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    <title>Old Post Books — Literature</title>
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    <description>The long view of writing: how forms develop, what a movement actually shared, how translation reshapes a text and why some books outlast their reception.</description>
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      <title>Where to Start with Toni Morrison: A Reading Order for Newcomers</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[Begin with Beloved (1987) or read the eleven novels chronologically from The Bluest Eye (1970) — two routes through the Nobel laureate's shelf, mapped from the record.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Fri, 28 Aug 2026 08:56:24 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Ruth Kaplan</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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      <title>Five Readers, Six Hundred Books: How the National Book Award Actually Picks a Longlist</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[The prize's glamour hides a blunt mechanism: a handful of judges, a submission fee, and a summer spent reading everything a publisher was willing to enter.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 19 Aug 2026 08:48:05 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Ruth Kaplan</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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      <title>Cover to Cover: How to Read a Poetry Collection</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[How to read a poetry collection from cover to cover: arcs, sequencing, and method, from Ariel to Native Guard.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 09 Jul 2026 12:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Imani Brooks</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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      <title>Groves of Academe: The Campus Novel and Its Discontents</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[The campus novel and its discontents: Lucky Jim, Changing Places, The Secret History—and why satire loves the university.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Sun, 05 Jul 2026 12:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Imani Brooks</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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      <title>Where to Start with James Baldwin: The Mountain, the Essays, the Fire</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[Where to start with James Baldwin: Go Tell It on the Mountain, Notes of a Native Son, The Fire Next Time—a reading order.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Sun, 21 Jun 2026 12:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Imani Brooks</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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      <title>The Three Percent Problem: How Translated Fiction Shapes English</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[How translated fiction shapes English: the three-to-six percent problem, and the translators who picked the voices.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Wed, 03 Jun 2026 12:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Ruth Kaplan</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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      <title>The Public Literary Critic: From Edmund Wilson to the Newsletter</title>
      <link>https://oldpostbooks.com/literature/the-critic-vs-the-essayist/</link>
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      <description><![CDATA[Where the public literary critic lives after the newspaper review section: from Edmund Wilson to newsletters and podcasts.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Sat, 02 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Ruth Kaplan</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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      <title>The Second Novel Problem: What Comes After Lightning</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[Why the second novel is so hard: Ralph Ellison, Harper Lee, and the sophomore slump—plus the writers who outlasted it.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Sun, 05 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Ruth Kaplan</dc:creator>
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      <title>Where to Start with George Eliot: Middlemarch First, Always</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[Where to start with George Eliot: Middlemarch first, then The Mill on the Floss and Daniel Deronda—a three-novel reading order.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Sun, 08 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Imani Brooks</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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      <title>A Town in Small Pieces: How the Short Story Cycle Builds a Novel</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[How the short story cycle builds a novel: Winesburg, Ohio to Olive Kitteridge and There There, and why reading order matters.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Sat, 14 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Imani Brooks</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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      <title>The Liar at the Wheel: A Field Guide to the Unreliable Narrator</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[A field guide to the unreliable narrator: Christie’s 1926 twist, Humbert Humbert, Stevens—and the signals that give the game away.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Thu, 22 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Ruth Kaplan</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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      <title>Where to Start with George Orwell: Essays Before Dystopia</title>
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      <description><![CDATA[Where to start with George Orwell: the essays and Down and Out before Nineteen Eighty-Four, with a five-step reading order.]]></description>
      <pubDate>Tue, 30 Dec 2025 12:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
      <dc:creator>Ruth Kaplan</dc:creator>
      <category>Literature</category>
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