Tin House Magazine, Volume 10, Issue 2, Winter 2009: #38 Winter Reading

It’s hard to match the recent political drama for sheer absurdity and shock value. In keeping with the dramatic mood of the season, Anne Carson, one of modern poetry’s great innovators and translators, has come to our rescue. Here Carson breathes life and fire into into the Greek classic, An Oresteia, braiding together three different visions—Aiskhylos’ Agamemnon, Sophokles’ Elektra, and Euripides’ Orestes—drawing the ancient tale of vengeance into the modern world. Closer to home, it’s the rot of betrayal that destroys the couple at the heart of Christopher Sorrentino’s story “Ever Again,” a stellar addition to the pantheon of divorce tragedies. Daniel Menaker, legendary fiction editor at the New Yorker and Random House, has for over three decades anointed rising stars and assisted literary giants in realizing their vision. In this issue he speaks to the thrill and challenge of editing many of the greatest modern American writers. One of those writers was the extraordinarily gifted David Foster Wallace, whom we lost last October. Tin House had the pleasure and honor of publishing Wallace in our premiere issue, and, like so many others, we mourn his passing. Greatness is transcendent and great art everlasting. His vision will be missed. His art will endure.