Shel Silverstein writes from beyond the grave

Shel Silverstein, beloved poet, will be publishing a second posthumous collection for children. I would be more excited, but I recently saw a staging of "Shel's Shorts," which was, perhaps, the dirtiest collection of short plays I have ever seen. Shel, your childlike wonder is now tainted by hilarious dirtiness.

Don't believe me? The first one stars a guy who dreams about effing his daughter. I saw this sitting between my parents. Emotionally scarred!

Shakespeare puts out a new play

Shakespeare may have written an heretofore unknown work, with a dubious and complicated past. Torrid! Shocking! So Shakespearean!

Abraham Lincoln + vampires + Tim Burton = Oh em gee

I have gone on record not liking book trailers. Today, I make an exception, for Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter:

Apparently Tim Burton wants to adapt this, but I say no thank you: someone needs to make Quentin Tarantino do this. And then make it Babe-raham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.

I think I just blew my own mind.

Zombies versus unicorns

Who will win???

Zombies, biyatches.

Dude looks like a lady?

Everyone has a Shakespeare theory, and the new one is that he was really the bastard Jewish daughter of an Italian court musician, Amelia Bassano Lanier. This is meant to explain Shakespeare's musical references, his knowledge of court, his hints of Hebrew and his references to Mediterranean locales. However:

“John's evidence is entirely circumstantial, or depends on quasi-allegorical readings of the texts,” says Kate McLuskie, director of the Shakespeare Institute at the University of Birmingham. “It is elegant and ingenious, but has no documentary foundation – a beautiful story that is not less beautiful for being entirely false.”

The article also contains a list of Shakespeare contenders (besides, you know...Shakespeare).

Louisa May, is there anything you can't do?

No. No there is not (besides still be alive). Not only is she cool enough to get a biopic, but now we learn that LM Alcott only wrote Little Women so her father could get a book published. That's some serious filial respect at work, friends.

Take the lesson: if you do nice things for your dads, you too will become the writers of American classics. This reminder counts as my nice thing. Happy early Father's Day, Dad!

A frolic through the author graveyard

Frolicking is very exciting, I know. And Steve Soper took a frolic through the graveyards of New England to check out the tombstones of some famous American authors.

A slightly morbid way to end the day? Maybe. But still pretty cool.

Carin' for Carlin

Although he's gone, George Carlin's memory lives on, in what he called a sorta-biography that was just published. NPR, being hip and with it, interviewed his co-author Tony Hendra, who talked about the book, answered some questions, but mostly sat through other people repeating George Carlin bits. And you know what? There is a reason most people are not comedians.

If you're so inclined, I've embedded the interview below, but it might be more fun to click here and read what Carlin wrote about his own conception. Some people got it, some people...call into radio shows and repeat what a famous comedian once said.

Ha cha cha.