He starred in Peep Show, Green Wing and Wonka – and his first novel won an award. Now the star is making operas with 64 homeless people. Not bad going for someone who was written off by his teachersPaterson Joseph is, by his own admission, an unlikely opera librettist. He had turned 50 by the time he got round to going to one, and only went because he was in it, as the “crazy” voice of God in Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht’s Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny. “It’s not my world,” says the actor. But therein lies part of his mission: as a black Londoner written off by the school system, his life was transformed by the goldmine he discovered while truanting down at his local library.One of his discoveries, as “a melancholy teen”, was Pushkin’s verse novel Eugene Onegin. “I remember getting it out of the library,” he says, “just because it was a small book. And I started reading this poem out loud, at night in my bedroom. And I laughed – but I was also frightened and frustrated, weeping at the tragedy of it. When I closed the book, it was dawn.” Continue reading... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'
[ The Guardian | 2024-05-27 04:00:13 UTC ]
At Electric Literature, Diane Cooke speaks to Jessamine Chan about The School for Good Mothers, Chan’s incisive debut novel that revolves around how a young mother’s error lands her in a government reform program and at risk of losing custody of her child. They discuss one of Chan’s main... Continue reading at The Millions
[ The Millions | 2022-01-18 21:30:56 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Allison & Busby has netted an "explosive" debut novel by former police officer Graham Bartlett. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2022-01-16 13:20:55 UTC ]
More news stories like this
On January 14, 1963, poet Sylvia Plath published her first novel in England under the pseudonym “Victoria Lucas.” The book had a positive but relatively quiet reception; only a few weeks after its publication, on February 11, Plath would die by suicide. It wasn’t published in the US until 1971,... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-01-14 09:50:32 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Two decades ago, I wrote my very first novel while working at The Community Bookstore, an independent bookstore in Brooklyn, New York. That job enabled me to complete my book, not just because of the flexible hours, but because the other staffers were all aspiring writers, and many of our... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2022-01-12 09:50:45 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Book Reviews Jean Giono at his home, Le Paraïs, in Manosque, France, 1942 / Photo by André Zucca / Courtesy Les Amis de Jean Giono Written late in life, “Le Haut Pays” and “Camargue”—once again paired in the Archipelago Books edition of... Continue reading at World Literature Today
[ World Literature Today | 2022-01-11 21:02:53 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Jessamine Chan’s “The School for Good Mothers” takes up themes of autonomy and technology in imagining an experimental facility where parents go through mandatory retraining. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2022-01-11 17:33:33 UTC ]
More news stories like this
"To Paradise," by Hanya Yanagihara, is the author's first novel since "A Little Life" became a major literary event in 2015. Continue reading at The Washington Post
[ The Washington Post | 2022-01-11 13:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Fig Tree has scooped the "powerful and beautifully humane" debut novel by Mo Siewcharran Prize-winner Santanu Bhattacharya. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2022-01-05 14:00:25 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Sequioa Nagamatsu discusses his much-awaited debut novel about people living in a future beset by the Arctic Plague. The post Sequoia Nagamatsu’s Dystopian Debut Is a Must-Read for the New Year appeared first on The Millions. Continue reading at The Millions
[ The Millions | 2022-01-04 21:00:24 UTC ]
More news stories like this
In “Brown Girls,” Daphne Palasi Andreades breaks a big world into small, meaningful pieces. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2022-01-04 10:00:03 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Dolly Parton will headline the audiobook cast of her debut novel Run Rose Run (Century) along with singer and songwriter Kelsea Ballerini in the role of protégée to Parton’s character. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-12-21 02:34:41 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Juhea Kim's "Beasts of a Little Land" captures the dualities of Korean history but ties up symbols too tightly in the service of grand ambitions. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2021-12-14 15:00:20 UTC ]
More news stories like this
A recent roundup of the ‘best books of 2021’ had every possible genre of novel – with the unsurprising exception of romanceIn the four months since my first novel came out, I’ve had the same conversation probably a dozen times.“What’s it about?” a well-meaning stranger will ask. “Well,” I’ll... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2021-12-05 15:25:24 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Literary Hub is pleased to reveal the cover for Sarah Thankam Mathews’ debut novel All This Could Be Different, which will be published by Viking—who acquired it in an 8-way auction—in summer 2022. The publisher describes the book as “an electrifying novel of a young immigrant building a life... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2021-12-03 15:00:16 UTC ]
More news stories like this
A debut novel by a HarperCollins UK editor goes to Putnam, former Washington quarterback Robert Griffin III sells a memoir to Atria, Random House buys NBA winner Tiya Miles’s latest, and more. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly
[ Publishers Weekly | 2021-12-03 05:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this
The translation of Deceit by ‘groundbreaking’ author Yuri Felsen, who died in Auschwitz in 1943, is set to come out next MayThe debut novel by Yuri Felsen, an author once regarded as the “Russian Proust” whose work has been forgotten since he died in Auschwitz in 1943, is set to be published in... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2021-12-01 14:12:48 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Academic Alex Hyde‘s first novel is a lyrical tale about two women named Violet during the Second World War. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-11-26 18:23:13 UTC ]
More news stories like this
In “A Little Hope,” Ethan Joella explores quiet lives in small-town Connecticut. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2021-11-16 10:00:03 UTC ]
More news stories like this
Atlantic Fiction has acquired Your Driver Is Waiting, the debut novel by Priya Guns, inspired by Martin Scorsese’s classic film "Taxi Driver". Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-11-16 03:54:36 UTC ]
More news stories like this
"Between the Covers" presenter Sara Cox’s debut novel, Thrown, has gone to Coronet. It follows the lives of four women at a pottery class held at a community centre. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2021-11-10 10:45:35 UTC ]
More news stories like this