Blake Shapiro

Issue 2: imagined cities and dragon smut

This week has a fantasy focus – and a very big release announcement.

Issue 1

Thoughts on Knausgaard, Didion, the Gatsby centennial – and a book bound in human skin.

The Great Gatsby turns 100: How old is our mass-cultural crisis?

What does our obsession with Gatsby mean? How does the novel’s endless popularisation alter the way that we relate to it – and what does that say about how mass culture obstructs our relationship to concepts in general?

How to read a novel

And yet, how does it work – this supposedly simple skill of reading which millions of children learn anew every single year? We stare at a screen or a page and a collection of dark curves and slashes causes us to see anything that it is possible for an author to have imagined.

Meaning and Technique in Knausgaard’s The Morning Star

I’m interested in The Morning Star at the level of technique: how does a nearly-700 page novel about the nature of reality become readable?