-
2 weeks ago | 
newyorker.com | Elif Batuman
One Sunday morning in May, 2023, I arrived at a literary agent’s Manhattan apartment, bearing a lemon tart, to attend a brunch in honor of the author Sayaka Murata. I rang the doorbell. There was a long pause before anyone answered, and a longer pause before I was buzzed in. When I reached the top of the stairs, the agent, Nicole Aragi, with whom I was previously unacquainted, came to the door wearing orange plush tiger slippers. “Elif, the brunch was yesterday,” she said.
-
2 weeks ago | 
flipboard.com | Elif Batuman
4 hours ago“I don’t have time,” I told myself, “to kill myself: I have to write a paper on Rimbaud.” Which even at the time I thought funny. Those were the days I could hardly tell the difference between hospital and classroom and walking the dog at 1 A.M. seemed the only way to preserve an illusion of balance. Which …
-
1 month ago | 
thisislocallondon.co.uk | Elif Batuman
After promising its reinstation in his inaugural address, US President Donald Trump has reinstated the centuries-old Alien Enemies Act of 1798. This act allowed him to legalise the deportation of 137 Venezuelans suspected of terrorism without evidence or trial. What is the Act? In 1798, under the threat of war with France, the US Congress wrote several laws that increased the federal government’s power in order to warn against those who sympathised with the French.
-
Oct 27, 2024 | 
open.substack.com | Celine Nguyen |Céline Nguyen |Elif Batuman
The most fulfilled people I know tend to have two traits. They’re insatiably curious—about new ideas, experiences, information and people. And they seem to exist in a state of perpetual, self-inflicted unhappiness. These people tend to have a project they’re working on. An essay. A poem. They’re reading Wittgenstein for the first time. Or rereading Proust. They’re rehearsing for a dance performance. Learning about carbon capture technologies. Making a track in Ableton. Knitting a jumper.
-
Oct 21, 2024 | 
eliflife.substack.com | Elif Batuman |Joyce White Vance |George Saunders
This started as a post about keeping a writing notebook, but at some point it ended up being about the concept of “butthurt,” which my instinct says to spell “butt-hurt,” but the OED says it’s one word. The post originally started like this:As I have mentioned elsewhere, one of my favorite parts of teaching is getting to go back to various aspects of writing pedagogy that made me demoralized when I was a student, and trying to find ways to make them re-moralizing for myself and others.
-
Oct 1, 2024 | 
beccafreeman.substack.com | Miranda July |Coco Mellors |Becca Freeman |Elif Batuman
Hi book pals,September was an unintentionally “literary cool girl” month of reading—someone get me a soapy teen boarding school drama as a palette cleanser, stat, because I am not that reader—but it was also a great month of reading. I didn’t DNF anything, there wasn’t a 3* book in sight (though there was one that’s either 5* or 1* and I’m still unsure which). Let’s get into it:Beautiful World, Where Are You? by Sally RooneyWho is this for?
-
Sep 27, 2024 | 
washingtonpost.com | Ronald Kuby |Ruth Marcus |Matt Bai |Elif Batuman
Democracy Dies in DarknessRonald L. Kuby, Ruth Marcus, Matt Bai and Elif Batuman contemplate the corruption charges against the New York City mayor. September 27, 2024 at 4:36 p.m. EDTIn New York City, a “bombshell” indictment is announced almost every week, and we have a “trial of the century” once a year. We have grown accustomed to, and even expect, corruption and depravity on a grand scale to be charged by federal prosecutors.
-
Sep 9, 2024 | 
barnesandnoble.com | Isabelle McConville |Elif Batuman |Caroline O'Donoghue |Donna Tartt
Whether you’re headed back to school this fall or the backpack-clad commercials are making you nostalgic, September is the perfect time to sink into a campus novel. Whether you look back fondly on library all-nighters or you know you’d never go back, we’ve rounded up a list of 10 books that capture the messiness of love and friendship and the uncertainty of life in your early twenties. Please enable javascript to add items to the cart. Please enable javascript to add items to the cart.
-
Aug 27, 2024 | 
adobomagazine.com | Elif Batuman
MANILA, PHILIPPINES - Have you ever encountered a book where almost "nothing" happens? These books might seem nearly plotless, with little to no action, pivotal events, or external struggles. Yet, somehow, they manage to be completely engrossing, drawing you in page after page, word after word. The Booktok community has coined a term for these kinds of books - "No plot, just vibes" - books with light or soft plots that rely on the characters to drive the story forward.
-
May 29, 2024 | 
electricliterature.com | Preety Sidhu |Elif Batuman
“When you mix your voice with others, you are captured as though with a fish hook,” Franz Kafka, who died on this day in 1924, wrote in “Children on the Country Road.” His lebensproblem (or problem of existence) was insoluble: he wanted to live (in order to write) but he didn’t want to exist, or be trapped by the conventions of what we call “life.” More brightly, it is a pleasure to watch Elif Batuman, an author known for bending the boundaries between subject and author, pick up Kafka’s...
