Authors beyond the page

We know our favorite writers because of the words they put down on page, but they of course have lives beyond that.

Sometimes, those lives are about as prosaic as can be — though perhaps not palatable.

That's the conclusion of the Guardian's Rachel Cooke, who reviewed Sylvia Plath’s Tomato Soup Cake: A Compendium of Classic Authors’ Favourite Recipes, which comes out November 5.

Cooke (ha!) mostly focuses on the not-so-appetizing entries, though she does point out a few of the tempting recipes.

Other times, though, our literary idols show off their creativity in other mediums.

That's true for Kurt Vonnegut, whose first novel's lackluster reception prompted him to try his hand at board game design.

GHQ didn't take off at the time, but thanks to game designer and NYU faculty member Geoff Engelstein, it has a second chance to do so.

Read about GHQ and how it came to be (both in 1956 and 2024) in Polygon.