Bulletin #250

• Plants teach us how to think differently. >>Tree Spirits Grass Spirits.

• Enough is enough. >>Slowing the Sun.

• The radical lord of light entertainment. >>Erik Satie — Three Piece Suite.

• Gymnopédies & Gnossiennes. >>Erik Satie — Three Piece Suite.

• What did we learn? >>The Covid Response.

• To the round meadow. >>Powsels and Thrums.

• The story goes. >>A Leopard-Skin Hat.

• Between repose and movement. >>The Gorgeous Inertia of the Earth.

• Fiction Round Table. >>Read this short list.

• The joys of house museums. >>Makeshift Seasons.

• What happened to my friend. >>Visas Now!

• The kēhua that haunt her. >>Whaea Blue.

• Wouldn’t you like to be normal? >>The Edge of the Alphabet.

• The power of perspective. >>Universality.

• Fitting in. >>The Life and Opinions of Kartik Popat.

• International Booker TV: >>On the Calculation of Volume. >>Perfection. >>Heart Lamp. >>A Leopard-Skin Hat. >>Under the Eye of the Big Bird. >>Small Boat. >>Read the books!

• Picking the best-written books.

• A forgotten expedition. >>A Training School for Elephants.

• Ned Wenlock gets it. >>Tsunami.

• Arsenals of democracy.

• Why the Romans stopped reading books.

• Does dream inception work?

• New-new.

• Our film recommendation this week: Move When the Spirit Says Move.

• Endpapers.

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Issue #249

• Authors and their bookshops.

• One of those who had disappeared. >>The Place of Shells.

• Obstacles and solutions. >>On the Calculation of Volume: 1.

• The work had already been done. >>A Leopard-Skin Hat.

• The threads shine through. >>You Are Here.

• What does the literature of the working class look like? >>On the Clock.

• Poverty and service work. >>On the Clock.

• A semi-infinite novel. >>Caret.

• Working while grieving. >>And the Walls Became the World All Around.

• Footnotes to a lost manuscript. >>The Ways of Paradise.

• Shine On.

• Whose voices are these? >>Parade.

• Dissecting the present. >>The Great When.

• Naomi walks the Earth. >>Northbound.

• Ōrongohau.

• Instantly iconic. >>The Life and Opinions of Kartik Popat.

• Every tender thing breaks. >>We Do Not Part.

• Frog-free. >>Conceiving Histories.

• Unconcerned with the connections between words and meanings. >>Freedom, tyranny, &c.

• A teenage holiday journal (1821).

• Straddling the border.

• An interview with a grain of sand.

If you enjoyed The Interesting Times, buy the interesting books!

Issue#248

• Books picked me up on bad days. >>Bookish.

• Why this need for definitions? >>Slender Volumes.

• Rewriting Georges Perec. >>Perfection.

• The age of aimless aspiration. >>Perfection.

• The fissures between one’s ideals and reality. >>Theory and Practice.

• Instantly iconic. >>The Life and Opinions of Kartik Popat.

• Sociopathic, horny, ambitious, confused. >>The Life and Opinions of Kartik Popat.

• A definite example of good and evil. >>Tony Fomison: Life of an artist.

• Marae food sovereignty. >>Pātaka Kai.

• Extraordinary delivery. >>Mary and the Rabbit Dream.

• Reality itself is blazing and burning. >>Slender Volumes. >>Hotel Theresa. >>Islands.

• How Clarice Lispector disrupts our notions of good and bad. >>Read C.L.

• Ending Neoliberalism. >>Futilitarianism.

• Expanding a global presence. >>Tsunami.

• Organising knowledge.

• Self-branching beings.

• My darlings.

• Drawnworks.

• Our film recommendation this week: No Other Land.

• Also recommended: Locked-Up Time.

• Knitting through digital decay.

Issue #247

• Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. >>You Are Here.

• More of an observer. >>Mountainish.

• Nothing is done because it was there. >>Mountainish.

• Can we ever rely on our brains? >>Changing My Mind.

• The scent of citrus. >>On a Woman’s Madness.

• This is wrong. >>Who’s Afraid of Gender?

• Making a claim on language. >>Minor Detail.

• A Taiwanese novel masquerading as a rediscovered Japanese novel. >>Taiwan Travelogue.

• Reduced to a lego block. >>Mammoth.

• Does writing matter? >>Question 7.

• A garden in this wretched world. >>A Mountain to the North, A Lake to the South, Paths to the West, A River to the East.

• Health anxiety and the writer’s calling. >>Kafka’s diaries.

• The Natural. >>Vehicle.

• The future of fiction and truth. >>Never Let Me Go.

• Celan’s ferryman. >>Under the Dome.

• The past is in the present is in the future.

• Rocks and racism. >>Rock Against Racism.

• Our film recommendation this week: Hive.

• Also: The Battle of Algiers.

• Roz and Emily eat their way through Midwood.

If you enjoy The Interesting Times — buy the interesting books!

Issue #246

• Influence and empowerment. >>Books of Mana.

• Beware the man whose handwriting sways like a reed in the wind. >>Wrong Norma.

• The edges of normalcy. >>The Edge of the Alphabet.

• Creative culmination. >>We Do Not Part.

• 11 things you learn when writing a novel about alpaca breeders. >>Star Gazers.

• Interview with an alpaca. >>Star Gazers.

• The heron and the snake. >>Gloss.

• Visionary tales. >>Mrs Calder and the Hyena.

• Prickly. >>Theory and Practice.

• The water in winter is cold. >>Petroglyphs.

• Fun with David Graeber. >>Books by David Graeber.

• David Graeber’s lasting influence on anthropology and activism. >>As If Already Free.

• “Books picked me up on bad days.” >>Bookish.

• The perfect climate-change novel? >>The Rings of Saturn.

• Blood, sweat, tears and body shaming. >>Cry When the Baby Cries.

• The biggest little press in the world. >>Books published by Fitzcarraldo Editions.

• The summer soundtrack.

• On the chess circuit.

• Our film recommendation this week: Once Upon a Time in Anatolia.

• Also: The Bibi Files.

• The Centaur Scale.

If you enjoyed The Interesting Times, buy the interesting books!

Issue #245

• First, the germ. >>On the Calculation of Volume.

• Day 121. >>On the Calculation of Volume.

• A memory campaign. >>Heroines.

• Laughter and tears. >>Childish Literature.

• A literary inheritance. >>Childish Literature.

• My Wonderful Description of Flowers. >>Prairie, Dresses, Art, Other.

• Chasing their dreams. >>Poorhara.

• Eight hours. >>The Sleepers.

• Your tone isn’t always the toniest. >>Speak / Stop.

• Fighting fate. >>The Watermark.

• Navigating romance. >>Reinventing Love.

• Remembering and forgetting. >>Question 7.

• The writing shack. >>Question 7.

• The merry fellowship of bothies. >>In Search of Simple Shelter.

• "Confiscate this sign.”

• How metaphor works.

• 16000 censored artworks.

• Not I.

Support The Interesting Times by buying the interesting books.

Issue #244

• Hope for the future. >>Gliff.

• A novelist who looks into the dark. >>Gliff.

• A communal space of writing. >>Prairie, Dresses, Art, Other. >>Committed.

• What is children’s literature for? >>Books by Katherine Rundell.

• “I want to be hopeful.” >>Books by Han Kang. >>Pre-order We Do Not Part.

• A killer and a critic. >>Walking Practice.

• United in torment. >>What Kingdom.

• “I must divorce!” >>If Only.

• After the buzz. >>I Who Have Never Known Men.

• Kafka: A world of truth. >>Diaries.

• Speculative fiction in the age of Artificial Intelligence. >>Hum.

• Open on Inland. >>Inland.

• Trying (and really failing).

• Sharing the bill with your younger self. >>Krapp’s Last Tape.

• What interacting with chatbots can reveal about ourselves.

• X is for…

• Can you save the Weimar Republic?

• Our film recommendation this week: Maurice and I.

• Our other film recommendation this week: Praying for Armageddon.

• I will not write unless I am swaddled in furs.

Support The Interesting Times by purchasing the interesting books.

Issue #243

• Phoning in from Te Araroa trail. >>Your signed copy of Naomi Arnold’s book at a special price.

• The weight of estrangement. >>The Position of Spoons.

• The power of the book. >>The Message.

• Destination big box store. >>Help Wanted.

• Who is controlling the plot? >>The Watermark.

• Listening to Palestinian silences. >>{ … }

• A rare interview with Gerald Murnane. >> Books by Gerald Murnane.

• Hayek’s bastards. >>Crack-Up Capitalism. >>Hayek’s Bastards.

• Life calls for a cheese souffle. >>French Cooking for One.

• A deadly book for naughty children. >>A copy for the child of your choice.

• The black sheep.

• Masters of the ice. >>To the polar regions.

• Overwhelmed by The Spectacle.

• The creature from the id.

• The forgers’ Hall of Fame.

• You’d be surprised how closed-minded you are.

• Breaking the power of the 1%.

• Pluck the Owl, anyone?

• Reset and refresh.

• Our film recommendations this week: Heart of Glass.

• And also: Marguerite’s Theorem.

• The life-changing magic of keeping absolutely everything.

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(Your purchases make us possible.)

Issue #242

• The art of watching and being watched. >>The Sleepers.

• The art of writing a cookbook. >>French Cooking for One.

• The power of the book. >>The Message.

• Fame and license. >>Memories of Distant Mountains.

• Navigating romance and the Patriarchy. >>Reinventing Love.

• Attrition in friendship. >>Understanding Brecht.

• Everything upside down. >>Biography of X.

• No place like home. >>Stranger in My Own Land.

• The cheap books problem.

• Embracing ambiguity — one sentence at a time.

• The illustrated envelopes of Edward Gorey. >>Born to Be Posthumous.

• A history of Janet Frame’s desk. >>A history of Janet Frame’s other desk. >>The Table.

• A guide to the Regulatory Standards Bill.

• 391.

• Enough already.

• Out of the cesspit.

• Couldn’t put it down.

• Our film recommendation this week: 45 Years.

• Live and learn.

Support The Interesting Times by buying the interesting books!

Issue #241

• A private dreamworld. >>Memories of Distant Mountains.

• The comfy story has got to change. >>Concerning the Future of Souls.

• Reading the signs of crisis. >>Gliff.

• What happens when people fight back. >>Gliff.

• Other intimacies. >>The Position of Spoons.

• Lemon curd, trauma. >>The Position of Spoons.

• A grim future. >>Juice.

• Enduring importance. >>The Question of Palestine.

• Thriving in the messy. >>Art Monsters.

• The classical music in Murakami’s novels. >>The City and Its Uncertain Walls.

• Good reading.

• Putting in the commas.

• Incoming.

• Did Michel Houellebecq steal Thomas Bernhard’s coat?

• Make your submission (however brief) on the Treaty Principles Bill by January 7th. >>This is a handy submission-builder. >>Read Thomas’s submission.

• Hobson’s actual pledges.

• Self-publishing and the Black American narrative.

• The Yule goat.

• Our film recommendation this week: Ginger and Rosa.

• The 100% true story of Santa and Jesus, probably.

Support The Interesting Times by buying the interesting books.
(Your purchases make possible everything that we do.)

Issue #240

• Joy of joys. >>Orbital.

• Not a book, except by its necessary containment in a physical form. >>Whaea Blue.

• Not so far apart. >>Unfinished and Far Far Away.

• Why the novel matters. >>The Position of Spoons.

• Anarchism and principle of play. >>The Ultimate Hidden Truth of the World.

• Predicament. >>Future Jaw-Clap.

• The punks of jazz. >>Future Jaw-Clap.

• The reverse bug. >>An Absence of Cousins.

• Translating Japanese’s many words for ‘I’. >>The City and Its Uncertain Walls. >>An I-Novel.

• The unbearable ennui of office life. >>Bullshit Jobs.

• A book for every year of your life: 0—30. >>Build the bookcase.

• The art of watching and the art of being watched. >>The Sleepers.

• According to Alice.

• Kafka’s screwball tragedy. >>Investigations of a Dog.

• What does a translator do?

• Under the radar. >>An incisive submission.

• On Nietzsche Mountain.

• Chronic illness and creative recuperation. >>Enacting the disease.

• With Clarice in Washington. >>Books by Clarice Lispector.

• Books that exist only in books.

• Our film recommendation this week: Janet Planet.

• Creating the perfect library.

Support The Interesting Times by buying the interesting books!

Issue #239

• Other Intimacies. >>The Position of Spoons.

• Sounds in the house. >>On the Calculation of Volume, Book I and Book II.

• Day 121. >>On the Calculation of Volume, Book I and Book II.

• The Angel of Death has some reservations about his job. >>Concerning the Future of Souls.

• Uncanny the singing that comes from certain husks. >>Concerning the Future of Souls.

• Haunting/haunted. >>The Royal Free.

• First a farce, then a tragedy. >>The Life and Opinions of Kartik Popat.

• Unashamedly political. >>The Life and Opinions of Kartik Popat.

• An ex-columnist! >>The Life and Opinions of Kartik Popat.

• Zebra power! >>Slender Volumes.

• Female rage and agency. >>Rhine Journey.

• Weeping for Babylon. >>Three Worlds.

• New ground. >>Juice.

• Reframing Māori art. >>Toi te Mana.

• Redeeming time. >>Second Chances.

• Disintegrating worldviews. >>Ghost Pains.

• Insecurity as a defining emotional register. >>Ghost Pains.

• An interview with Fady Joudah. >>[…]

• Behind the scenes. >>Giant.

• Love and silence. >>Traces of Enayat.

• Looking to learn. >> A Handbook of Basic Facts.

• Critical. >>Submit!

• No illusions intact.

• On lists.

• Can poets drive?

• Our film recommendation this week: A Mistake. >>Read the book!

• To be read.

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