Vladimir Putin has unexpectedly closed RIA Novosti, a state news agency. According to agency insiders, the move “appear[s] to point toward a tightening of state control in the already heavily regulated media sector.”
Claire Messud takes an interviewer to task for dwelling on the unlikable qualities of her latest protagonist. Harper Lee sues a museum in Alabama for trying to cash in on her legacy. Lauren Sandler tells women writers that if they want to be successful, they should stick to having just one child. At the New Yorker, Rachel Arons reviews the year in literary feuds. But on the whole, the world of arts and letters appears almost comically gentle here. “If you’re reading to find friends,” Messud remarks, when a reporter tells her that her character is grim, “you’re in deep trouble.”
This Saturday, Pitchfork.com is launching the Pitchfork Review, its new print magazine, with an event in Brooklyn, featuring bands, DJs, and a panel discussion led by Michael Azerrad (Our Band Could Be Your Life) on music journalism in the internet era. Washington Post writer Richard Cohen is working on an authorized biography of Nora Ephron.
The Center for Fiction is hosting its annual First Novel Fête on Tuesday evening, a prelude to the Flaherty-Dunnan First Novel Prize, which will be announced at a gala dinner at the Union League Club on Wednesday. All of the eight finalists for this year’s award, which honors excellence in a debut work of fiction, are lined up to read, including Anthony Marra (author of A Constellation of Vital Phenomena), Lea Carpenter (author of Eleven Days), and Taiye Selasi (author of Ghana Must Go).
Short attention span? Huffington Post recommends 23 classics under 200 pages, including books by Albert Camus, Franz Kafka, and Raymond Chandler.