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Katy Waldman

@xwaldie.bsky.social
2.6K followers 554 following 41 posts
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 01/09/2026
“The Disappearers,” the latest novel by Marlon James, is evocative, vibrant, and raggedly lyrical. “James’s dialogue fountains down the page, as if a tap has been opened. Life pours from him,” Katy Waldman writes. newyorkermag.visitlink.me/ulCteI
newyorkermag.visitlink.me
“The Disappearers” Stages the Pain and Pleasure of Jamaican Gay Life
Marlon James’s new novel follows a group of gay men who seek love, connection, and restitution after a bloody homophobic attack.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 31/08/2026
Marlon James’s new novel follows a group of gay men who seek love, connection, and restitution after a bloody homophobic attack. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
“The Disappearers” Stages the Pain and Pleasure of Jamaican Gay Life
Marlon James’s new novel follows a group of gay men who seek love, connection, and restitution after a bloody homophobic attack.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 31/08/2026
Kinda liked it. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
“The Disappearers” Stages the Pain and Pleasure of Jamaican Gay Life
Marlon James’s new novel follows a group of gay men who seek love, connection, and restitution after a bloody homophobic attack.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 04/08/2026
I wrote about BookTok's embrace of Jacqueline Harpman www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
An Uncompromising Belgian Novelist’s Afterlife as a BookTok Star
Jacqueline Harpman wrote her best-known works in the nineteen-nineties, but her fiction’s elegiac loneliness seems to anticipate our own solitary, screen-bound era.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 24/07/2026
Kent Nishimura’s photographs capture the backstage labor that allows the Trump show to go on. www.newyorker.com/culture/phot...
newyorker.com
The White House Press Corps in the Second Trump Era
Kent Nishimura’s photographs capture the backstage labor that allows the Trump show to go on.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 13/07/2026
New books, articles, and shows lament a crisis of connection among American men. But the picture of friendship that emerges can feel romanticized and brittle. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
The Lost Art of the Bromance
New books, articles, and shows lament a crisis of connection among American men. But the picture of friendship that emerges can feel romanticized and brittle.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 16/06/2026
Maggie O’Farrell’s “Land” delights in the interplay between historical fact and fictional world-building. “Her characters may die of plague or starve in famines, but she appears to be enjoying herself,” Katy Waldman writes. newyorkermag.visitlink.me/XBOKZW
newyorkermag.visitlink.me
Maggie O’Farrell and the Art of Inventing the Past
Why read historical fiction? A new novel by the author of “Hamnet” offers one answer: because it’s fun.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 10/06/2026
My addition to the Granta/A.I. discourse! (comes with this cool animated illo) www.newyorker.com/books/page-t...
newyorker.com
Did a Chatbot Write a Prize-Winning Story? Does It Matter?
A Commonwealth Prize-winning short story appears to have been generated with A.I. The response exposes larger fears about honesty, motivation, and expectation in literary writing.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 10/06/2026
A Commonwealth Prize-winning short story appears to have been generated with A.I. The response exposes larger fears about honesty, motivation, and expectation in literary writing. www.newyorker.com/books/page-t...
newyorker.com
Did a Chatbot Write a Prize-Winning Story? Does It Matter?
A Commonwealth Prize-winning short story appears to have been generated with A.I. The response exposes larger fears about honesty, motivation, and expectation in literary writing.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 01/06/2026
Why read historical fiction? A new novel by the author of “Hamnet” offers one answer: because it’s fun. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
Maggie O’Farrell and the Art of Inventing the Past
Why read historical fiction? A new novel by the author of “Hamnet” offers one answer: because it’s fun.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 16/03/2026
A new book wages a playful war on the strictures of traditional talk therapy. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
Can Psychoanalysis Help You Get the Life You Want?
In a new book, Adam Phillips wages a playful war on the strictures of traditional talk therapy.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 16/03/2026
Wrote about therapy and desire www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
Can Psychoanalysis Help You Get the Life You Want?
In a new book, Adam Phillips wages a playful war on the strictures of traditional talk therapy.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
Jonathan L. Fischer @jonfischer.bsky.social · 14/03/2026
I start at the Atlantic next week, But I got an early start: www.theatlantic.com/culture/2026...
theatlantic.com
The Wrecking of the Kennedy Center
America’s Trumpiest arts administrator leaves the institution renamed, nearly closed, and wildly unpopular.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 08/02/2026
Yup! I think, psychoanalyzing my own hatred of AI, that a lot of it stems from an intuition that what people want out of AI (affirmation, therapy, instant gratification) is what they increasingly want (or are being trained to want) out of art and culture bsky.app/profile/alis...
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 05/02/2026
look at this Maleficent bombshell queen x.com/ABC/status/2...
x.com
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 02/02/2026
I found this book to be genuinely restorative! www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
The Perennial Predicament of the Artist with an Office Job
In “The Copywriter,” by Daniel Poppick, a poet searches for meaning in the grindset.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 16/01/2026
Two new books consider fawning—a trauma response involving ingratiating, people-pleasing behavior—and how we can unlearn it. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
How to Recover from Caring Too Much
If you laugh at unfunny jokes, raise your hand too quickly, or can’t decide on your favorite color, you may be exhibiting a fawn response.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
tnyfrontrow.bsky.social @tnyfrontrow.bsky.social · 17/01/2026
Greatly enjoyed my colleague @xwaldie.bsky.social's anti-anti-fawning piece; turns out fawning has a great artistic tradition, on stage and screen (as here: two pieces, and a better translation of the full, hair-raising Nietzsche passage: www.newyorker.com/culture/rich...
newyorker.com
Martial Art
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 15/01/2026
Contemporary escapism: scroll past "Trump threatens to invoke Insurrection Act after people in Minneapolis protest ICE shooting a woman in the face," "Trump is risking global catastrophe by kidnapping the leader of Venezuela and menacing NATO," click on "people are mad about autistic Barbie"
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 12/01/2026
So I thought these authors really had a point
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 05/01/2026
Reposts equal I want to die bsky.app/profile/jody...
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
Jody Rosen @jodyrosen.bsky.social · 05/01/2026
Algorithmic America
ft.com
Influencers and OnlyFans models dominate US ‘extraordinary’ artist visas
Work permits increasingly being awarded on basis of online reach, favouring content creators
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 20/12/2025
Reupping my 2025 Trump Kennedy Center Honors bingo card for no particular reason
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 19/12/2025
omg what an honor! um i'd like to thank the academy, james frey, my parents for ruining my personality (just kidding mom and dad it's not your fault!) lithub.com/the-most-sca...
lithub.com
The Most Scathing Book Reviews of 2025
Pans, glorious pans. No end-of-year roundup would be complete without them. Among the books being driven into the woods by pitchfork-wielding villagers this year: Louis C.K.’s masturbatory debut no…
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 18/12/2025
Not Zoltan Maga at the white nationalist soiree!
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 15/12/2025
A “take” on (or ode to) Mary McCarthy in last week’s mag www.newyorker.com/magazine/tak...
newyorker.com
Katy Waldman on Mary McCarthy’s “One Touch of Nature”
A reader trusts the author’s voice instinctively, charmed by its opaline assessments and zinging aperçus. Still, one can quibble.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 12/12/2025
This was my Trump Kennedy Center Honors bingo card (12/6)
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 11/12/2025
Donld Trump’s takeover of the Kennedy Center has led to a year of embarrassment and chaos for the once venerable art institution. www.newyorker.com/culture/the-...
newyorker.com
How the Kennedy Center Has Been Transformed by Trumpism
The President was drawn to the institution for its cultural prestige. He and his allies made it radioactive.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 11/12/2025
Wrote about Trump’s Kennedy Center Honors www.newyorker.com/culture/the-...
newyorker.com
How the Kennedy Center Has Been Transformed by Trumpism
The President was drawn to the institution for its cultural prestige. He and his allies made it radioactive.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 10/12/2025
The 48th Kennedy Center Honors was “a tacky, supersized love letter to the center’s self-installed chairman, President Donald Trump,” @xwaldie.bsky.social writes. www.newyorker.com/culture/the-...
newyorker.com
How the Kennedy Center Has Been Transformed by Trumpism
The President was drawn to the institution for its cultural prestige. He and his allies made it radioactive.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 18/11/2025
Happy Solvej Balle day! (Every day the eighteenth) m.youtube.com/watch?v=kRAW...
m.youtube.com
Happy Valentines Day - OutKast (HD)
YouTube video by Mark Cee
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 10/11/2025
Most stories in the time-loop genre build to a moment of escape. “On the Calculation of Volume” imagines a woman making a life inside an infinitely repeating November 18th. www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/11/…
newyorker.com
Solvej Balle’s Novels Rewire the Time Loop
Most stories in the genre build to a moment of escape. “On the Calculation of Volume” imagines a woman making a life inside an infinitely repeating November 18th.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 01/11/2025
Is something going on with lettuce in NY being rotten?
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 26/10/2025
“According to the spokespeople of grind culture, the choice is clear: your individuality can make money for you or it can make money for somebody else,” Katy Waldman writes.
newyorker.com
How Corporate Feminism Went from “Love Me” to “Buy Me”
A decade ago, Sheryl Sandberg’s “Lean In” aimed to tear down the obstacles that kept women from reaching the top. Now her successors want to tear down everything.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 22/10/2025
Today’s self-help books for working women abandon the pretense that they have anything to do with feminism, or even work. Instead, everything is content. www.newyorker.com/magazine/2025/10/…
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 20/10/2025
Wrote about the state of corporate feminist self-help! www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
How Corporate Feminism Went from “Love Me” to “Buy Me”
A decade ago, Sheryl Sandberg’s “Lean In” aimed to tear down the obstacles that kept women from reaching the top. Now her successors want to tear down everything.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 09/10/2025
You know what bsky.app/profile/blip...
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 24/09/2025
For the fall books issue of @newyorker.com, I reviewed Ian McEwan's excellent new novel, which features city-drowning floods, "the famous group Radiohead," and a metric ton of adultery. www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
Ian McEwan Casts the Climate Crisis as a Story of Adultery
His new novel, “What We Can Know,” imagines the historians of the twenty-second century, who long for the world that they’ve missed out on.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 24/09/2025
“What We Can Know,” Ian McEwan’s 18th novel, takes place in the 22nd century, after a nuclear disaster. “Much of the novel’s charm lies in its re-creation of our era as seen from the future,” Katy Waldman writes.
newyorker.com
Ian McEwan Casts the Climate Crisis as a Story of Adultery
His new novel, “What We Can Know,” imagines the historians of the twenty-second century, who long for the world that they’ve missed out on.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
Matt Shipman (he/him) @shiplives.bsky.social · 24/09/2025
Seeing ice cream cones during their spawning runs really takes your breath away. They’ll only do this once in their entire lives.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 01/09/2025
Monday version of me here to re-up this post for all of your Monday selves!
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 25/08/2025
I reviewed Helen Oyeyemi’s new new novel, in which a character divides herself by seven — one identity for each day of the week (Should we all try this?) www.newyorker.com/magazine/202...
newyorker.com
Helen Oyeyemi’s Novel of Cognitive Dissonance
Kinga, the protagonist of “A New New Me,” has an odd affliction: there are seven of her.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 11/08/2025
While I’m self-promoting, this piece is in dialogue with an earlier piece about MAGA aesthetics and how Trump is a LLM regurgitating signifiers without understanding them www.newyorker.com/culture/crit... bsky.app/profile/xwal...
newyorker.com
Trump Is the Emperor of A.I. Slop
It makes sense that a man who yearns for a reality untroubled by other humans would be drawn to art that is untouched by anything human.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 09/08/2025
With media such as “28 Years Later” and “The Last of Us,” 2025 has been a bacchanalia of zombies. Katy Waldman writes about our cultural fixation on the walking dead.
newyorker.com
Our Age of Zombie Culture
Zombies are the least eloquent monster. But they have a lot to say about us.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 09/08/2025
Zombies are reactionary babies, tell your friends www.newyorker.com/culture/crit...
newyorker.com
Our Age of Zombie Culture
Zombies are the least eloquent monster. But they have a lot to say about us.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 07/07/2025
Really enjoyed spending time with the film Sorry Baby and with its singular creator and star Eva Victor www.newyorker.com/culture/pers...
newyorker.com
How Eva Victor Reimagined the Trauma Plot
In her new film, the actor, writer, and director charts the nonlinear course of a young woman’s recovery from assault.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 24/06/2025
I snuck a few of my "Anora" gripes into a piece about "Materialists" and the rise of the anti-Cinderella story www.newyorker.com/culture/crit...
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 21/06/2025
Does Prince Charming still exist? A spate of media scrutinizing the one-percent—including “Materialists” and “Anora”—attests to the difficulty of romanticizing wealth and love.
newyorker.com
The Rise of the Anti-Cinderella Story
A pair of recent films, Celine Song’s “Materialists” and Sean Baker’s “Anora,” turn the fairy tale on its head, with mixed results.
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Katy Waldman @xwaldie.bsky.social · 21/06/2025
Subbing in for the inimitable Naomi Fry on this week’s critics column, I wrote about Hollywood’s new anti-Cinderella plot www.newyorker.com/culture/crit...
newyorker.com
The Rise of the Anti-Cinderella Story
A pair of recent films, Celine Song’s “Materialists” and Sean Baker’s “Anora,” turn the fairy tale on its head, with mixed results.
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Reposted by Katy Waldman
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 18/06/2025
“I have wrestled with a Frey-like dread through the writing of this review—I’m afraid that I’ll describe his book and no one will believe me.” Read @xwaldie.bsky.social’s review of the cancelled author’s attempt to rebrand.
newyorker.com
James Frey’s New Cancelled-Guy Sex Novel Is as Bad as It Sounds
With a status-obsessed comeback book, the author of the fabricated memoir “A Million Little Pieces” attempts to rebrand.
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