Joseph Brodsky, from AGNI (Issue 43, 1996).

John Dos Passos, from New Masses (1927).

Betty White; the treasure she is.

John Berryman, from His Toy, His Dream, His Rest (1968).

Thomas Pynchon knew.

The best book I’ve read this year. Structurally, it sets the standard every historian should aspire to. Out of his glut of detail, Caro doesn’t just recount Robert Moses’s rise and fall; he shows what power is and, more importantly, why it grips people.

Nick Flynn, from Some Ether (2000).

Started the day with Pynchon’s Vineland, ended with Weir’s The Mosquito Coast. Both circle the same truth: you can flee, you can dream up Eden, but the rot comes with you. Read one, watched the other. Now left with the rotten knowledge that every escape builds another trap. That trap is man.