paper trail

Mar 2, 2012 @ 4:00:00 am

Roald Dahl

Before his death last December, Christopher Hitchens was known for torching his intellectual adversaries. Vanity Fair interpreted this talent rather literally when they handed out Christopher Hitchens lighters at their Oscar party last weekend. Each quote came engraved with a Hitch quote, including our favorite: “Everyone has a book inside them, which is exactly where I think it should, in most cases, remain.”

Slate launches the inaugural issue of the Slate Book Review today, a monthly review that will publish on the first Saturday of every month.

To protest a bill passed last year in the Tucson, Arizona, public school system that bans school curriculum “designed primarily for pupils of a particular ethnic group,” a group calling themselves Librotraficante have organized a book caravan to smuggle “contraband” books back into affected schools.

Bookstores are suffering, and so are libraries. But curiously, bookstores in libraries are on the rise.

McSweeney’s imagines the titles of rejected AWP panels, including “How to Explain to Your Parents That Your Novel is Not Based On Them”; “I Love Your Use of Narrative Exposition: Dating Writers 101,” and “So You’re the Person Who Rejected My Story: Proper Editor Etiquette.”

The musical adaptation of Roald Dahl’s children’s book Matilda has been a runaway success in London, and this week, The Royal Shakespeare Company announced plans to bring the production to Broadway.