Lit Hub Weekly: August 17 – 21, 2026
What Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel can teach us about grief, literature, and growing up. | Lit Hub TV Why the tragedy of Jason Arday reflects a rigged game for today’s Black scholars. | Lit Hub Politics How environmentalism
In 1904, renowned writer Kate Chopin passed away. According to a recent Lit Hub TV episode, Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel offer insights into grief, literature, and growing up. The tragedy of Jason Arday, a Black scholar, highlights a flawed system for today's scholars, as discussed in Lit Hub Politics. Environmental themes are woven into Ursula K. Le Guin's fiction, according to Lit Hub Criticism.
The popularity of Thoreau's "Walden" among modern Chinese youth is attributed to their understanding of his ideas, as explained in Lit Hub On Translation. R.K. Hegelman discusses Fernando Pessoa, a unique figure in modern poetic tradition, in Poetry. Ed Park shares his experiences with stamp collecting, maximum scrutiny, and his book, Three Tenses, in Broadcast.
Rebecca Ford delves into the issues surrounding the Children of Blood and Bone set in Vanity Fair. Anna Ballan reflects on Freud in the age of therapy-speak in The Hedgehog Review. Maria Adelmann reports on the crisis of the eternal adjunct for The Nation. An illustrated journey through the lost vocabulary of whaling, including terms like greasy luck and blubber room, is presented in Orion.
Paul Celan's writing style is theorized in a wild proposition by Poetry. Nuncore is explored in an article by Paul Michael Johnson, covering new books, music, and art fueling cultural fixation on nuns. Mychal Denzel Smith discusses the legacy and exploitation of "Woke 1" in Defector, while Geertje Bol considers the historical case for "righteous zeal" in Aeon.
Mark Bould interviews China Miéville about his creative process in Boston Review. Lauren Michele Jackson offers a poignant tribute to Jason Arday in The New Yorker. Various artists contribute to Grace Byron, Dorothea Lasky, and Philip Ball's exploration of astrology in Broadcast. Mitch Therieau discusses the allure of "lore" in The New York Times Magazine.
Other articles in Lit Hub cover topics such as Jodi Picoult getting a tattoo, new poetry by Rebecca Solnit, and the history of the parenthesis. Other sections include excerpts from the Independent Press Top 40 Bestsellers list, a review of why smartphones may have killed reading, and insights into wild swimming and the sensitivity of plants from Maris Kreizman.
Written by urgent.news from Literary Hub's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
