Interviews Carolyne Larrington Audible’s new fiction podcast, Hag, launching August 29, features eight reimaginings of traditional British folktales by eight contemporary female writers, with folktales chosen from across the UK. The collection will be released in audio only, building on the time-old tradition of oral storytelling. Mahsuda Snaith’s story, “The Panther’s Tale,” is written as a lost “full version” of Staffordshire’s “Legend of Chillington Hall.” Keeping the original setting, Snaith tells the story of Sir John Giffard and his fondness for wild beasts but with a modern outlook. Narrated in Snaith’s vivid, visceral style, her version of the story speaks of imprisonment, fierceness, and female solidarity. Carolyne Larrington, who teaches medieval English literature at St. John’s College, University of Oxford, was the consultant on the HAG project, researching the original tales that inspired each writer, chatting with the authors who wanted more background, and then interviewing each writer after the stories were finished. These fascinating conversations range back and forth between discussing themes and motifs in folk tradition and the authors’ own feelings about the tales they had been given. Carolyne Larrington: How did you become involved with the project? What drew you to it? Mahusda Snaith Mahsuda Snaith: Harriet Poland from Audible approached my agent about writing a story for the project. She’d read my previous... Continue reading at 'World Literature Today'
[ World Literature Today | 2019-08-30 14:21:50 UTC ]
Guest Blogger: Prof Katy Shaw, University of Northumbria, Vice-Chair of BACLS – the British Association of Literary Studies – and executive committee member of University English, the national subject association. In recent years there has been a rapid rise in the teaching of English Literature... Continue reading at British Council global
[ British Council global | 2020-05-18 09:30:54 UTC ]
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Claire Adam has scooped the Authors' Club Best First Novel Award for her “outstanding” novel Golden Child (Faber). Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-05-17 13:26:01 UTC ]
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Whether delving into chunky historical narratives or listening to short story podcasts, we’ve all been approaching reading differently during lockdown. Our reading habits can take us back in time, allow us to examine our present, or give us hope for the future. In time for the May bank holiday... Continue reading at British Council global
[ British Council global | 2020-05-07 13:58:54 UTC ]
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Jeremy Trafford, who has died aged 85 after contracting Covid-19, was a publisher, teacher and writer. I met him in the late 1970s, while supply teaching at the London Oratory school, in west London, where he taught English literature in the sixth form. He was a brilliant teacher, who inspired... Continue reading at The Guardian
[ The Guardian | 2020-05-05 11:07:04 UTC ]
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When we think of poems, these days most people probably automatically think of lyric poems: usually quite short poems which describe the poet’s (or an imagined speaker’s) thoughts and feelings. But from the epic poems of Homer to the Border Ballads of the Middle Ages to notable contemporary... Continue reading at Interesting Literature
[ Interesting Literature | 2020-04-29 14:00:40 UTC ]
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My first novel bombed spectacularly. This was about 20 years ago. Everything went wrong. First my editor quit after which my publishing house kinda-sorta forgot I existed. Orphaned was the word they used. Since nobody gave a damn, I at least got to choose my own book cover. The photograph I... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2020-04-27 08:49:54 UTC ]
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Many lives are radically different right now. But birthdays, anniversaries, and public holidays come and go as before. The pink supermoon would have appeared whether we’d watched it from our windows or outdoors among a crowd of strangers. This week, Earth Day, Shakespeare’s birthday, and World... Continue reading at British Council global
[ British Council global | 2020-04-24 14:34:13 UTC ]
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Book Reviews Natalia Lomaia Left: Daisy Edgar-Jones and Paul Mescal in Normal People (2020) / Courtesy of IMDB Sally Rooney’s 2018 novel is a meticulous observation, or even a study, of how one human being can have immense, intense power over another.... Continue reading at World Literature Today
[ World Literature Today | 2020-04-23 13:18:03 UTC ]
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Recently, I threw out the first 60 pages of the novel I am currently working on. I had been determined to challenge myself by writing in the third person—I had spent the last ten years working on my first novel in the first person and I thought I was ready for something new and difficult. […] Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2020-04-21 08:48:34 UTC ]
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T Kira Mahealani Madden is the author of the memoir Long Live the Tribe of Fatherless Girls. She is still an amateur magician. Rowan Hisayo Buchanan is the author of Harmless Like You—the winner of The Authors’ Club First Novel Award and a Betty Trask Award. Her short work has appeared in... Continue reading at Literrary Hub
[ Literrary Hub | 2020-04-16 08:48:38 UTC ]
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Literary criticism (or even ‘literary theory’) goes back as far as ancient Greece, and Aristotle’s Poetics. But the rise of English Literature as a university subject, at the beginning of the twentieth century, led to literary criticism focusing on English literature – everything from... Continue reading at Interesting Literature
[ Interesting Literature | 2020-04-15 14:00:07 UTC ]
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The first novel to be published by Stormzy’s new imprint #Merky Books, That Reminds Me by poet and podcaster Derek Owusu, has been longlisted for the £10,000 Desmond Elliott Prize for debuts. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-04-06 14:35:00 UTC ]
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Julia Alvarez's "Afterlife" is her first novel for adults in 15 years. She talks about loss, fragmentation and "American Dirt." Continue reading at Los Angeles Times
[ Los Angeles Times | 2020-04-02 22:24:09 UTC ]
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“Then the Fish Swallowed Him,” the first novel in English by the Iranian-born Amir Ahmadi Arian, makes for unnerving reading. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2020-03-24 09:00:00 UTC ]
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The sought-after first novel by former blogger Clare Pooley exposes the need for connection in the age of social media Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-03-20 07:25:26 UTC ]
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“The Mountains Sing,” the first novel in English by the Vietnamese poet Nguyen Phan Que Mai, imagines her country’s traumatic 20th century through the stories of three generations of women. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2020-03-17 09:00:13 UTC ]
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“Nobody Will Tell You This but Me,” a memoir by Bess Kalb, traces her family history from the Russian pogroms to the American dream. Continue reading at The New York Times
[ The New York Times | 2020-03-17 09:00:08 UTC ]
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John Murray has snapped up an American debut, Memphis, based on Tara Stringfellow’s "extraordinary" family history, in a five-way auction for a "strong" five-figure sum. Continue reading at The Bookseller
[ The Bookseller | 2020-03-15 17:46:06 UTC ]
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Mankell’s 1972 book, “The Rock Blaster,” now available in English, explores the struggles of a working-class man. Continue reading at The Washington Post
[ The Washington Post | 2020-03-05 17:00:00 UTC ]
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The sestina form is thought to have been created by Provencal troubadours – and possibly by one specific troubadour, Arnaut Daniel – in around 1200. However, it didn’t arrive in English literature until the late 1570s, when both Sir Philip Sidney and Edmund Spenser, poets at the court of Queen... Continue reading at Interesting Literature
[ Interesting Literature | 2020-03-04 15:00:47 UTC ]
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