A newsletter, an update, and the year's best writing & music
Hello, friends.
I've decided to start a newsletter. I should say at the outset that I do not yet feel entirely not weird about doing this, nor do I know exactly what this will be or become. But I'm doing it, first and foremost, out of a desire to stay better connected, and in many cases reconnect, with all of you – and further, to do so without having to go through the typical social media channels, but in a way that feels truer to me, viz., via infrequent, long-form emails.
What this newsletter will be – or at least, how I'm envisioning it at the moment – is an occasional update on what I've been up to and what I've been loving lately, a collection of things that have been interesting me and that I think might interest you, too. I'm calling it Selection Bias.
I've included you on the initial subscribers list because I thought this might be something you'd enjoy. If it's not your jam, just scroll down to the bottom to unsubscribe; I will not be offended, or any the wiser. But I do hope that some of you will enjoy receiving and reading these newsletters, and that some of you will even reply back to them from time to time. Feel free to share them with others, too, if you know anyone else who might like them (subscribe page here). Or just enjoy them quietly from the privacy of your own inbox.
And so, with those introductions taken care of, here's my inaugural newsletter.
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I spent a lot of the fall thinking about shame. Not because I was particularly ashamed about anything, but because I was teaching a class on shame, or, as I fashioned it, "Shame, in Antiquity & Today" (syllabus here, fyi). Of course, it also turned out that shame – or rather, a conspicuous lack thereof – was probably the defining emotion of this autumn in America, if not the year as a whole. Not that I'm all that surprised that things shook out this way: I proposed to teach the class last spring precisely because of its contemporary resonance, the idea coming to me while listening to a fanciful episode of Benjamen Walker's Theory of Everything, in which our Commander-in-Chief was referred to as the first "post-shame" President. But I'm glad to report that it was indeed invigorating to read and discuss, e.g., Sophocles' Ajax and Plato's Gorgias with all this other shame stuff present in the background. And there was something almost vertiginous about reading pieces from the nineties about shame and American politics (pieces by the likes of Nagel, Calhoun, and Velleman) and seeing how much, and how little, has changed since.
I'd like to say that, as a result of all this, I've come to many great revelations about shame. Yet like most great philosophical endeavors, the class ended in aporia, and in many ways I'm even more confused about shame now than I was at the start. But one thing I am convinced of is that these confusions run deep, and that insofar as we as a culture don't know what to make of shame it's because we're also confused about how to draw the line between the moral and the ethical, the political and the social, and the public and the private. And I'm also convinced that shame is a powerful lens through which to teach students the foundations of ethics.
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I also spent the fall taking a lot of photos. As some of you know, photography is my latest hobby. I got into it over the summer, when, more or less on a whim, I decided to enroll in an introductory photography course. I've been hooked ever since.
Part of the excitement of photography for me is just the general excitement that comes with any new creative hobby, the wide-open expanse of possibilities not yet explored. But the real reason I'm enjoying photography so much is because I am not naturally a visual person. I mean this quite strongly. I've always had aphantasia, a complete inability to mentally visualize anything (a condition which is, ridiculously, most thoroughly explained in a Facebook post by the cofounder of Firefox). And though this has never hampered my ability to appreciate visual art, it has made drawing and painting feel damn near impossible. But photography allows me to skirt around all those problems, because (at least the way I photograph) it's about visual discovery rather than visual manifestation – the orchestration of the visual, rather than its creation.
Unsurprisingly, my new fascination with photography has in turn made me newly visually attentive to things in life, too – the subtle play of light, the counterweight of shadow, the transient appearance of form. (This is something else, thanks to aphantasia, that I'm not naturally inclined to do.) Taking photos has also, predictably, made me much more literate at looking at photographs, and opened up whole new wings of the modern art world to my appreciation. It's been great.
As the result of my newfound photographic fervor, I'll be closing each of these letters will one of my recent photographs. And if you're interested in seeing my photos on a slightly more frequent basis, you can follow me on Instagram.
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Throughout the fall I also found some time (though never enough time) to read and hear some really good new things. I've gathered the best of them together below. This letter's list of recommendations is longer than they will typically be, as I'm treating it as a year-end "best of" of sorts, and because I figure that some of you will appreciate the extra sustenance as the winter holidays wind to a close. As you'll see, it's a mix of books, essays, radio, albums, and songs.
WORDS // LONG FORM
Go, Went, Gone by Jenny Erpenbeck No single thing is sufficient to fully reckon with the gravity of the African refugee crisis, but Go, Went, Gone – the latest novel by German author Jenny Erpenbeck – is an essential contribution to our broader understanding. It doesn't solve anything, of course, nor does it make anything easier, but it brings to these issues an acuity and humanity that is depressingly rare.
Janesville by Amy Goldstein In the big pile of reading I've done this year that could be filed under the heading of "attempts to better understand Trump's America", Amy Goldstein's Janesville was the best and most illuminating. Ironically, the Wisconsin factory town that is her titular focus (and Paul Ryan's hometown) did not actually end up voting for Trump, but what the town's gone through since the closing of its General Motors plant in 2008 tells a bigger story that transcends traditional red state–blue state politics.
What Belongs To You by Garth Greenwell Technically, this book is so 2016, but I didn't get around to reading it until this year, and it's worth remembering and rereading. Poetic, potent, and heartrending. Like Death in Venice, except in Bulgaria and without the pederasty and the protagonist is the healthy one.
WORDS // SHORT FORM
"The Takeover" / "How the Elderly Lose Their Rights" by Rachel Aviv Easily the most harrowing piece I read all year. An urgent reminder, as our parents retire, to make sure they don't choose to reside in a state with guardianship laws like Nevada's.
"What Writers Really Do When They Write" by George Saunders This has been a good year for George Saunders (he finally wrote a novel, that novel won the Man Booker, he got to meet Josh Landy). He also wrote this great little piece about the art of writing, which feels relevant even to "noncreative" academic writers like me.
"Goodbye, Yosemite. Hello, What?" by Daniel Duane A powerful reminder of how the history of Yosemite National Park is inextricably intertwined with the genocide and land theft of the Miwok, Mono Paiute, and countless other Native Californians.
"If You Prick Us" / "Shakespeare's Cure for Xenophobia" by Stephen Greenblatt A personal essay on the relation between literature and morality, and more specifically, between The Merchant of Venice and antisemitism, and more specifically than that, between Stephen Greenblatt's love of Shakespeare and his experience as a Jew in academia.
"Time Out" / "Confessions of a Watch Geek" by Gary Shteyngart I do not understand what makes this article (about high-end watches and the desire to own them) so compelling, but there you have it.
WORDS // SPOKEN
The Memory Palace, "A Portrait" | "A Washington Monument" | "A Brief Eulogy for a Commercial Radio Station" If you're not already listening to The Memory Palace, you're doing podcasts wrong. Nate DiMeo has been knocking it out of the park for years, and he's now at the top of his game. It's difficult to describe the power and poignancy of The Memory Palace in words; the best thing to do is just go listen to it. Here are three of the most personally Memorable episodes of the past year.
Love + Radio, "The Boys Will Work It Out" At the risk of repeating myself, if you're not already listening to Love + Radio, you're doing podcasts wrong. Nick van der Kolk & co. do stories that no one else is doing, and use the medium to its full potential. This recommendation is not their all-time best (that'd be this or this), but it was the most memorable piece they did all year. (N.B.: Love + Radio is NeverSFW.)
This American Life, "Fear and Loathing in Homer and Rockville" I know I know, listening to TAL was uncool even when it was still cool to listen to podcasts. But TAL has always produced some of the best work out there, and this episode is further proof: Two fantastic stories about American towns reacting in very real ways to the mostly imagined threat of undocumented immigrants.
SOUNDS // LONG PLAYS
***If you want to hear all the below music recommendations in a single streamable playlist, go here.
Moses Sumney, Aromanticism An intoxicating siren song of a record, like Jeff Buckley's Grace brought two decades into the future.
The Weather Station, The Weather Station The best folk record of the year, in a year of stiff competition from the likes of Laura Marling, Julie Byrne, Phoebe Bridgers, and more. This is Tamara Lindeman at her best, which is Joni Mitchell-level good.
Hundred Waters, Communicating Perhaps it's not surprising with a band name like "Hundred Waters", but in describing their music I'm always drawn to the language of inundation: the way it immediately engulfs, envelops, and surrounds you, though softly and somehow as if from a distance. This latest record of theirs felt like it was a long time coming, but was everything I wanted and more.
Forest Swords, Compassion The weirdest, most experimental record I fell in love with this year. A friend described Forest Swords as the "most singable unsingable music", which seems about right to me.
Big Thief, Capacity An instant indie classic.
SOUNDS // EXTENDED PLAYS
St. Vincent, "New York" A pitch-perfect pop song, by today's greatest rockstar.
Porches, "Country" A bracing, intimate, damn near perfect song. Most entire albums don't accomplish, musically or emotionally, what Porches achieves here in just under two minutes.
Giraffage (ft. Matosic), "Slowly" Giraffage's SoundCloud page includes a two-word description of his music: "poppy nonsense". This is Giraffage at his poppiest and most nonsensical.
Four Tet, "Lush" There's lots to love in Four Tet's new record, New Energy, and "Lush" encapsulates much of what I've always found most invigorating about Kieran Hebden's distinct brand of "intelligent dance music": his attention to detail, the diversity of his sonic palette, and, indeed, his ability to make electronic music sound lush.
Daphni, "Tin" All of Dan Snaith's new Daphni record Joli Mai is pure dancefloor goodness; "Tin" is one of many stand-out tracks.
And since no year would be complete without some catchy billboard hits, here's my personal top five in pop for the year: Katy Perry, "Chained to the Rhythm" || Charlie Puth, "Attention" || Alessia Cara, "Stay" || Calvin Harris (ft. Frank Ocean & Migos), "Slide" || Calvin Harris (ft. Pharrell Williams, Katy Perry, & Big Sean), "Feels"
SPECIAL YEAR-END BONUS: 64 DOLPHIN SONGS
The "Hot 100 Dolphin Cameos" playlist As any of you who have ridden in a car with me for an extended period of time this past year know, I have been obsessed with what I call "dolphin songs" – a trend in recent pop music to include, often as the song's chorus, melodic phrases that sound suspiciously like they're being made by dolphins. I first came across this phenomenon thanks to this great episode of the great Switched on Pop podcast concerning Bieber's / Jack Ü's breakout hit "Where Are Ü Now?", which I consider the Ur-dolphin song. (Also pertinent: this episode of theirs on the "pop drop".) Since Bieber, the meme has spread, and dolphins are now popping up everywhere. I've been keeping tabs on them by means of a Spotify playlist, which is currently 64 songs deep. Enjoy all the dolphiny goodness for yourself here.
A PARTING PHOTOGRAPH
"Homer & Boyce"
That's all for this time. Till next time, sometime in 2018,
W