One of the novel’s most original stylists, Alain Robbe-Grillet, has died. (Robbe-Grillet was also, as one can see in this 2003 Bookforum interview, one of literature’s most interesting thinkers.) More from the literary counter-culture: a LOOK magazine photo-spread of cartoonist Charles Addams (of New Yorker and Addams Family fame) posted by in crowd. Rachel Donadio writes for the Sunday New York Times Book Review on recently much talked about Paris Review forefather Doc Humes. Trouble at a more modern lit mag: Oxford American operations manager charged with embezzling $30,000. (And on her blog Kelly Spitzer reminds some people that many lit mags have never even seen that kind of cash.) Donadio also takes the NYTimes outlook to international literary magazines with great acclaim of Bidoun, a Middle Eastern focused publication. The English language Icelandic Review has launched an online book review section. Also overseas, a both stylish and newish English literary magazine based in Hungary, Pilvax. Over at Three Percent, they reflect on the recently released PEN/Ramon Llull “To Be Translated or Not To Be” report on the state of literary translation worldwide (along with additional commentary by Words Without Borders) [links obtained via LitKicks]. The Rattapallax blog writes on the poetry and power of French hip-hop sensation MC Solaar. While The Millions blog may have no worries about the state of the short story, Zadie Smith certainly does, and Larry Dark disagrees with Smith’s Willesden Prize decision. Kenyon Review lists the most literary YouTubes around. On the topic of voyeurism–aren’t The Believer interviews just more interesting than, well, any others? Here’s one from the newest issue with Maximum City author Suketu Mehta, along with two bonus blasts from the past: Chip Kidd interviewing design superstar Milton Glaser (also of Push Pin Graphic magazine fame) and Zadie Smith interviewing her literary hero, Ian McEwan. Finally, trying to keep pace with the primaries, Boldtype releases their political issue of book reviews, and Darryl Pinckney writes for the New York Review of Books possibly one of the best pieces yet on Obama.