Nearly twenty years into its history, the Thurber Prize for American Humor will finally be going to a woman (either Annabelle Gurwitch, Roz Chast, or Julie Schumacher) on September 28.
Donald Trump and Fox News CEO Roger Ailes are continuing to do battle (for one thing, Trump revived his attack on Megyn Kelly last night). Ailes means well, according to an unnamed source who talked to Gabriel Sherman: “Roger says Trump is unelectable. His goal here is to save the country.”
Music critic David Hajdu has gone out on a limb and made his own album. Being interviewed about it by The Observer also gave him the opportunity to share “something I’ve wanted to say, but nobody’s asked me so I can finally say it.” Here are his thoughts on leaving the New Republic with the rest of the old guard, and going to The Nation: “Writing for The Nation after writing for The New Republic for twelve years is like, your wife dies so you marry her sister. But then you start to realize that you sort of always had a crush on her the whole time, you know? Because I’m really happy there.”
Alison Bechdel’s graphic memoir Fun Home has proved too much for some of Duke’s fainter-hearted freshmen.
Not content with just whining about the dominance of Amazon et al., a Japanese bookstore chain is buying up ninety percent of the print run of Haruki Murakami’s new essay collection (about being a writer) to sell themselves and distribute to other bookstores.