Literary Friction by Literary Friction

12.19.2023

Literary Friction - Year (and Decade) in Review 2023

It's time for our usual Year in Review show, but seeing as this is also our last EVER episode (sob!), we're shaking things up a little to bring you a bit of a decade in review as well, so we...

11.30.2023

Literary Friction - A Life of One's Own with Xialou Guo

What does it mean, to pursue a life of your own? And what is art and literature's role in figuring out what that might look like? This month we're delighted to be talking to writer and filmmaker Xiaolu Guo, whose...

11.16.2023

Minisode Forty-Five: Friendship

Our theme this month was suggested by our patron Maral, who asked us to do an episode about our friendship, because she’s interested in how our (very!) different personalities align. We thought it might be a little self-indulgent to spend...

11.02.2023

Literary Friction - Desire with K Patrick

How do the people and things we desire shape our identities? And how do you render the physical intensity of desire on the page? Author K Patrick joins us in thinking about desire this month - we spoke to K...

10.19.2023

Minisode Forty-four: Parenthood

Last year we made a minisode about mothers, and one about fathers, both of which began an ongoing conversation about parenthood and literature that we wanted to pick up this month. Is fiction a good form for exploring the experience...

10.05.2023

Literary Friction - Doppelgangers with Naomi Klein

What is it about doppelgangers that's so endlessly compelling? Who better to answer this question than the one and only Naomi Klein, who joined us to talk about her latest book, Doppelganger. This riveting and intellectually rigorous journey begins with...

09.21.2023

Minisode Forty-Three: Sad Girl Novels

Our theme this month was suggested by our patron Mary, who asked us to talk about so-called 'sad girl novels', and it turns out we have some strong opinions! So, listen in as we get to grips with what the...

09.07.2023

Literary Friction - Short Stories with Arinze Ifeakandu

What makes a brilliant short story? Are they better read as part of a collection or as a sharp shot on their own? How do you render fully formed characters in very few words? We're thrilled that this month, Arinze...

08.10.2023

RE-RUN: Author Special with Ocean Vuong

We first aired this episode back in July 2019, and it was recorded in the studio when Ocean was on the international tour for his novel On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous. It’s a really rich and beautiful conversation, full of...

07.31.2023

Minisode Forty-Two: Artificial Intelligence

Are you a techno-optimist or a techno-pessimist? Or even a total Luddite? Does Chat GPT excite you or completely freak you out? Our theme this month was suggested by our patron Elisse, who asked us to talk about Chat GPT...

07.20.2023

Literary Friction - Dark Comedy with Lorrie Moore

Dark humour - do you love it or hate it? Do you find it cathartic or macho? Can humour ever be too dark, and is it a useful political tool? This month our guest is the one and only Lorrie...

06.29.2023

RE-RUN - Minisode Three: Red Flags

Octavia has been away on her book tour, so today we’re bringing you a re-run of one of our earliest minisodes from April 2019. It was a fun one, inspired by a viral tweet about literary red flags, in which...

06.15.2023

Literary Friction - Romantic Comedy with Curtis Sittenfeld

From Pride and Prejudice to Detransition, Baby, the romcom can be an enduring source of great pleasure, fun and comfort. This month we’re thrilled to welcome the American writer Curtis Sittenfeld to talk about her latest novel Romantic Comedy, a...

06.01.2023

Minisode Forty: Author Special with Octavia Bright

Today’s show is an author special, and in the hot seat is our very own Octavia Bright. You probably know by now that Octavia’s first book This Ragged Grace is coming out - and is published today in fact! So...

05.18.2023

Literary Friction - Writing about Writers with Tan Twan Eng

Do you like reading about writers? What does good writing about the act of writing do? And what happens when you write a real writer into a novel? Our guest this month is Tan Twan Eng, who joined us to...

05.04.2023

Minisode Thirty-nine: Cities

How do you feel about cities? Do you love the thrust and thrum of them, or are you more interested in escaping it? Do you like to read urban histories, or stories set in the heady metropolis? Our theme this month was...

04.26.2023

Literary Friction - Feminism with Sara Ahmed

What's the relationship between feminist writing and feminist activism? What does it mean to be a feminist killjoy, and what can we learn from her? This month, we're joined by scholar and writer Sara Ahmed to answer these questions and...

04.06.2023

Minisode Thirty-Eight: Book covers

Today our theme is… kinda judgy! Everyone says you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, but we all know everyone does. So, this month we thought we'd get into it - we partly covered (lol) this topic in our...

03.23.2023

Literary Friction - Dancing Time with Jacqueline Crooks

Dancing can be about escape, about pleasure, but it can also be about protest. It can be a powerful means of expression, but how does writing capture all that movement and rhythm? And what does good writing about dancing do?...

03.09.2023

Minisode Thirty-Seven: Etiquette

Our theme this month was inspired by a recent story in New York magazine about, as they described it, “How to text, tip, ghost, host, and generally exist in polite society today.” The idea behind this list of 140 rules...

02.23.2023

Literary Friction - Journalism with Tania Branigan

When journalists write books, how do they balance the potentially tricky relationship between weaving a compelling narrative and sticking to the facts? What's the role of storytelling in reportage? And what are the ethics of reporting on other peoples' lived...

02.09.2023

Minisode Thirty-six: Money

Money makes the world go round: it's an inescapable presence in our lives, and yet in a lot of cultures it's still a pretty big conversational taboo. Here in the UK right now there’s a serious cost of living crisis...

01.26.2023

Literary Friction - The Lives of Others with Kathryn Scanlan

Portraits of real people abound in books. There are novels that use transcribed conversations, like Sheila Heti’s How Should A Person Be, or fiction based on historical or even living people, like Curtis Sittenfield’s Rodham. Our guest this month is...

01.05.2023

Minisode Thirty-Five: Food and Feasting

Our January theme is heavily influenced by this time of year. Because the winter months are full of different feast days and celebrations, and because generally in the northern hemisphere it's a time where you just want to cocoon inside...

12.29.2022

Literary Friction - RE-RUN: Abstract Romanticism with Chris Kraus

We're on our end of year break, but didn't want to leave you without some LF to keep you company while you cook up your leftovers and potter around in your new socks. So, inspired by one of our new...

12.15.2022

Literary Friction - Year in Review 2022

Somehow it's already our last Literary Friction of 2022, which means as usual it's time for our year in review show, packed full of recommendations just in time for your holiday shopping. We've got you - and your Uncle Joe...

11.19.2022

Minisode Thirty-Four: Swearing

Nothing beats a good, carefully deployed swear word - or sometimes even a sloppily deployed one. We decided that this month we would make a minisode dedicated to swearing, that fabulously creative, often blasphemous, sometimes hilarious, sometimes frightening corner of...

11.11.2022

Literary Friction - Deception with Yiyun Li

When it comes to fiction, why are people so obsessed with authenticity and so appalled by literary deception? Does it matter who tells a story? And what do novels that confront these ideas have to tell us? Our guest this...

10.20.2022

Literary Friction - Graphic Novels with Lizzy Stewart

In this show we're getting to grips with graphic novels. What's the history of this kind of storytelling? What narrative possibilities does the form open up? We first explored this theme with the artist Nick Hayes all the way back...

10.06.2022

Literary Friction - Playing Games with Gabrielle Zevin

This month we’re delighted to welcome Gabrielle Zevin to Literary Friction. Gabrielle’s latest novel Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is an engrossing and moving story of a multi-decade creative partnership between two video game designers, so we thought it only...

09.22.2022

Rediscovery with Jamaica Kincaid and Stu Wilson (Picador Sponsored Episode)

For this minisode we’re doing something a little different - this episode is sponsored by publisher Picador, who this year have launched a new list of contemporary classics, called The Picador Collection, to coincide with their 50th anniversary year. With...

09.08.2022

Minisode Thirty-Three: Correspondence

It's autumn in the UK and we're full of that back to school feeling - fresh pencils, new pens and notebooks - so what better time for a minisode about correspondence. This theme was suggested by our patron Liza and...

08.12.2022

Literary Friction - RE-RUN: a Spoonful of Sugar with Leïla Slimani

We're on our summer break, which means we can re-run this excellent conversation we had with the French-Moroccan author Leïla Slimani in 2018. Leïla came in to talk to us about her second novel Lullaby (or Chanson Douce in French)...

07.23.2022

Fandom with Sheena Patel

When does fandom tip over into unhealthy obsession? What are the power dynamics of being someone's fan, and how do they get exploited? This month author Sheena Patel joins Carrie to talk about her debut, I'm A Fan, a novel...

06.30.2022

Minisode Thirty-Two: A Short History of Literary Friction (Patreon Sneak Peek)

For this month's minisode, we thought we'd give our listeners a preview of some of the bonus minisodes that we're creating for our patreon subscribers. This is one we recorded in May 2021, and it's all about the history of...

06.24.2022

Literary Friction Special - Elif Batuman

This month we're bringing you an author special with Elif Batuman, who joined Carrie in cyberspace to talk about her hilarious and original second novel Either/Or. In this extended interview, they discussed what makes a novel political, snobberies about structure...

06.02.2022

What's Literary Friction about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

Literary Friction episodes: