The 2024 Olympic Summer Games in Paris kicked off on July 26, with many of the best athletes in the world gathering to compete for their countries. Some of the world’s best photographers are there, too, capturing all the action. Here’s a look at some of the most dazzling images so far.
Montréal will welcome a new museum dedicated to Salvador Dalí in 2027, bringing the Spanish surrealist’s lesser-known works and archives to a historic building in Old Montréal.
The Musée des archives de Salvador Dalí (MASD) unveiled its plans on October 27, revealing a project that aims to explore the artist’s work beyond his best-known paintings. According to Radio-Canada, the museum will occupy the former Harbour Commissioners’ Building at 357 rue de la Commune, a landmark constructed in 1875 that is set to open to the public as a museum for the first time. The building previously housed the private members’ club 357c and has remained largely inaccessible to the general public for decades.
The institution will focus on the artist's graphic work, including drawings, prints, lithographs and silkscreens. The collection will also include authenticated artworks and archival documents, with an emphasis on researching and preserving the artist’s creative legacy.
The project was initiated by local cultural entrepreneur and historian Félix Bélanger, who began researching Dalí’s work in 2017. Theatre director Lorraine Pintal, formerly at the helm of the Théâtre du Nouveau Monde, has joined the project as its director.
The museum will also take an immersive approach to presenting the artist’s work. Plans include projections, lighting, music and occasional live performances, drawing on Québec’s traditions in theatre, dance and other performing arts. In an interview with CityNews, Bélanger described the intended experience as being similar to a theatrical production, with creative staging designed to complement the artworks.
Construction and preparations are underway, with the Musée des archives de Salvador Dalí expected to open in 2027. Ticket prices and an exact opening date have not yet been announced.
Dictionary.com is upping the ante. The online thesaurus announced Monday that it has landed on its word of the year: “maxxing.”
The company says the word was chosen to “capture a society that’s deeply online and focused on optimization in all forms.” According to data analyzed by Dictionary.com, usage, including searches for the term, increased by 1000 percent in 2026. Past winners have included the viral “6-7” trend, “demure,” and “hallucinate.”
“’Maxxing’ is unique for its versatility, popular as a standalone verb and a modifier,” Steve Johnson, Director of Lexicography for the Dictionary Media Group, said in a statement. “It reflects both the 2026 urge to push everything further and the need to make fun of ourselves when optimizing life starts to feel absurd.”
The term was first used in gaming circles with “min-maxing,” a strategy where tabletop and role-playing (RPG) gamers put all their focus on optimizing one of their character’s specific skills, like strength or speed, minimizing the necessity of other extra qualities like intellect or luck. It gained popularity — and its interpretive spelling — in incel and manosphere circles beginning in the 2010s, where young men often discuss best practices to “looksmaxx,” or make themselves more attractive and increase their number of sexual partners.
While “maxxing” is less of a word and more like a one-size-fits-all suffix for any behavior that doesn’t have chic enough branding, its usage online has developed from a one-off phrase to an ad nauseam staple. You can become an expert in moneymaxxing, fitnessmaxxing, foodmaxxing, sleepmaxxing, even maxxingmaxxing. (There are no rules! I can do what I want — dictionary.com said so.) It’s about improving everything — small and large — as much as possible.
Dictionary.com picks its words of the year to represent distinct moments in pop culture and social history. They choose based on a combination of articles, search history, and social media trends and are clear that they allow slang words that other dictionary and thesaurus companies might not consider legit enough for a printing. “As we define it, our mission as a dictionary is to document words as they are actually used,” the online dictionary says on its site.
Other words that just missed out on the top prize include “affordability,” “data center,” “unc,” and “odyssey.”
Sally Rooney’s books are seen in a bookstore as sales of her books will be halted in United Kingdom over her support for Palestine Action in London on October 16
Authors, actors, and musicians are standing with Sally Rooney after it was determined the author’s books could not be sold in the UK due to her support of Palestine Action, a direct action group. An open letter published in the New Statesman bearing signatures from Paul Mescal, Daisy Edgar-Jones, Kneecap, and more argues: “Sally Rooney is a writer, not a terrorist. Her books must be available to the public.”
Palestine Action is committed to “ending global complicity with Israel’s genocidal apartheid regime,” according to their website. (Humanitarian groups and a United Nations commission have said Israel’s actions in Gaza constitute a genocide. Israel and its allies, including the United States, have denied this.)
In 2025, UK officials designated the group as a terrorist organization. The ban was upheld despite an extensive legal battle, making public membership, support, or financial aid raised for the group a punishable crime with prison time up to 14 years. Under these conditions, Rooney cannot publish or sell her books in the UK, she said earlier this month.
The letter addressed to the UK government describes the removal of Rooney’s books from shelves as an “affront to basic principles of free speech and expression so long taken for granted in this country,” saying the move was made “on the basis of ill-conceived and draconian anti-terror legislation.”
Last year, Rooney published an op-ed in the Irish Times stating she would continue to donate proceeds from her books to Palestine Action. The author argued that designating the group as a terrorist organization put vandalism, public demonstrations, and base disruptions on the same level as al-Qaeda war crimes. She called it an attempt by the UK government to police political speech.
“We categorically reject censorship – whether direct or indirect – and urge the government to change course, amending the legislation which has led us to this point of repressive absurdity,” the open letter continues. Other signees include Zadie Smith, Tilda Swinton, Kate Nash, Jonathan Glazer, and more than 150 others.
Rooney’s publisher Faber determined it could “no longer supply my work within the UK,” Rooney said in recent a statement to the Guardian. She noted the decision was made with her full agreement. “I have made every effort to be honest with the public about my beliefs and intentions,” she said. “And I am wholly prepared to accept the consequences.”
Québec publisher Éditions du Boréal says it cannot independently establish the origins of Thélyson Orélien’s manuscript for C’était ça ou mourir, leaving allegations that artificial intelligence was used to write the acclaimed novel unresolved.
In a statement shared today, the publisher said it had been unable to trace the manuscript’s history before September 12, 2025, when its team received the text. The novel remains available in bookstores and sales have kept climbing, despite the controversy surrounding its authorship.
“We would have liked to be able to provide definitive answers to the allegations against him,” the publisher said, according to a report by Agence QMI. It added that it had no evidence allowing it to reconstruct the manuscript’s earlier history.
The announcement follows a statement from Orélien on Tuesday, in which the Canadian-Haitian author denied using AI to generate any part of the novel while acknowledging plagiarism in two earlier works. “Not a single sentence of this book was created by a machine,” Orélien wrote in a statement. He said he began writing the novel in Québec in 2017 and completed a first draft of more than 300 pages in 2019.
Orélien also apologized for passages plagiarized in a 2012 short story and a 2013 opinion piece. He described the incidents as unacceptable mistakes made when he was younger.
The allegations against the novel first surfaced in September, when an account on X claimed that AI-detection software had identified extensive AI-generated text. The accusations prompted renewed scrutiny of the book and its place in France’s literary awards season. The novel was removed from the Prix Goncourt selection, while Boréal suspended promotional activities surrounding the book. It remains in contention for the Prix Renaudot, one of France's most prestigious prizes.
Pope Leo XIV greets faithful as he holds the Sunday Angelus prayer from his studio overlooking St. Peter’s Square on October 11, 2026 in Vatican City, Vatican.
Pope Leo XIV has been diagnosed with lung cancer, the Vatican said in a statement. The announcement was made following a surgery on Tuesday to remove the lower lobe of his right lung.
An examination confirmed a diagnosis of lung adenocarcinoma, which the statement said was “suspected by the pre-operative tests.” The pope was in the operating room for three hours and the surgery itself lasted about 90 minutes. “The operation was successful and there were no complications,” the statement said.
According to the Lung Cancer Foundation of America, lung adenocarcinoma is the most common type of lung cancer in the United States and makes up about 40 percent of all lung cancer cases.
The Vatican has not disclosed what stage the cancer was in or whether the pope will undergo further treatment.
On Sunday, the pope announced that he would be undergoing surgery. The pontiff made the announcement while addressing those gathered in St. Peter’s Square for the Angelus prayer, as subsequently on social media.
“Dear friends, during some recent medical examinations, the doctors found a small, localized nodule in my lung,” Pope Leo XIV wrote. “It was detected at a very early stage and is well-localized. The doctors believe that it is best to intervene, so, following their advice, I have decided to undergo surgery to remove it. The operation is already scheduled to take place in the coming days.”
He added, “I thank you for your spiritual closeness and entrust myself to your prayers.” At the time, it wasn’t revealed whether or not the nodule was cancerous.
The Vatican said in a previous statement that Pope Leo XIV will spend an additional week spent recovering in the hospital, likely Rome’s Gemelli Hospital, which has a special apartment for the pope. The Vatican will function as usual during that time, but decisions needing the pope’s input or signature will be put on hold.
The pope is scheduled to embark on a trip to South America on Nov. 6, visiting Uruguay, Argentina, and Peru over the course of 11 days; it’s unclear whether the pope’s surgery and recovery will postpone that trip.
This article was updated on Oct. 13 at 10:26 p.m. ET to include news of Pope Leo XIV’s diagnoses.
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