BY frieze in Culture Digest | 31 MAY 19

Weekend Reading List: Fiction After Autofiction; Criticism at the End of the World

What the frieze editors have been reading this week

BY frieze in Culture Digest | 31 MAY 19

For the TLS, Alice Atlee considers what the fashion for autofiction means for the relationship between an author and their work.
For frieze, Juliet Jacques on the emergence of a literature that puts trans and non-binary characters at its heart, written by openly trans authors who draw from lived experience.
‘The situation of the vagina in feminist politics today is, even by optimistic standards, hairy.’ Andrea Long Chu, in n+1, on the relationship between contemporary feminism and vaginas.
‘It is always night-time. There is scant backlighting. No street signs or familiar buildings to give us our bearings. No context.’ Sukhdev Sandhu on the photographs of Soham Gupta, in Bidoun.
‘Joss Sackler's husband and his family are accused of making billions off the opioid crisis. Does she get to be a rebel without a cause?’ For Town and Country, Norman Vanamee explains how ‘Sackler’ became the most toxic name in philanthropy.
‘A Film of Immediate Pleasures’: Charles Bramesco on Bong Joon-ho’s Palme d’Or-winning film, Parasite.
‘Billionaires, Bombers and Bellydancers’: Omar Mouallem on a century of Muslim misrepresentation in Hollywood, for The Ringer.

‘The Artist Who Gave Up Her Daughter’: For Topic, Sasha Bonét tells the story of Camille Billops, who abandoned her four-year-old to become the artist she knew she was meant to be.
‘It’s a strange feeling being a cultural critic at this point in history. It’s like standing on the deck of the Titanic, feeling it sink into the sea, hearing the orchestra play as they go down — then reviewing the show.’ At Longreads, Soraya Roberts asks: How do you engage in cultural criticism at the end of the world?
‘Two centuries of calumny have created sympathy for the musical devil: I found Salieri’s grave festooned with bouquets.’ For the New Yorker, Alex Ross on the renaissance of Antonio Salieri, a composer falsely cast as Mozart’s murderer.
‘Trump has told people to lie – including people who reported to him in his capacity as president – and he has done it often. The evidence is here.’ David Runciman on the Mueller report, for the London Review of Books.
In anticipation of this weekend’s Champions League final, the New Yorker’s Sam Knight discusses how ‘Football Leaks’ is exposing corruption in the European game.