Ethiopian and Irish actress Ruth Negga reads from Zadie Smith’s Swing Time. Ruth Negga was nominated for the Golden Globes for her role in Loving, an American movie about interracial marriage. Smith’s novel explores status and class and the way these distinctions shift between Africa and the Western world; a shift to which Negga herself […]
Tag Archives: literature
Adichie Talks Dior, Paris, and Her Fashion Week Experience in New Interview with Elle.com
In October, Adichie sat front row at a Christian Dior fashion show in Paris and watched models strutting the run way dressed in t-shirts bearing the inscription, “we should all be feminists.” [read here if you missed it.] In a recent interview published on elle.com, Adichie takes us back to when Dior first invited her to […]
Did Shakespeare Smoke Weed?
Is this what happens when American TV tries to think about literature? Jon Stewart, the anchor of The Daily Show, takes a trip down the literary lane and ends up in very strange and hilarious places. Plus, don’t miss out on GOP Chairman, Michael Steele, making a fool of himself. Dude can’t tell the difference […]
Invisible Cities…and The Dead
Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino. A bewitching little book. No use trying to figure out what it is. Is it a collection of poems, a series of vignettes, a novel, a travel guide, an ethnographic commentary, a bureaucratic document, a lineup of fireside tales, a meditation? What I can tell you is that it’s a rewrite or, […]
Rushdie at Duke Uni: “Man is a storytelling Animal”
On April 12, Salman Rushdie gave a lecture at Duke University titled, “Public Events, Private Lives: Literature and Politics in the Modern World.” As far as lectures by novelists go, I have seen better. To be fair, I would say it was merely boring. To be mean, I would say it was vacuous. But I […]
I hold a doctorate in English from Duke University and recently joined the Marquette University English faculty as an Assistant Professor. I love teaching African fiction and contemporary British novels. Brittle Paper is the virtual space/station where I play and experiment with ideas on how to reinvent African fiction and literary culture.
