Michael David Lukas

Just as a bottle of wine is enhanced by knowledge of its production and provenance, food is enriched by a sustained meditation on the life it once was and a reverence for all the work that brought it to the table.

Instead of singing his praises, perhaps it is best to let his words sing for themselves.

Written interviews are just one of many small changes we must reckon with as publishing and literature sail into uncharted territory.

Short stories, poems, and essays written by Iraq and Afghanistan War veterans in MFA workshops.

The internet is filled with gossip, hucksterism, schlock, back-biting, and valueless aggregation about the publishing industry. Poets & Writers magazine is a diamond in the junk.

Consider the difference between James Cooper and James Fenimore Cooper; David Wallace and David Foster Wallace; or Jorge Luis Borges and Jorge Borges. Who would want to go down in history as Jorge Borges?

While here are only two freestanding book reviews in this fair country, we do have a wealth of best book lists. Here is a meta-list: The Best of the Best Books of 2009.

Does the motivation behind my philanthropic giving matter? If so, is it wrong to give out of guilt?

The biggest problem with The New York Times' new Bay Area section is that it acts like a foreign desk, treating the region like a surprisingly cosmopolitan colonial outpost.

Every time I crunch into a fuyu persimmon I feel guilty, like when I read the Times online or ignore my local bookstore for a cheaper copy on Amazon or Alibris.

The heckling of a peace activist just shows how little Americans are used to hearing from the Palestinian perspective.

Sure, you spend a few months resting on your laurels. You go to Stockholm, you collect your prize, you give your speech, but then what?

The best way to bolster literature in translation is to buy some, and maybe you’ll get a jump on next year’s Nobel Prize winner.

His writing is devastating in its beauty, evoking West Virginia's mountain hollows with a sinewy and precise prose that comes as close to Hemingway as anything I've ever read.

The great anthropological cookbooks of the 1960s and 1970s have been all but replaced by the fluffy side-projects of TV personalities, further alienating home cooks from their kitchens.

Some would toss their e-book device in the glove compartment and head out on the super highway. I’ll take the heft of the book in my hand.

Amidst all the excitement of the Roths and Moores and Chabons we should not forget about Lydia Davis, whose Collected Stories comes out in one month.

Part workshop, part retreat, part lecture, it hibernates for much of the year in university English departments and home offices, emerging for a week or two at the height of the summer before scuttling back to its lair.

The past two months have seen a bumper crop of trend pieces about the old and formerly untrendy practice of preserving the harvest.

The completion of a novel is nowhere near as momentous as the birth of a child. But in some ways, the pain and anxiety of separation is similar.

What does the King of Pop have in common with the main character of an 18th century German novel? Quite a lot, in fact.

No one book could ever hope to encompass a country as complex and multi-faceted as Iran. But if you read these five, you’ll be on your way.

President Obama’s health care reform could be a huge legislative achievement and, not incidentally, a boon to the arts.

In these days of excessive credit card fees and imminent financial regulation, one of the most bandied-about (and misused) Shakespearean phrases is “a pound of flesh.”

A few further examples of why University Presses and literary magazines are necessary, beautiful, and vital.

The newest crop of books about the United States’ relationship with the Muslim world has a decidedly hopeful twist.

In a world that fetishizes speed, the act of reading a long novel feels almost perverse. But perhaps longness is what we need most these days.

If you are going to purge your bookstore of gay and lesbian literature, you should do a proper job of it.

Supplementing faith with science.

The success of Graywolf is not just a good news story in a bad news cycle, it is a validation of their small-batch editorial philosophy.

The New York Times columnist has a lot of friends. But does his penchant for quoting them in his column run counter to the paper’s anonymous sources policy?

Is the balance regarding discussions of US support of Israeli policies changing?

When food becomes a mask for snobbery and pretension the foodie underground ceases to be a movement and starts to become nothing more than a demographic.

The death of the great Sudanese novelist went largely without comment in this country.

The Short Story Bubble may not cause the global economy to collapse, but it might take down a few literary magazines.

Day 2. The genius of Charles Baxter and the difficulty of following Marilynne Robinson.

Day 1. Eight thousand lonely souls schmooze, discuss their craft, and attend readings.

The Association of Writers & Writing Programs Conference starts tomorrow, with four days of literary readings, panel discussions, schmoozing, and an enormous book fair.

Works of literature on the Palestinian/Israeli conflict—four from the Palestinians, four from the Israelis, and one in between.

E-books have been getting a lot of press recently. But why you would want to pay $400 for something no smaller, no lighter, and no easier to read than a paperback?

Spanning December 27-January 17, through the eyes of four very different people.

How will John Updike's writing measure up twenty years from now?

I'd put up $20 that one of these six books will make the NYT Best Books of 2009.