremely renowned poet, novelist, and performer Maya Angelou died in her Winston-Salem home after a long illness. She was 86. Read more...
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May 20, 2014
China Sentences Publisher to Ten Years in Prison
Hong Kong-based publisher Yao Wentian was convicted on May 7, 2014, on the charge of “smuggling prohibited items” by the Shenzhen Intermediate People’s Court and sentenced to ten years in jail. Read more...
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May 20, 2014
George R. R. Martin on Technology as Hindrance to Creative Writing
When Game of Thrones author George R. R. Martin published the first installment of his iconic series in 1996, the Disk Operating System he used was already considered outdated. Read more...