The Penguin Press

Scroll to Info & Navigation

Sam Anderson in The New York Times Magazine Phil Jackson profile: “Although I’m a lifelong basketball fan and an enthusiastic pickup player, I’m no expert in Xs and Os. So I can’t speak to the technical aspects of Jackson’s drawings. He drew quickly and sloppily, revising as he went, scribbling over lines he had just drawn, and most of the pages ended up looking like big disorienting hashes. One of the simpler and most memorable diagrams, below, was of Jordan’s final two plays against Utah in the 1998 Finals: a layup that got the Bulls within one and then the famous game-winning jump shot that ended (almost) his career.”

Sam Anderson in The New York Times Magazine Phil Jackson profile: “Although I’m a lifelong basketball fan and an enthusiastic pickup player, I’m no expert in Xs and Os. So I can’t speak to the technical aspects of Jackson’s drawings. He drew quickly and sloppily, revising as he went, scribbling over lines he had just drawn, and most of the pages ended up looking like big disorienting hashes.

One of the simpler and most memorable diagrams, below, was of Jordan’s final two plays against Utah in the 1998 Finals: a layup that got the Bulls within one and then the famous game-winning jump shot that ended (almost) his career.”

bookavore: I don’t always love quiet books, but Ghana Must Go by Taiye Selasi is so beautifully written that I fell for it, hard. When people talk about writing as a craft, they’re talking about writing like Selasi’s. I finished this book on the train and then worked on some writing of my own; this ended up mirroring an experience I usually have during the Olympics while watching ice skating, because they make it look simple to skate backwards in a circle and then launch their body into a triple whateverthehell, and then I stand up to go get more tea and skate myself down the hall in my socks, humming, and then trip on the floor and bruise a knee. She makes it look easy because the prose is basically perfect, so there’s no comparison, until you crash back to reality in your own journal. A beautiful family saga of sorts that brings not just her characters, but also contemporary Africa and the United States, to pulsing, vibrant life.

bookavore:

I don’t always love quiet books, but Ghana Must Go by Taiye Selasi is so beautifully written that I fell for it, hard. When people talk about writing as a craft, they’re talking about writing like Selasi’s. I finished this book on the train and then worked on some writing of my own; this ended up mirroring an experience I usually have during the Olympics while watching ice skating, because they make it look simple to skate backwards in a circle and then launch their body into a triple whateverthehell, and then I stand up to go get more tea and skate myself down the hall in my socks, humming, and then trip on the floor and bruise a knee. She makes it look easy because the prose is basically perfect, so there’s no comparison, until you crash back to reality in your own journal. A beautiful family saga of sorts that brings not just her characters, but also contemporary Africa and the United States, to pulsing, vibrant life.

nprfreshair: Mr. Food Revolution, Michael Pollan, as a new book out called Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation. He tells Weekend Edition: [T]here’s something magical that happens when people eat from the same pot. The family meal is really the nursery of democracy. It’s where we learn to share, it’s where we learn to argue without offending. It’s just too critical to let go, as we’ve been so blithely doing.” Here’s a 2006 interview with Pollan. Image from Pollan’s Food Rules, illustrated by Maira Kalman via Improvised Life

nprfreshair:

Mr. Food Revolution, Michael Pollan, as a new book out called Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation. He tells Weekend Edition:

[T]here’s something magical that happens when people eat from the same pot. The family meal is really the nursery of democracy. It’s where we learn to share, it’s where we learn to argue without offending. It’s just too critical to let go, as we’ve been so blithely doing.”

Here’s a 2006 interview with Pollan.

Image from Pollan’s Food Rules, illustrated by Maira Kalman via Improvised Life