by Iraj Pezeshkzad My Uncle Napoleon is a famous, cherished Iranian novel. Written in the ’70s, it was banned briefly after the 1979 revolution, presumably because of lewdness and sexuality. The story apparently struck such a chord in Iran because Pezeshkzad so accurately captured and poked fun at the widespread paranoia toward the British that…
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by Ta-Nehisi Coates When I originally heard about David Chariandy’s I’ve Been Meaning to Tell You, it immediately brought Between the World and Me to mind. Of course, I hadn’t actually read Coates’ book yet at the time, but I nonetheless wondered whether Chariandy’s essays directed at his young daughter about the history of racism…
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by Stephen Markley Ohio is made up of four stories. Bill Ashcraft bombs across the United States in a drug-addled frenzy, smuggling a mysterious package; Stacey Moore reluctantly agrees to meet her former lover’s mother who traumatized her in her youth; Dan Eaton returns from a tour in Afghanistan to visit the high school sweetheart…
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by Farley Mowat Never Cry Wolf is presented as the true account of Mowat’s time in the Canadian subarctic in the late ’40s, sent as a government researcher in order to investigate the impacts wolves were having on declining caribou populations. However, I’m led to believe from parallel reading that “true” may be more than…
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by Louis L’Amour I was recently wandering a large antique shop in Duluth, perusing their small display of books for sale––including a sizeable collection of Westerns––when it occurred to me that I almost certainly have never read a genre Western. Eager to remedy this deficiency, (who am I to think myself broadly-read otherwise?) I picked…
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by Misha Glenny I’m a sucker for what I understand to be a sort of Slavic charisma. It’s probably not actually exclusive to the Slavs, but that’s where I can recall encountering a sort of joking, masculine joviality with a subtle undercurrent of cruelty or aggression. And I love it, for some reason––even when it’s…
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by Meša Selimović Taking place in eighteenth century Bosnia, Death and the Dervish follows Sheikh Ahmed Nuruddin as he attempts to navigate the corrupt Turkish bureaucracy to free his brother Harun from their city’s foreboding dungeon and almost certain death. Most of the story involves Nuruddin’s paralyzing internal conflict between his morals and cowardice, and…
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by David Chariandy After a stranger asserted her right to butt in front of the brown-skinned Chariandy because she “was born here,” he had a difficult time explaining what happened to his then three year-old daughter. I’ve Been Meaning to Tell You is his attempt to do just that. Written as a letter to his…
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by Tomaž Šalamun I think studiousness is really threatening to overcome most, if not all, aspects of my life. It’s probably at least partially because I’ve enjoyed taking steps to not feel in over my head at all times, but I’m learning more and more that it’s not at all common. I bring this up…
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by Noam Chomsky Fateful Triangle is Noam Chomsky’s analysis of the relationship among the US, Israel, and Palestine. While most of the book centres on the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, he talks about the history of conflict and subjugation within Israel, beginning with the country’s origins, moving through the expansionist period post-1967, and…
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