Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 2hA draft is born! 104K words, 445 pages. My biggest book to date, and my favorite. I have never had so much fun writing a novel in all my life. Rough, of course, but into the drawer until my November residency in Scotland, when the real work begins. Today we celebrate. 3100
Reposted by Mark SarvasMark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 28/09/2026Returning to teaching in January and looking to refresh my Novel 2 syllabus. I structure the whole course around a single book. Here are the finalists, help me choose! 461
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 28/09/2026Returning to teaching in January and looking to refresh my Novel 2 syllabus. I structure the whole course around a single book. Here are the finalists, help me choose! 461
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 27/09/2026@amitava.bsky.social has the crowd eating out of his witty hands at the 2026 SALA Festival in Atherton. Great talk with Manil Suri and Vikram Chandra. 000
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 22/09/2026Two hours ago, I hadn't a clue in all the world that Ari Emanuel had written a memoir, and now, six chapters in, I cannot set it aside ... 000
Reposted by Mark SarvasCongressman Greg Casar @repcasar.bsky.social · 22/09/2026Good news: a federal judge just paused Wilber's deportation. The government shouldn’t be allowed to shoot you from an unmarked vehicle and then cover it up by deporting you. Keep speaking out, it's working. 8142931211
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 22/09/2026Happy paperback pub day to Marisa Silver! If you missed this one, I urge you to catch it now. Funny, wise, moving. A book for grown ups. 🥂👏🏻 000
Reposted by Mark SarvasFight For A Union @fightforaunion.bsky.social · 21/09/2026San Frans Opera demanded a 5-year wage freeze for its musicians while the General Director's salary jumped from $424k to $729k. 30 minutes before opening night, the orchestra packed up and walked out to join the picket line for the first strike in the opera’s 100 year history. 328260
Reposted by Mark SarvasRebecca Solnit @rebeccasolnit.bsky.social · 22/09/2026"The disappeared*" was a term for those the military dictatorship in Argentina imprisoned/tortured/murdered during the dirty war. *"detenidos-desaparecidos" (detained-disappeared) 20854479
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 21/09/2026Just barely more than a quarter way into the century, the New York Times is proclaiming the one hundred best shows of the century? Embarrassing, idiotic clickbait. I no longer recognize the Times. 130
Reposted by Mark SarvasBill Grueskin @bgrueskin.bsky.social · 21/09/2026I was deputy M.E. at the WSJ when Murdoch took over, with a similar “editorial independence board.” Within 4 months, our top editor was gone, replaced by a loyal Murdoch deputy. That board raised a quivering objection, but the deed was done. If the Ellisons own CNN, they’ll do whatever they want. 652609903
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 18/09/2026I just can't quite with the whole "Yeah, no" construction. It's weird, innit? 110
Reposted by Mark Sarvaselia ayoub @ayoub.bsky.social · 17/09/2026Friend shared this video of a man unveiling the library he hid when he fled Damascus in 2011. It’s incredible 25150193940
Reposted by Mark SarvasLynda Carter @lyndacarter.bsky.social · 17/09/2026Our music and our memories are being wiped out. AMERICA built this city. Not a president. Join us! 9036621458
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 17/09/2026You know how funny this is? This is "I don't give a rat's ass about sports OR podcasts and I am still laughing my ass off" funny ... 000
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 17/09/2026Berger & Berger, occasional series pairing John Berger quotes with my dog Berger. JB: The poverty of our century is unlike that of any other. It is not, as poverty was before, the result of natural scarcity, but of a set of priorities imposed upon the rest of the world by the rich. Berger: 030
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 17/09/2026Berger & Berger: “The precondition for thinking politically on a global scale is to see the unity of the unnecessary suffering taking place.” 010
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 17/09/2026A hot take I agree with. Jagger's hacky on-the-nose lyric embarrasses me every time I hear it ... 010
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 16/09/2026Ordered a major appliance without checking the hookups because I was sure I knew. Reader, I was wrong. 110
Reposted by Mark SarvasJohn Williams @johnwilliams.bsky.social · 16/09/2026Annie Dillard, John Updike, and Larry McMurtry at a public Q&A session in 1983. Dillard and Wendell Berry leaving us so close together is as good a reminder as any to get outside, which I’m going to do now. www.youtube.com/watch?v=1vX7...youtube.comJohn Updike, Annie Dillard, and Larry McMurtry at the University of Richmond, 1983YouTube video by UR Digital Engagement 13313
Reposted by Mark SarvasMatthew Gertz @mattgertz.bsky.social · 15/09/2026Sending a message to your current audience that you'd prefer to have a different audience results in losing the former without gaining the latter. www.thewrap.com/creative-con...thewrap.comRefurbished ‘60 Minutes’ Debuts to a 19% Ratings DropThe “60 Minutes” Season 59 premiere drew 7.7 million viewers, down 19% year over year. 822081344
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 15/09/2026Chacun à son goût and all, but The Diplomat was one of the most consistently stupid shows I can recall ever having sat through, and yet all this nomination love. Bewildering. 000
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 15/09/2026No SCOTUS scholar here, but is it at least possible that Kavanaugh's "concurrence" is really a wedge to leave the issue viable for 2028? Smarter folks than me will surely weigh in. 000
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 15/09/2026Literally the ONLY reason for a Harris candidacy ... 010
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 15/09/2026Lanterns episode 3 is a rather tedious infodump, innit? Hoping episode 4 picks back up. 000
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 14/09/2026Today's recommended read. (Like you need me to tell you to read O'Hagan on anything ... ) www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...lrb.co.ukAndrew O’Hagan · Omelettes and Whisky: Anita Brookner’s EdgeOver the course of 24 novels and 87 years, Anita Brookner achieved many dislocations of selfhood and may have become... 030
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 14/09/2026ICYMI, everyone enjoying dunking on Douthat tonight will have even more fun with this ... podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/p...podcasts.apple.comPundit Portrait: Ross DouthatPodcast Episode · If Books Could Kill · August 28 · Bonus · Subscribers Only · 1h 12m 010
Reposted by Mark SarvasAstra Taylor @astra.bsky.social · 12/09/2026Pause talk coming from the tech barons (which is not new, they've played this tune before) sounds to me like hedging for a shift in power after the midterms more than anything else. We should regulate them, but they should not be rehabilitated. 637276
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 11/09/2026I really can’t abide this “loss of innocence” narrative. Loss of naïveté, maybe. There is no innocence in America’s history. 001
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 10/09/2026Late to this. Enthralled. www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4a4...youtube.comJames Wood: Reflections on the Practice of Literary CriticismYouTube video by Einstein Forum 020
Reposted by Mark SarvasCarolina A. Miranda @cmonstah.bsky.social · 10/09/2026Just want to remind you all that my Bluesky Starter Pack features only the weirdest, most visually driven accounts. Need random quotes from Moby Dick and photos of hyenas every hours? I got you. go.bsky.app/CUczzszgo.bsky.appThe Strange and the CuriousJoin the conversation 1143
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 09/09/2026There are some days, like today, when it actually delights me not to understand a single fucking word of this post ... 000
Reposted by Mark SarvasDr. William Horne @wihorne.bsky.social · 09/09/2026The unwaged labor machine is certainly designed to kill us, but probably in some un-fun way like starving or resource depletion rather than with a “kill the humans” button. 12510
Reposted by Mark SarvasBill McKibben @billmckibben.bsky.social · 08/09/2026First on energy and now on West Bank settlements, the UK's Ed Miliband has emerged as that rarest of center-left Anglophone politicians: a guy who actually does stuff www.theguardian.com/world/2026/s...theguardian.comEd Miliband has overturned decades of Foreign Office inertia on illegal Israeli settlementsForeign secretary ends UK’s feigned helplessness with sanctions and condemnation of ‘ethnic cleansing’ 519944
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 08/09/2026It is a sign of how thoroughly out of step with the times I am that I found this trailer repellent, unwatchable. Anyone who is excited to watch this remains a true mystery to me. 001
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 05/09/2026Happy George Lazenby’s Birthday to those who observe. 000
Reposted by Mark SarvasLos Angeles Review of Books @lareviewofbooks.bsky.social · 04/09/2026"There’s a kind of magic to being a woman among women. As if, for just a second, you get a glimpse into what sisterhood can mean." Gina Tomaine interviews Meg Howrey about her new novel "Body Language": lareviewofbooks.org/article/meg-how… 062
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 03/09/2026Funny how everyone just kind of forgot about Mitch McConnell … (Not actually funny, though.) 030
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 02/09/2026Tonight in Pasadena! Come and join us! vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-0...vromansbookstore.comAndre Hardy, in conversation with Mark Sarvas, discusses & signs Tear the City DownWe've updated our website. Returning users, click here to reset your password when logging in. 000
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 02/09/2026Holy smokes. Could be the best description I have ever heard: "She once, brilliantly, described novel-writing as 'trying very hard to remember something which has not yet taken place'." www.theguardian.com/books/2026/s...theguardian.comAnita Brookner by Hermione Lee review – an enigmatic literary great given her dueThis exhaustive biography of the Booker winner brings her properly out of the shadows for the first time 0248
Mark Sarvas @marksarvas.bsky.social · 02/09/2026Moulton is a suck-ass centrist who has no business in the Senate; but no one should be celebrating returning another 80-year-old to office, most likely to finish up like McConnell or Feinstein. The gerontocracy will be the end of us ... 000