The Secret to Viet Thanh Nguyen’s Overnight Success
The novelist seemed to go from unknown to MacArthur genius in two years. In truth, it took decades.
by Joe Fassler
From: Electric Literature
This month, the novelist Viet Thanh Nguyen was awarded one of the most prestigious honors a writer can receive: the MacArthur “genius” grant, given to artists, thinkers, and public intellectuals whose ideas have culture-altering potential. This, in itself, should surprise no one. Nguyen writes with arresting moral and intellectual force, often about people scarred and uprooted by conflict. As the MacArthur Foundation put it in its citation, Nguyen’s demonstrated a unique gift for exploring how depictions of the Vietnam War “often fail to capture the full humanity and inhumanity, the sacrifices and savagery, of participants on opposing sides.”
Continue reading “The Secret to Viet Thanh Nguyen’s Overnight Success”
Please join us to hear Steven J. Ross, son of Holocaust survivors, author and professor of history at USC, discussing and signing his new book, Hitler in Los Angeles: How Jews Foiled Nazi Plots Against Hollywood and America, in conversation with the host and producer of “Start Making Sense,” The Nation’s weekly podcast Jon Wiener (How We Forgot the Cold War: A Historical Journey Across America). The book examines how the Nazis plotted to sabotage the nation’s military installations, propaganda and communications along the Pacific Coast
Napa, California–based artist known for multimedia installations, public art, photography, printmaking, and sculpture, Lewis deSoto revisits Southern California’s Inland Empire, where he lived the first half of his life. From his creative toolbox, deSoto grabs an old standby—his photographic lens—to articulate the 21st century present of the Inland Empire. He overlays the visuals with written filters of his narrative past to produce Empire: Photographs and Essays.
Los Angeles – Several hundred people gathering in Leimert Park Village in front of the iconic Vision Theater, Saturday, October 14, 2017.
Please join us to hear the Pulitzer Prize winning author for Hamilton, Ron Chernow, discuss and sign Grant, his newest masterful biography, about Ulysses S. Grant’s life as a general and president, whose fortunes rose and fell with dizzying speed and frequency. In conversation with USC professor and author William Deverell, Chernow offers this sweeping and dramatic portrait, that finds the threads that bind the disparate stores together, and makes sense of all sides of Grant’s life, contradictions, and accomplishments.
