Anne Boyer—the author of the poetry collection Garments Against Women, the essay collection A Handbook of Disappointed Fate, and the nonfiction book The Undying—has resigned from her position as poetry editor at the New York Times Magazine, stating: “The Israeli state’s U.S.-backed war against the people of Gaza is not a war for anyone.” She also writes: “I can’t write about poetry amid the ‘reasonable’ tones of those who aim to acclimatize us to this unreasonable suffering. No more ghoulish euphemisms. No more verbally sanitized hellscapes. No more warmongering lies.”
The winners of the 2023 National Book Awards are: Justin Torres’s Blackouts (fiction), Ned Blackhawk’s The Rediscovery of America (nonfiction), Craig Santos Peres’s from unincorporated territory [åmot] (poetry), Stênio Gardel’s The Words that Remain (translated literature), and Dan Santat’s A First Time for Everything (young people’s literature). After his acceptance speech, Torres was joined on stage by a collective of authors who read a statement on behalf of Palestinians and demanded a ceasefire.
The Washington Post has named its top ten books of 2023. And Publishers Weekly has named its ten favorite books of 2023.
Fran Lebowitz shares her appreciation of Martin Scorcese, Lynne Tillman, Colson Whitehead, the ballet, Rembrandt, and Deborah Eisenberg.