Hell Yeah! Worthy: SATs, Poetry, and Literary Rappers

curated by the Atticus Books staff

Hell Yeah! Worthy is a weekly Friday feature where our staff distills the plethora of scat on the Internet into a succinct list of the best you haven’t seen, the best you ignored, and the best you should visit again.

 

Alice Walker: The Time for Poetry Is Now

“I turned to writing poetry for a room of my own. Solitude: a place I could express my thoughts and ideas that were not prevalent in my family. There was a quiet reserve in poetry.”

Pulitzer-winner Alice Walker discusses her life as a poet, an activist, and the importance of bringing all voices into the conversation. She’ll read at the Split This Rock Festival in Washington, DC this Saturday. (Lacey)

Faster tests
Photo credit: Eric Lefevre-Ardant via Flickr

What Happens When a 35-Year Old Man Retakes the SAT?
An incredibly hysterical article that reminds you of all the reasons you hated and feared the SATs so much.

“It’s as if the entire test had been conceived of and written by the SS. Would it kill them to have a bit of levity in the copy? Perhaps a bit of gentle reassurance? ‘Look, we know this is stressful for you. Just hang with us and you’ll get to go to Dairy Queen afterwards.’ I think something like that would be really helpful to the more testing-averse kids out there.”

What if the Atticus team had to retake the SATs? As people who read, write and edit for a living, I’d like to think we’d all get at least an above-average score on verbal. When it comes to math, my hopes are not so high. (Libby)

 

That Sh*T Cray (B*tches in Bookshops)
It’s my turn to add a video clip that’s both literary and hip. I’m positive that introducing folks to “B*tches in Bookshops” (based on Jay Z and Kanye West’s “N*ggas in Paris”) video doesn’t make me literary or hip, but I do find it rather entertaining. As far as the repetitious line, “That shit cray,” I find it rather James Joyce-esque in a Kerouac-ian, James Baldwin-ish sort of way. Psych! “Burroughs, Golding, Shakespeare – all dead.” (Dan)