Creative 06/10/2022

Alison Bechdel watches Hulu like the rest of us, the unburnable "Handmade's Tale" sells at auction.

by | June 10, 2022

UP FOR DISCUSSION

 

MEMES

https://twitter.com/antje_schmidt_/status/1533798542938198017

https://twitter.com/_daniola/status/1533845472107954177

ALISON BECHDEL UPDATES BECHDEL TEST

On Wednesday, graphic novelist Alison Bechdel (“Fun Home”, “Are You My Mother?”) added a heretofore unprecedented addendum to her iconic Bechdel Test after writer Hanna Rosin panned Hulu’s new gay rom-com, “Fire Island,” on Twitter.  

Based on Jane Austen’s “Pride and Prejudice,” “Fire Island” explores the comedy and drama of a queer, racially diverse group of friends on their summer trip to the vacation destination. In her since-deleted tweet, Rosin wrote, “#FireIslandMovie gets an F- on the Bechdel test in a whole new way. Do we just ignore the drab lesbian stereotypes bc cute gay Asian boys? Is this revenge for all those years of the gay boy best friend?”

The Bechdel test has its roots in 1985, when Bechdel published a comic strip as part of her series, “Dykes To Watch Out For.” In the historic scene, one woman explains to another that she only sees a movie if it successfully meets three criteria: 

  1. The movie needs to have at least two women characters.
  2. These characters have at least one conversation
  3. … about anything that is NOT a man.

Decades later, the Bechdel Test has ascended the echelons of academia, film theory and scholarship, and become a monolith in mainstream cultural criticism in the process. Many films – perhaps most films – do not pass the Bechdel Test (“I haven’t seen a movie since Alien,” the original comic strip character joked to her companion). 

Many – and I mean MANY – people had thoughts about Rosin’s original tweet. 

 

In response, Alison Bechdel herself chimed in to the online discourse.

I’m obsessed with the idea that Alison Bechdel – whose brilliant, tragic “Fun Home” is one of my all-time-fave literary graphic novels – watched “Fire Island,” a film that includes scenes of best friends screaming out opposing imitations of Marissa Tomei. Do you think Bechdel also listens to “Las Culturistas” (the irreverent pop culture podcast hosted by two of the film’s stars, Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers)?

No, but really: in a moment when writers from J.K. Rowling to, I guess, Alison Bechdel can log on to add contemporary clarification to their canonical works of yore, what does that mean for literature as a whole? In the social media age, are all of our once-published works in a constant state of flux, just waiting for our addenda to follow, decades later? One can only imagine, if George Orwell was still among us, just what he would do if he saw the way some of us use the word “Orwellian” …

TLDR — THE LITERARY DRAMA ROUNDUP

– A special-edition copy of “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood, which was made to be fire-resistant in a symbol against censorship, sold this week for $130,000 at auction via Sotheby’s. It has not been made public who purchased the object. Proceeds from the sale will go to benefit PEN America. 

– An uncharacteristically serious dispatch in Gawker this week argues convincingly for an end to letters of recommendation, particularly for writing MFA programs. Citing the recommendation letters’ history, rooted in intentionally icing out underprivileged applicants, Erin Somers describes the massive uptick in applications to a university that has chosen to do away with letters of rec, which she argues levels the playing field more for applicants. She also references the refusal of most of the US’s most prestigious MFA programs and fellowships (Iowa, Cornell, the Guggenheim, Stanford, NYU) to “respond to multiple queries” about their stubborn and, in some cases, elaborate recommendation policy.  

– Some TikTokers are reportedly encouraging readers to buy, read, then return e-books from Amazon. Authors Lisa Kessler and K. Bromberg then explained on Twitter that when readers return books on Amazon, authors are actually charged for that transaction – and it’s an amount greater than what the author receives for the initial sale. An uptick in returns means that there is a possibility that they will owe Amazon money by month’s end, the authors said. In an effort to curb the trend, Bromberg started the hashtag #AmazonIsNotALibrary, which has been picking up steam on Twitter.

BEST OF LIT TWITTER 

– Despy Boutris is making a list of lit mags that are “open to (very) emerging writers.” So far, recommendations include Zyzzyva, Cream City Review, Dillydoun Review, and Glass Poetry Press. 

DEALS, DEALS, DEALS

– Isle McElroy (“The Atmospherians”) sold their forthcoming novel, “People Collide”, to HarperVia, Publishers Weekly reports. The book “is about a man who wakes up alone in his apartment in Bulgaria and finds he is in his wife’s body.” It is set to publish next year. 

– HarperCollins will publish a memoir by Suleika Dawson, the “secret muse and last love” of John le Carré, The Bookseller reports. Joel Simons, a TK at HarperCollins described “The Secret Heart: John le Carré: An Intimate Memoir” as “a many-layered, multi-faceted portrait of one of our greatest ever writers – presenting him in a new, utterly fascinating light.” The memoir will hit shelves this fall. 

COMINGS AND GOINGS

– Emi Ikkanda is joining the team as executive editor of Tiny Reparations Books, the Penguin imprint spearheaded by comedian and actress Phoebe Robinson. Ikkanda, previously at Seal Press, will also oversee “selective” acquisitions for two other Penguin imprints, Plume and Dutton, according to Publishers Lunch.

WRITING PROMPTS AND CHALLENGES

– Who’s doing #1000WordsofSummer? This week, Jami Attenberg (the project’s creator) posted this inspiring note to self from Morgan Parker (“There Are More Beautiful Things Than Beyonce”, “Magical Negro”), who reminds us: “… I would like to congratulate myself for all the days when 20 [words] feels like Everest. When I hate 1,000 out of 1,000 of my words. … I will de-intellectualize and re-sensualize my writing practice. Pay attention to how my body feels.… Turning a new page. I will turn a new page.” 

AND EVERYTHING ELSE

– 19-year-old author Leila Mottley is the youngest author ever to be picked for Oprah’s Book Club for “Nightcrawling,” a book she wrote at age 17. Study Haller Kate Dwyer profiled Leila Mottley this week for Teen Vogue – check it out here!

– HarperVia announced this week that it will publish “Tomb of Sand,” the International Booker Prize-winning book by Geetanjali Shree, in the U.S. in winter 2023. Daisy Rockwell, who also won the International Booker for her English translation of the book in the U.K., will remain translator in the U.S. edition. 

– Words Without Borders revamped its website this week. Using an influx of new funding, WWB plans to regularly publish new writing, as well as curate collections of texts, art, and videos and a searchable archive for its users.

– Poet and author Dionne Brand is teaming up with Knopf Canada to create Alchemy, an imprint focused on “decenter[ing] colonial models of literature,” according to CBC. The new program will acquire both fiction and nonfiction titles, with plans to publish up to three books per year. – Grace Shuyi Liew was awarded the 2022 Stella Kupferberg Memorial Short Story Prize for “Love Is Not A Permanent Structure.” Read the piece here.

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