Recently in literature Category

Finally! The film adaptation of Roald Dahl's classic children's novel is due in theaters this November. Kudos to Wes Anderson for using stop motion animation.

If you're a Lord of the Rings geek like me, you've always wanted to figure out how to write you name in Elvish. It turns out that it's not that hard, grammaticality speaking. Maybe I can talk Brooke into writing our wedding invitations in Elvish...okay, maybe not.

2,777 pages and counting. Go write something.

The first volume of W.F.P. Napier's four-volume set, History of the War in the Peninsula and in the South of France, was returned to the shelves of Washington and Lee University's library, after an absence of 52,858 days.

A Union soldier named C.S. Gates took the book from Washington College, as it was then called, on June 11, 1864, when General David Hunter and his army of West Virginia raided the area and looted the college's buildings.

Gates, however, thought he was exacting revenge on Washington College's next-door neighbor, the Virginia Military Institute, which was set on fire by the raiding party.

A note signed by Gates and inscribed in the book reads: "This book was taken from the Military Institute at Lexington Virginia in June 1864 when General Hunter was on his Lynchburg raid. The Institution was burned by the order of Gen Hunter. The remains of Gen. Stonewall Jackson rest in the cemetery at this place."

The book was returned by Mike Dau, of Lake Forest, IL, who inherited it from the Lake Forest couple, Myron and Isabel Gates, ancestors of the aforementioned soldier.

If Washington and Lee would have hired Detective Bookman, this never would have been an issue.

Via McSweeney's: Be A Nose.

Art Spiegelman, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Maus, creator of Wacky Packs and the Garbage Pail Kids, and father of the modern graphic novel (though hes still demanding a blood test), presents this warts-and-all reproduction of his private sketchbooks -- and the results are as candid, sharp, and funny as the relentlessly innovative man behind them. BE A NOSE! is a rare glimpse into the secret scribblings of an American original.

Happy Darwin Day everyone! Celebrating the man who wrote one of the most influential books the world has ever seen, The Origin of Species.

I was introduced to xkcd today through an entry on with leather. A humorous entry that looks to finally get to the bottom of the Base System. Considering our obsession with TED though I couldn't help but also include one man's efforts to bring to light the trouble with ... well you're just going to have to see for yourself.

John Updike passed away today at the age of seventy-six. The New Yorker has set up a thread with comments from individuals sharing their thoughts "about one of the great voices of postwar America".

Academy Award nominee M. Night Shyamalan wrote and directed The Sixth Sense, a critical and financial success in 1999. The story hinged on the literary device of a plot twist in the form of a twist ending. It was a beautiful movie that left many in the theatre, if not all, gasping in shock as the ending unfolded. As a viewer you immediately questioned all that you had seen and heard during the film and felt compelled to watch it again with this newfound knowledge of where the line between reality and fantasy really existed. Shyamalan was widely considered an up and coming star only to see his luminescence dim over time. These days many consider him to be a one trick pony of sorts. All too frequently relying on his widely successful plot twist technique presented in The Sixth Sense and repeatedly including twist endings in his films ever since. As a result none of his subsequent movies have reached the heights of The Sixth Sense and in fact some have been considered flops, most notably 2004's The Village and 2006's Lady in the Water. Shyamalan doesn't seem to have progressed in his story telling and with each passing movie his approach seems stale and regurgitated.