Rethinking the Classics

July 21, 2024 News Editor 0

Do you think you know what makes a classic novel… er… classic? The Washington Post thinks maybe we should think again. WaPo recently asked readers of their Book Club newsletter “which classic books are overrated and which unsung novels should be considered top-tier, we didn’t predict the level of enthusiasm that would accompany the responses”. Among those that some readers thought should get the toss were iconic books like J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the […]

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Fear of Living

June 3, 2023 News Editor 0

Everyone is looking for the perfect creative space, but it’s not unthinkable that Fear of Flying (1973) author Erica Jong’s Upper East Side New York apartment might fit the bill for a number of creators: if you can get past the $4.25 million dollar price tag, that is.“Located in the coveted Imperial House building on the Upper East Side,” says Top Ten Real Estate Deals, “the 3,000-square-foot apartment boasts specta cular Central Park and skyline […]

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East of Eden Will Be Limited Series

June 21, 2022 News Editor 0

A lot of history will be made by an upcoming Netflix limited series now in very early development. The series will be based on Nobel Prize-winning author John Steinbeck’s magnum opus, East of Eden. Zoe Kazan will write and executive produce. Her grandfather, Elia Kazan, adapted and directed a 1955 large screen version of East of Eden, which was released by Warner Brothers. Florence Pugh has been signed to star and co-produce. From Deadline Hollywood: […]

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In Translation: Norwid’s Dramatic Works by Cyprian Kamil Norwid

January 17, 2022 admin 0

“Perhaps some day I’ll disappear forever,” muses the master-builder Psymmachus in Cyprian Kamil Norwid’s Cleopatra and Caesar, “Becoming one with my work…” Two hundred years after the poet’s birth, it is difficult not to hear Norwid speaking through the lips of his character. The greatest poet of the second phase of Polish Romanticism, Norwid, like Gerard Manley Hopkins in England, created a new poetic idiom so ahead of his time, that he virtually “disappeared” from […]

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Unknown Steinbeck Mystery Novel Uncovered

May 30, 2021 Linda L. Richards 0

In 1930, struggling writer John Steinbeck (East of Eden, The Grapes of Wrath) couldn’t find a publisher for a mystery novel with supernatural undertones he called Murder at Full Moon. As described by the Guardian, this is a book that both fans of the author and of early mystery would love to get their hands on, but it’s been kept in the dark in archives for over 90 years. Set in a fictional Californian coastal […]

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Classic Fiction: Macbeth: Shakespeare at Home Book 1

December 14, 2020 admin 0

Macbeth: Book 1 of the Shakespeare at Home series, is a fully annotated printing of the Shakespearean classic, annotated by Philadelphia Shakespeare Theatre founders Carmen Khan and Jack Armstrong. Macbeth is the first of the eight-book series featuring detailed notes on every line of the play – what is being said, why it’s being said, what the drama of the scene is, and why Shakespeare included it. Why Macbeth? “Almost everyone knows the story of […]

Gone with the Wind Mansion Goes on the Block

August 9, 2019 admin 0

The Georgia mansion Margaret Mitchell told David Selznick was the living embodiment of Ashley Wilkes’ plantation home when she wrote Gone With the Wind recently sold at auction. Twelve Oaks is 10,000 square feet with 12 bedrooms, 13 bathrooms and a dozen fireplaces. Just the sort of place one would imagine Scarlett O’Hara swanning around in in Mitchell’s enduring 1936 classic Gone With the Wind. From Top Ten Real Estate Deals: When Selznick International Pictures […]

One Hundred Years of Solitude Heads to Spanish Netflix

March 10, 2019 Linda L. Richards 0

One can’t help but wonder what Gabriel García Márquez would be thinking about the fact that his classic novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude, will go into production as a Spanish-language series. García Márquez, who died in 2014 at the age of 87, had always declined offers when Hollywood came knocking.   The series will be filmed in the author’s native Colombia and his sons, Rodrigo Garcia and Gonzalo García Barcha will act as executive […]

Gal Gadot to Star in adaptation of Death on the Nile

September 29, 2018 Linda L. Richards 0

The next Kenneth Branagh-directed adaptation of an Agatha Christie novel will be 1937’s Death on the Nile. Gal Gadot (Wonder Woman, Justice League) has been tapped to star and the project is moving full steam ahead with release planned for late 2019. The production follows on the oh so successful heels of 2017’s Murder on the Orient Express which grossed $352.8 million worldwide. The book-length version of Death on the Nile was published in 1937, […]

Jane Austen and the Law

April 30, 2018 admin 0

Since Jane Austen’s Emma was first cited in 1978, Jane Austen and her work — sometimes together, sometimes separately — have been mentioned many, many time in legal decisions? Why? Writing on Medium, Matthew H. Birkhold, professor of law, literature, and culture and author of the forthcoming book, Characters before Copyright (Oxford University Press) asks: Why Do So Many Judges Cite Jane Austen in Legal Decisions? Though it’s not something I’d ever thought about before, […]