Longform

Sloane Crosley is the author of I Was Told There’d Be Cake and How Did You Get This Number. Her latest essay collection is Look Alive Out There.

“The more extreme things get in reality, the more extreme escapism has to be. It’s like Game of Thrones or bust. But in reality, I think that part of what I’m trying to do with this book, or in anything I write, is to give permission to be mad about little things. Just because there’s all of this, someone still slid their hand down a subway pole and touched you. Or somebody bumped into you. There are still these minor indignities and infractions that occur consistently. And I think there’s some sort of robbing if you tell yourself, Well, I’m not going to be mad about this because of the political landscape that we’re in.”

Thanks to MailChimp, Squarespace, The Great Courses Plus, and @askanyone

Crosley on Longform

[11:20] ”Goodbye, Columbus” (Village Voice • 2004)

[14:15] Read Bottom Up: A Novel (Riverhead Books • 2016)

[22:00] I Was Told There’d Be Cake: Essays (Dey Street Books • 2008)

[25:50] Look Alive Out There: Essays (MCD • 2018)

[26:00] "A Dog Named Humphrey" (Believer Magazine • June 2012)

[26:00] Outside Voices (New Yorker • 2018)

[26:00] Up the Down Volcano (Kindle Single • 2011)

[26:00] "Light Pollution" (Vice • May 2010)

[36:15] "My Uncle, The 70s Porn Star" (Esquire • Apr 2018)

[37:47] "The Doctor Is a Woman" (The Cut • 2018)

[43:25] "Spin the Globe: Sloane Crosley in Ecuador" (Afar • Nov 2011)

[46:00] "All Aboard the Good Ship Self-Care" (Vogue • Mar 2019)

[53:45] "Living in Print: David Sedaris and Sloane Crosley in Conversation”

[1:02:30] "Laura Dern’s Big Little Truths" (Vanity Fair • Feb 2019)

[1:02:30] "The Art of the Real Starring Stormy Daniels" (Playboy • Dec 2018)

[1:02:30] "The Dr. Ruth You Don't Know" (InStyle • May 2019)

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Christine Kenneally has written for The New Yorker, The New York Times, and The Monthly. Her 2018 Buzzfeed article, “The Ghosts of the Orphanage,” was nominated for a National Magazine Award.

"I understood that the abuse was a big part of the story. But the thing that really hooked me and disturbed me and I wouldn’t forget was the depersonalization that went on in these places. It wasn’t just that the records had been lost along the way. It became really clear that the information was intentionally withheld, and it was all part of just this extraordinary depersonalization that happened to these kids.”

Thanks to MailChimp and Pitt Writers for sponsoring this week's episode.

@chriskenneally

Christine Kenneally on Longform

[8:25] The First Word: The Search for the Origins of Language (Christine Kenneally • Penguin Books • 2007)

[14:05] "The Invisible History of the Human Race: How DNA and History Shape Our Identities and Our Futures" (Christine Kenneally • Penguin Books • 2015)

[21:18] Kenneally’s New Yorker archive

[22:22] "The Inferno" (New Yorker • Oct 2009)

[24:53] "We Saw Nuns Kill Children: The Ghosts of St. Joseph’s Catholic Orphanage" (Buzzfeed News • Aug 2018)

[25:21] "The Deepest Cut" (New Yorker • June 2006)

[51:07] Spotlight

[51:20] Pennsylvania Diocese Victims Report

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David Wallace-Wells is the deputy editor of New York and the author of The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming.

“Between 1.5 degrees and 2 degrees of warming, just that extra half degree of warming, is going to kill 150 million people from air pollution alone. That’s 25 times the death toll of the Holocaust. And when I say that to people, their eyes open. They’re like oh my god, this is suffering on such an unconscionable scale. And it is. But 9 million people are dying already every year from air pollution. That’s a Holocaust every year, right now. And our lives aren’t meaningfully oriented around those people and those deaths. And very few people we know have their lives meaningfully oriented around those people and those deaths. And I think it’s quite likely that, going forward, those impulses of compartmentalization and denial and narcissism will continue to govern our response to this crisis. Which is tragic.”

Thanks to MailChimp, The Great Courses Plus, The Primary Ride Home Podcast, and Pitt Writers for sponsoring this week's episode.

The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming

@dwallacewells

Wallace-Wells on Longform

[3:45] "When Will the Planet Be Too Hot for Humans? Much, Much Sooner Than You Imagine." (New York • Jul 2017)

[4:00] Wallace-Wells's New York archive

[13:00] "Are We as Doomed as That New York Magazine Article Says?" (Robinson Meyer • The Atlantic • Jul 2017)

[13:30] "Scientific Reticence: a DRAFT Discussion" (James Hansen • Earth Institute • Oct 2017)

[15:55] Silent Spring (Rachel Carson • Houghton Mifflin • 1962)

[26:45] "The Doomed Earth Controversy: David Wallace-Wells and Michael Mann" (YouTube • Nov 2017)

[27:30] "Stop Scaring People About Climate Change. It Doesn’t Work." (Eric Holthaus • Grist • Jul 2017)

[27:30] "Scientists Challenge Magazine Story About 'Uninhabitable Earth'" (Chris Mooney • Washington Post • Jul 2017)

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Linda Villarosa directs the journalism program at the City College of New York and is a contributing writer at the New York Times Magazine. Her article "Why America’s Black Mothers and Babies Are in a Life-or-Death Crisis" was one of Longform's Top Ten of 2018. She is at work on a new book, Under the Skin: Race, Inequality and the Health of a Nation, due out in 2020.

“I think at the beginning I was afraid to say it right out, so I think I was saying ‘racial bias’ or something like that. Then I stopped. ... I think how I learned about it both in earlier reporting and in grad school and in my own research was that race is a risk factor for a bunch of different health problems, whether it’s heart disease, infant and maternal mortality, or HIV. It’s just said that race is a risk factor. It’s disproportionate. What it really is is that race is a risk factor, but it’s also a risk marker. Instead of looking at what individuals are doing wrong, it’s what society is doing wrong in creating problems for individual people which lead to health crisis. It’s sort of like bias, related to racism, is creating problems in people’s actual bodies. That’s what I came to understand. It really shifts the blame off the individual.”

Thanks to MailChimp, The Great Courses Plus, and Pitt Writers for sponsoring this week's episode.

@lindavillarosa

lindavillarosa.com

Villarosa on Longform

[0:40] "Why America’s Black Mothers and Babies Are in a Life-or-Death Crisis" (New York Times Magazine • Apr 2018)

[5:00] "America’s Hidden H.I.V. Epidemic" (New York Times Magazine • Jun 2017)

[13:20] "A Conversation With: Phill Wilson; Speaking Out to Make AIDS an Issue of Color" (New York Times Magazine • Dec 2000)

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Michael Lewis is the author of several bestselling books and the host of the podcast Against the Rules.

“I think anything you do, if it’s going to be any good, there’s got to be some risk involved. I think the reader or the listener will sense that you were taking chances and it will excite them. So, you never want to do the same thing twice, and you don’t want to cling to something because it’s the safe thing. I try to keep that in mind. Ok, I started with this, but if I push off shore clinging to this life raft or this floatation device and I get way out of swimming range of the beach, but I find this more interesting flotation device, have the nerve to jump from one to the next. You never know where it’s going to lead.”

Thanks to MailChimp, Going Through It, Green Chef, and Pitt Writers for sponsoring this week's episode.

Lewis's author site

Lewis on Longform

[1:40] Against the Rules with Michael Lewis

[4:55] The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game (W. W. Norton & Company • 2007

[9:50] The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine (W. W. Norton & Company • 2011)

[11:10] The Fifth Risk (W. W. Norton & Company • 2018)

[11:40] Revisionist History

[13:15] Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game (W. W. Norton & Company • 2004)

[14:35] The Undoing Project: A Friendship That Changed Our Minds (W. W. Norton & Company • 2016)

[14:50] Home Game: An Accidental Guide to Fatherhood (W. W. Norton & Company • 2010)

[27:10] How I Got Into College (This American Life • 2013)

[30:00] Ref, You Suck! (Against the Rules • 2019)

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Hillary Frank is the creator of The Longest Shortest Time podcast and the author of Weird Parenting Wins.

“I think motherhood is not valued in our culture. We don’t value the work of mothers both at home and then at work. Mothers are the most discriminated against people at work. They’re discriminated more against than fathers or people without children. Mothers are promoted less, hired less, and paid less. People are forced out of their jobs after they announce that they’re pregnant, they’re passed over for promotions, and they get horrible, discriminatory comments like, ‘Oh, don’t you really think you want to be at home? Do you really want to come back?‘ And American work culture is not set up for people to be parents and mothers.”

Thanks to MailChimp, The Great Courses Plus, and Pitt Writers for sponsoring this week's episode.

@hillaryfrank

hillaryfrank.com

[0:35] The Longest Shortest podcast

[6:00] The Special Misogyny Reserved for Mothers (New York Times • Dec 2018)

[19:20] This American Life archives on family

[41:35] Weird Parenting Wins: Bathtub Dining, Family Screams, and Other Hacks from the Parenting Trenches (Penguin • 2019)

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Casey Newton covers technology for The Verge and writes The Interface newsletter.

“I remember one time a Facebook employee told me when I wrote something critical and I said something like, ‘Yeah, I know that one was a little harder on you.’ I remember he said to me, ‘Please understand that this helps to make the case internally for changes we want to make.’ When this type of criticism get published when we know that this is the conversation, we can push for these kinds of changes on the inside. If you believe that these platforms are going to be around and that they aren’t going to be shut down and all the executives put into jail, I think what you actually want is to see them get better at things.”

Thanks to MailChimp, The Great Courses Plus, and Pitt Writers for sponsoring this week's episode.

The Mastermind (Evan Ratliff • Random House • 2019)

CoinTalk Podcast

@CaseyNewton

Newton on Longform

[1:40] The Interface

[5:00] Newton's archive at The Verge

[20:20] Longform Podcast #171: Adrian Chen

[24:25] "The Trauma Floor" (The Verge • Feb 2019)

[29:00] Sarah Frier's archive at Bloomberg

[32:40] The Bill Simmons Podcast

[49:00] Newton's archive at San Francisco Chronicle

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Wesley Morris is a critic at large for The New York Times, a staff writer for The New York Times Magazine, and the co-host of Still Processing.

“I think that the taking of extra time to be more thoughtful and less reactive is, to the extent that I have any wisdom to impart, that is it. Just wait a second. Because someone’s going to get there before you get there anyway.”

Thanks to MailChimp and Pitt Writers for sponsoring this week's episode.

The Mastermind (Evan Ratliff • Random House • 2019)

@Wesley_Morris

Morris on Longform

Morris's New York Times archive

[1:55] Still Processing Podcast

[3:25] Longform Podcast #95: Wesley Morris

[3:30] Longform Podcast #218: Wesley Morris

[6:55] In the Land of Women (Warner Brothers • John Kasdan • 2008)

[9:25] Boomerang (Paramount • Reginald Hudlin • 2002

[10:45] "The Morality Wars" (New York Times • Oct 2018)

[10:50] Insecure (HBO • 2016)

[16:00] Crazy Rich Asians (Warner Brothers • Jon M. Chu • 2018)

[30:25] "The Governor Who Partied Like It’s 1884" (New York Times • Feb 2019)

[34:55] Green Book (Universal • Peter Farrelly • 2018)

[37:05] Get Out (Blumhouse Productions • Jordan Peele • 2017)

[37:10] Moonlight (A24 • Barry Jenkins • 2016)

[42:10] Black Panther (Marvel • Ryan Coogler • 2018)

[43:25] Wonder Woman (Warner Brothers • Patty Jenkins • 2017)

[44:30] King Kong: Skull Island (Warner Brothers • Jordan Vogt-Roberts • 2017)

[44:35] Captain Marvel (Marvel • Anna Boden • 2019

[46:00] Russian Doll (Netflix • Leslye Headland • 2019)

[46:10] Catastrophe (Amazon • 2019)

[46:15] Game of Thrones (Netflix • Leslye Headland • 2019)

[50:55] Us (Monkeypaw Productions • Jordan Peele • 2019)

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Evan Ratliff, a co-host of the Longform Podcast, is the author of The Mastermind: Drugs. Empire. Murder. Betrayal.

“We’re all less moral than we think we are, including myself. I’m interested in the justifications people provide for themselves to get deep into something that starts as one thing and ends up as a murderous criminal cartel. Paul Le Roux, sure—but also doctors and pharmacists. It’s interesting to think about where the pressures in our lives create moral ambiguity that we didn't think was there, and why we do things that we’ve said we'll never do. We look at someone else and think that they’re really bad or evil, but then we’ve never experienced those pressures. That cauldron of factors is something I’m very interested in because I think it applies to everyone.”

Thanks to MailChimp and Pitt Writers for sponsoring this week's episode.

@ev_rat

cazart.net

Ratliff on Longform

Longform Podcast #48: Evan Ratliff

Longform Podcast Bonus Episode: Evan Ratliff (April 2016)

[3:00] The Oilman's Daughter (The Atavist • 2013)

[3:05] The Mastermind (The Atavist • Mar 2016)

[5:15] The Mastermind (Evan Ratliff • Random House • 2019)

[17:10] Longform Podcast #66: Andy Ward

[49:50] Hunting LeRoux: The Inside Story of the DEA Takedown of a Criminal Genius and His Empire (Elaine Shannon • HarperLuxe • 2019)

[1:03:20] Ratliff's New Yorker archive

[1:03:25] Ratliff's Atavist Magazine archive

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Kiese Laymon is the author of How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America and Heavy: An American Memoir.

“It's ironic to me that my mom was the woman who taught me how to read—she was the black woman who taught me how to read and write—and everything I wrote outside of my house I was taught not to write to my mama. I just think that’s where we are as black writers and black creators in this country. Literally because most of our teachers are white. Principals are white. The standards are white. But I wanted to flip this on its head and I wanted to write this book to the person who taught me how to read and write. And, yeah, we got some dysfunctional, fucked-up shit going on. But we also have some abundant love shit going on, too.”

Thanks to MailChimp, The Last Column, and Pitt Writers for sponsoring this week's episode.

The Mastermind (Evan Ratliff • Random House • 2019)

@KieseLaymon

Laymon on Longform

[1:30] Heavy: An American Memoir (Scribner • 2018)

[1:40] How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America (Agate Bolden • 2013)

[01:45] "The Worst of White Folks" (Gawker • Jul 2013)

[01:50] "How They Do in Ole Miss" (ESPN • Oct 2015)

[03:20] The lamppost

[08:40] "Da Art of Storytellin’ (A Prequel)" (Oxford American • Nov 2015)

[33:45] "You Are the Second Person" (Guernica • Jun 2013)

[35:05] Where the Line Bleeds (Jesmyn Ward • Agate Bolden • 2008)

[35:15] Long Division (Agate Bolden • 2013)

[36:00] "D'Andre Brown's Basketball Dream" (ESPN • Aug 2013)

[39:40] "My Vassar College Faculty ID Makes Everything OK" (Gawker • Nov 2014)

[55:35] "Michelle Obama Should Go High—And Kick" (Vanity Fair • Nov 2018)

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