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Max Liu

@maxjliu.bsky.social
414 followers 469 following 488 posts

Freelance writer

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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 55m
When i lived here six years ago this was a Planet Organic. Packet ramen eating has triumphed over wellness
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Sam Sacks @ssacks.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
For National Poetry Day "Jamesian" By Thom Gunn (From 'The Man with Night Sweats,' which has just been reissued by FSG.)
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
It's National Poetry Day and I still like this poem v much - by an actual living poet
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London Review of Books @lrb.co.uk · 01/10/2026
The poet, translator and physician Dr. Fady Joudah will give this year’s Edward W. Said London Lecture, titled ‘Notes on Solidarity’, on 15 October at the Royal Geographical Society. Tickets here: mosaicrooms.org/edward-w-sai...
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RRRMMM @strongmisgiving.bsky.social · 01/10/2026
For National Poetry Day, Frank O'Hara
Poem [“Lana Turner has collapsed!”]

By Frank O’Hara
Lana Turner has collapsed!
I was trotting along and suddenly
it started raining and snowing
and you said it was hailing
but hailing hits you on the head
hard so it was really snowing and
raining and I was in such a hurry
to meet you but the traffic
was acting exactly like the sky
and suddenly I see a headline
lana turner has collapsed!
there is no snow in Hollywood
there is no rain in California
I have been to lots of parties
and acted perfectly disgraceful
but I never actually collapsed
oh Lana Turner we love you get up
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Helen Barrett @helenbarrett.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
‘The Sixties never happened in Blackburn.’ www.ft.com/content/4277...
ft.com
Deep into the Sixties: Britain 1965-66 — David Kynaston’s latest vivid history
The historian richly evokes the texture of a decade that was often dubbed ‘swinging’ — but was, for many, a time of unsettling change and death of tradition
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
Anyone else read this? I really struggled and would like to think I'm missing something. His films are eternal, his prose dead on the page. Some things are better left in the archives
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Two mins before filing piece I've fiddled with for two days: "Now I see how I could make this much better."
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Brian Goldstone @brian-goldstone.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
This story brought me back to Kara, one of the mothers in my book, There Is No Place for Us. She was homeless with her four kids while driving for DoorDash. They had to pee in bottles so bathroom stops wouldn't make her late. After gas, she earned $6.50 an hour—75 cents less than the minimum wage.
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Reckon I've seen more Man City shirts today than on any day during their decade-and-a-half of stolen success
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 26/09/2026
Good Emily Witt critique of an artist whose work I've found original, perceptive and underwhelming at various points over the the last 20 years www.newyorker.com/culture/crit...
newyorker.com
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Clare Bogen @clarebot.bsky.social · 25/09/2026
www.ft.com/content/fad8...
ft.com
Fitzcarraldo – inside the chicest publisher on earth
Jacques Testard is transforming our reading habits, one blue book at a time
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Season 4 complete. Iowa Writers' Workshop triggering
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Samantha Asumadu @samanthaasumadu.substack.com · 22/09/2026
'New analysis on UK media: British media is not delivering the news to its readers. They are delivering an agenda. The seven days after Channel 4 filmed James Orr are a damning indictment of the British press. Orr is a Cambridge associate professor.' via @newscord.org
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 22/09/2026
I thought this v good. I've struggled with some politically astute/stylistically null books recently but that doesn't apply here - AJ can write. Using Ernaux, Houellebecq, more to look at the mess we're in today. I found it revelatory and inspiring
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Damn. Left my laptop with all my work on it in the library while I went out for lunch and nobody stole it
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 16/09/2026
Am reading The Netanyahus again as prep for this and, while not my favourite Cohen due to the letters and lectures, I just know with the truth of fiction that the depiction of the eponymous family is spot on
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
One of the reasons popstars today are sell outs is that so many of them went to private school
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Graeme Thomson @graemethomson.bsky.social · 15/09/2026
The sad fact is, as Ed Sheeran well knows, that this Macklemore business will not materially impact upon his career one jot. Of all the musicians I've met, I found Sheeran perhaps the most numbers conscious (those album titles are very intentional). He will have done his calculations.
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Lydia Kiesling @lydiakiesling.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Unbelievably pathetic capitulation to truly terrible people www.theguardian.com/music/2026/s...
theguardian.com
Macklemore dropped from Ed Sheeran’s US tour after ‘free Palestine’ speech
The American rapper will no longer support Sheeran’s US leg of Loop tour after comments at MetLife Stadium show
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 14/09/2026
Well now, this I am looking forward to
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 12/09/2026
"Rosalía’s audience: in general I take no comfort from these people." I felt exactly the same when I saw her perform in London. www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...
lrb.co.uk
Anne Carson · On Rosalía
We require heroism of our entertainers. We want them sacrificing themselves to a certain ultimate degree of input. No...
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 09/09/2026
Went to see Kurt Vile. Awesome cosmic autorock. Everyone still loves guitars. Hooray
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
This is two weeks from today (22/9). Munir Hachemi is an entertaining speaker (I've talked to him before so this is episode 2) on writing, writing about writing, translation and he's funny. Both of his novels from @fitzcarraldoeds.bsky.social are excellent in different ways. Come down
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Helen Barrett @helenbarrett.bsky.social · 06/09/2026
So engrossed in this I've missed by tube destination by three stops.
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 07/09/2026
I'm rewatching Girls and, midway season 3, I will say it has aged well. Could be wrong but I think the world it chronicles came and went v quickly. Episodes released 2012-14 feel more like stuff I was reading and reading about 2008-2010, perhaps because TV plays catch up with lit
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
Reviewed Sebastian Barry's novel The Newer World for this week's @ftweekend.com. It's as accomplished as you'd expect, if a little lyrical for my tastes. The big question is whether he should be writing this story in the first place and I don't really have the answer www.ft.com/content/a442...
ft.com
The Newer World — Sebastian Barry’s novel of the Black American slave experience
Set in the mid-1800s, the Irish author’s narrative blazes with an authenticity and poignancy that mitigates any risk of ‘cultural appropriation’
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 05/09/2026
Reviewed Sebastian Barry's novel The Newer World for this week's @ftweekend.com. It's as accomplished as you'd expect, if a little lyrical for my tastes. The big question is whether he should be writing this story in the first place and I don't really have the answer www.ft.com/content/a442...
ft.com
The Newer World — Sebastian Barry’s novel of the Black American slave experience
Set in the mid-1800s, the Irish author’s narrative blazes with an authenticity and poignancy that mitigates any risk of ‘cultural appropriation’
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Anne-Marie Creamer @amcreamer.bsky.social · 03/09/2026
Excellent reporting from Channel4 news & Verbatim Media- more corruption from Farage & Reform caught on camera. Great to see James Orr & co, & dubious pollsters screwed. Bring in the police Reforms ‘popularity’ maybe based on more fictitious polling than we realised. 👇 youtu.be/aXut3s90rUI?...
youtu.be
Going undercover to expose Reform's secret donations plot
YouTube video by Channel 4 News
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 01/09/2026
Are there left-handed hairdressers?
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
"Hallway" by Roy DeCarava from the Dulwich Picture Gallery American photography show. Mostly the usual names - Winogrand, Leiter, a whole room from Bruce Davidson's Subway - but this strange, painterly picture is among the highlights
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 29/08/2026
I wrote about the worst way to dine www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
The hill I will die on: The barbecue is fundamentally unenjoyable. Please, put a lid on it | Max Liu
Dress up the barbie however you like – it’s toxic, tiresome and, more to the point, malnourishing, says freelance writer Max Liu
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George Monbiot @georgemonbiot.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
I know this isn't terrorism. You know this isn't terrorism. The authorities know this isn't terrorism. But, once again, they have labelled protesters "terrorists", as part of the long-running programme to ensure that no one dares protest about anything any more. www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...
theguardian.com
Seven charged with damaging Trump’s Scottish golf course accused of ‘terrorist connection’
Course at Donald Trump’s Turnberry resort was painted with words ‘Gaza is not 4 sale’ and clubhouse was sprayed with graffiti
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
The new Lambchop album Punching The Clown is a beauty. I'm taking detours on walks so I can keep listening on my headphones and playing the record every night. There's a choir and Justin Vernon plays banjo on every song but more than anything it's Kurt Wagner at his strange and sublime best
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 26/08/2026
To the tune of Helpless by Neil Young today's writing/typing soundtrack is: "Joyless joyless joyless"
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Marie Le Conte @youngvulgarian.marieleconte.com · 26/08/2026
honestly I think literally all gigs should do this, sincerely don't understand what people believe they're achieving by not meaningfully watching a gig and instead filming a video they will obviously never watch again, hateful behaviour, get rid
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
Good wide-ranging interview with Samanta Schweblin whose Good and Evil and Other Stories has really stayed with me since I read it a year ago. Nice to be reminded too that there are still things to like about Argentina english.elpais.com/culture/2026...
english.elpais.com
Samanta Schweblin, writer: ‘Paying attention is the greatest superpower. Not everyone is still capable of it’
From ‘Mouthful of Birds’ to ‘Good and Evil and Other Stories,’ the Argentine writer has built one of the most distinctive and unsettling bodies of work in Spanish-language literature. In an interview ...
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 25/08/2026
Heard an American in Naples order a drink by saying: "We're going to do..." Camorra should've been alerted
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The Onion @theonion.com · 24/08/2026
Guy Who Sucks At Being A Person Sees Huge Potential In AI theonion.com/guy-who-sucks-at-being…
Guy Who Sucks At Being A Person Sees Huge Potential In AI
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
I'm looking forward to asking Spanish writer Munir Hachemi about his new novel The Mulai and much more at Libreria on 22 September. It's FREE and you can reserve tickets here libreria.io/munir-hachem...
libreria.io
Munir Hachemi: Inventing Another World | Libreria
Spanish writer Munir Hachemi talks with Max Liu about his new novel, The Mulai, in which an archaeologist travels to a distant planet to study the descendants
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
Man Utd and Tottenham fans... "It's happening again..."
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 22/08/2026
Kermode (M) says Camp Miasma is a big step up from I Saw The TV Glow for Jane Schoenbrun. How is that possible?! I have to find out by going to the cinema...
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
There are probably enough FT Lunches with the far right to make a book now
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 21/08/2026
With its wish washy production there doesn't seem to be a good time to listen to the new Phoebe Bridgers record. Its alternately muffled and raspy so no good at night and I've found it oddly unengaging so far. Am trying an early listen, when I'm most receptive, to see if I can click with it
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 19/08/2026
Becca Rothfeld being marvellously cutting about a writer to whose work my own reaction has always been indifference www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
Rachel Cusk’s Protest Against Personhood
Short reviews of recent releases.
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
I'm looking forward to asking Spanish writer Munir Hachemi about his new novel The Mulai and much more at Libreria on 22 September. It's FREE and you can reserve tickets here libreria.io/munir-hachem...
libreria.io
Munir Hachemi: Inventing Another World | Libreria
Spanish writer Munir Hachemi talks with Max Liu about his new novel, The Mulai, in which an archaeologist travels to a distant planet to study the descendants
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 18/08/2026
Enjoyed Alfie Whiteman: A Loan exhib at OOF Gallery. Witty photo diary of ex-Spurs GK AW's loan at Swedish club. Do footballers get bored, introspective, read Thoreau? Apparently yes! Small show, prob better as book. AW retired from football last year age 25 & is now full-time photographer. Cool
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 15/08/2026
I was lucky enough to read, wrestle with, re-read and review Triage by Claudia Rankine - a writer whose work is never less than essential and exhilarating - for this week's @ftweekend.com www.ft.com/content/f566...
ft.com
Claudia Rankine’s Triage explores a harder America under Trump 2.0
A hybrid work of poetry, fiction and memoir challenges both its writer and readers to consider what kind of world they want to live in
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Max Liu @maxjliu.bsky.social · 13/08/2026
Escaped the hell to see Tony in an air-conditioned cinema. Jolly glad I did too. They got it just right. We seem to have worked out how to do biopic. Wish something had saved me from writing when I was 20
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