Columns

The Third Hobbit Movie Made Me Sad and Hollywood's New Addiction For Splitting Adaptations Sucks

February 16th, 2015

Those first two Hobbit movies. Man, they were long. Longer than they needed to be. It's easy to forget they're about a hobbit. If you didn't know anything about J.R.R. Tolkien's novel, then I have to imagine the title is confusing—you'd think The Hobbit is about the wacky adventures of a handful of dwarves, and also sometimes Bilbo Baggins shows up to say something pithy. 

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Book vs. Film: Fifty Shades of Grey

February 13th, 2015

It seems insulting to describe Fifty Shades of Grey simply as a book.  It’s one of the most successful intellectual properties of our time, generating a massive revenue stream and commanding extraordinary brand name recognition globally. It was a gamechanger for publishing, eReaders and sex toy manufacturers.

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Seven Grammar Tools to Love

February 13th, 2015

Like many rule sets, grammar rules seem like they are forced upon us by some faceless, evil source driven to destroy our everyday communication. But you can look at it another way. To me, grammar rules are more like grammar tools—common methods understood by many that can be used to create something extraordinary.

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Some Literary Dos and Don'ts for a Lonely Valentine's Day

February 12th, 2015

Once again, it's time. It's time to be inundated by a torrent of both overwrought sentimentality and reactionary snark. A time for feeling like your special outing might not be so special after all, as you stand in line with thirty-two other couples and grumble about how long your magical evening is taking. A time for rage-reading holiday-themed web content (ahem). A time for looking at everything, ever so briefly, through the rosy-colored lens of love or the black-lidded shades of lonerdom. It's time for Valentine's Day.

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Culling the Poetry Classics: Edna St. Vincent Millay

February 12th, 2015

Happy Valentine's Day! I've got quite the treat for all you hopeless romantics out there. Hopefully you weren't too discouraged by the rough start this column got off to last month with the über-New Englander Robert Frost. I've got another American for you—and another New Englander, actually—but a woman this time, one who was obsessed with love in all its many forms and facets. Does she survive the culling, though?

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How to Make Sweet, Sweet Love to your Books

February 11th, 2015

Image by Ulysses0302 Last year, the New Yorker ran a piece called Ghosts in the Stacks that I liked simply because it began with the perfect way to talk about our current book fetish:

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Crazy In Love: Five Authors And Their Stalkers

February 9th, 2015

When you start talking stalkers, some famous songs spring to mind. "Every Breath You Take" by The Police. The classic in which Sting gets detailed. He'll watch every breath AND every move. Buddy, if you're watching every breath, in and out, I'll assume you'll be watching when I actually do something. What kind of stalker watches me breathe all night, but when I go out to, I don't know, skate a half-pipe, he says, "Eh. Not interested"?

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The Anti-Love: 10 Great Fictional Nemeses

February 6th, 2015

All we hear about in February is love love love! Well, humbug! Let’s talk about the anti-love, aka great nemesis pairings in media!

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Do the Love Lives of Writers Matter?

February 6th, 2015

The Dickinson House Museum is a quiet place on the outskirts of Amherst, Massachusetts. There’s nothing dark or brooding about the atmosphere there, particularly not in the poet’s bedroom, which is a comfortable space with a good amount of light. When I visited in 2013, the tour guide was careful to point out that Emily was probably somewhat livelier than the dour-faced portrait of her as a 17-year-old reveals, and her hair a more reddish hue. She had been sick just before the image was taken, unfortunately.

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Celebrating Women In Horror Month

February 5th, 2015

Horror's Gender Problem One of the most talked-about and critically praised horror films of the last year was The Babadook (and let me tell you, it lives up to the hype). Eschewing the modern propensity for violence and gore and hearkening back to the minimalist atmosphere and suspense that characterized the genre in decades past, the film unnerves its audience psychologically, making the few instances of visceral horror all the more effective. Given this, it seems obvious to me that a woman—Jennifer Kent—wrote and directed this gem.

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