Podcast · Arts & Books

The Critic and Her Publics

Welcome to Season Four of The Critic and Her Publics: The Art of the Interview . This season, host Merve Emre talks with professional interviewers of all kinds about how they get the answer they're looking for, what makes a good question, how do you listen for what's unsaid, and how hard do you ha

New episodes: Every two weeks
Typical length: 41 min
Latest: 8 Sep 2026
Language: English

Latest episode

8 Sep 2026 · 43 min

Anna Silman

We try to end each season of The Critic and Her Publics with a little twist on our theme, something different and often risky or uncomfortable. A few years ago, our final guest Anna Silman interviewed and profiled me for Business Insider. Back then, when Twitter was still called Twitter, it was possible for a profile of someone in a niche industry to go viral, as Anna's profile of me did. The subject of a profile rarely gets to confront its writer and ask "what were you thinking?" or "why did you do that?" but in this episode, Anna and I finally have an opportunity to compare memories of our…

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Earlier episodes 29 most recent

S4 · E7 · 1 Sep 2026 · 40 min
Isaac Chotiner
"I don't understand why people talk to Isaac Chotiner when his reputation precedes him. He's the best interview-assassin at work today, maybe the best ever. I suspect that each guest thinks they'll be the one to finally best Isaac—and Isaac makes good work of that hubris. He calmly and respectfully dismantles arguments that people make about everything from the wars in Ukraine and the Middle east to gerrymandering, genocide denial, and deportation. But he also has an obvious appreciation for deep knowledge, and for each 'gotcha' interview he conducts, there's an expert interview, one where…
S4 · E6 · 25 Aug 2026 · 46 min
Agnes Callard
"The philosopher Agnes Callard is one of the most genuinely curious thinkers I have ever met. Whether she’s writing about unrequited love, parenting, politics in the classroom, or the moral failures of people who like to travel, I get a thrill hearing her examine ordinary life from unexpected angles. And I love to disagree with her, which I often do.Callard teaches at the University of Chicago and is the author of several books, including, most recently Open Socrates: The Case for a Philosophical Life, which came out last year. She joined me to talk about perhaps the oldest form of the…
S4 · E5 · 11 Aug 2026 · 48 min
Rachel Syme
"Rachel Syme has interviewed all the grand dames of New York and Los Angeles: she's had Cosmos with Carol Burnett, she's accompanied Sarah Jessica Parker to the ballet, she's shopped with Parker Posey at Rachel Comey, she's Skyped with Patti LuPone and gabbed with Barbra Streisand on her landline. At a time when the glossy profile feels hopelessly compromised, Rachel uses her deep knowledge of musicals, fashion, and old Hollywood to put meat on the bones of fame and fortune—and Rachel loves a good yarn. Our conversation was full of behind-the-scenes stories, showing how an interview can…
S4 · E4 · 4 Aug 2026 · 45 min
Orna Guralnik
"Couples therapy. The words alone are enough to send many people running for the hills, but Orna Guralnik—star of Showtime's documentary series Couples Therapy—has people running to her office. Orna, a clinical psychologist and psychoanalyst, has become a household name: she's a watchful guide for couples as they navigate intimate and sometimes agonizing discussions, and for viewers, as they watch these couples bare their souls or refuse to do so. With her beloved dog Nico on her lap, Orna explained to me how she practices listening for the unconscious, the limits and possibilities of…
S4 · E3 · 28 Jul 2026 · 45 min
Sarah Stillman
"Sarah Stillman is a staff writer at The New Yorker and one of the most decorated investigative reporters of her generation. She's won several National Magazine Awards, the Pulitzer Prize, and a MacArthur 'Genius' Grant. Her articles draw attention to the men and women forced to do the bidding of the American security state; the third-country nationals tricked into working on military bases in Iraq; the addicts coerced into serving as informants; the victims of civil asset forfeiture. Our conversation touched on every stage of Sarah's career, from her days as a student journalist to her…
S4 · E2 · 21 Jul 2026 · 37 min
Sheila Heti
"In the fall of 2022, I saw the novelist Shelia Heti give a presentation on her conversations with early AI chatbots. Their names were Eliza, Alice, and George, and they had wild, undisciplined opinions about art, selfhood, and God. Talking to them seemed to come naturally to Sheila: for several years, she had been the interviews editors at The Believer and her novels Motherhood and Pure Colour featured narrators who ask difficult questions of non-human entities like the I Ching or a leaf on a tree. A few months after OpenAI released ChatGPT-5, Sheila and I spoke about the role of the…
S4 · E1 · 14 Jul 2026 · 40 min
Chana Joffe-Walt
The new season of The Critic and Her Publics—The Art of the Interview—begins!"Chana Joffe-Walt is a Peabody Award-winning journalist and a producer at This American Life. Her series on school segregation, Nice White Parents, examined how progressive Brooklyn families undermined racial integration. She regularly takes over from Ira Glass to host special episodes on race, labor, and education. But it was her series of conversations with men, women, and children in Gaza that made me want to begin the season with her, to explore how the interview can preserve the dignity and complexity of…
30 Aug 2025 · 46 min
Money
In this final episode of Hawthornden's Como Conversazione series for 2025, we’ll confront a subject that the literary world likes to keep subtextual: money. The translators and publishers, who usually meet over contract negotiations, open up their books and compare bottom lines, to see who feels like they’re being short-changed, and why. Is there—or could there be—a pay structure that works for everyone? And how should the translator be compensated, when their role is still so unresolved? See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at…
29 Aug 2025 · 57 min
Judgement
How do we decide which translations are better than others? In this episode of Hawthornden's Como Conversazione, Jacques Testard of Fitzcarraldo Editions and Adam Levy of Transit Books reveal how they evaluate books for acquisition. And, because so many of the guests on this show have served on prize juries, we compare our experiences making judgments that can seem at once arbitrary and hugely consequential. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
28 Aug 2025 · 39 min
Practical Translation: 1,001 Nights
In this episode of Hawthornden's Como Conversazione, another session of practical translation: the reading and comparing of many renditions of one passage, to see how translators make their choices. But the text we’ll be examining, 1001 Nights, presents an unusual challenge. Unlike with the Proust that we discussed in the first episode, there is not one fixed source text to work with. There were many retellings of Scheherazade’s tales over the centuries, which were then written down as many different manuscripts. What, then, does it mean for a translator to “take liberties,” or to be…
27 Aug 2025 · 39 min
English
In this episode of Hawthornden's Como Conversazione, we discuss the problem of English. What happens when you bring a nation’s literature into its colonizer’s language? Is it inevitably a kind of violence? Here, we look to the field of translation studies, which provides some answers—not all of them satisfying. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
26 Aug 2025 · 49 min
Shame
In this episode of Hawthornden’s Como Conversazione, the translators discuss the fraught emotional condition of their work: the sense that not only is their work shameful and grotesque but that they are too, for daring to attempt it. Translation demands a deep and scholarly knowledge of language, which never feels sufficient. Translators are often faced with a binary of either making themselves invisible or asserting their styles. Many of them are caught between identities. You’ll hear Maureen Freely, an American who grew up in Istanbul, talk about her vexed relationship with Orhan Pamuk and…
25 Aug 2025 · 33 min
First Sentences
In this second episode of Hawthornden’s Como Conversazione, we explore beginnings. Anyone who has been around kids knows that a good Lego build starts with a good base. In a translation, this is the first sentence of a text. First sentences are so often the most famous lines. They are a place for a translator to make their mark. They dictate the voice in which the book unfolds. But has the importance of the first sentence been overly inflated? See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
24 Aug 2025 · 36 min
Practical Translation: Proust
In the first episode of Hawthornden’s Como Conversazione, we start with an exercise in practical translation: a discussion of seven different English interpretations of one, highly complicated sentence from Volume One of Marcel Proust’s In Search of Lost Time. Maureen Freely will speak first, followed by Daisy Rockwell, Virginia Jewiss, Jeremy Tiang, and finally Tiffany Tsao. It sounds like a lot to keep track of, but in the course of these conversations, you will get to know all of their voices very well. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at…
17 Jun 2025 · 43 min
Leo Carey: "What's Not There"
Leo Carey is a senior editor at The New Yorker. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
3 Jun 2025 · 42 min
Yahdon Israel: "Faustian Bargains"
Yahdon Israel is a senior editor at Simon Schuster and founder of Literaryswag, a cultural movement that intersects literature and fashion to make books accessible. He brings an entrepreneurial spirit to these pursuits as the founder of a popular book club, host of a literary podcast, creative writing teacher, event producer, as well as his work in support of several prestigious literary awards. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
20 May 2025 · 37 min
Ben Calhoun: "Close Listening"
Ben Calhoun is the executive producer of "The Daily" (The New York Times). Previously, he was an editor and producer for This American Life and Serial , and VP of programming at WBEZ in Chicago. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
6 May 2025 · 40 min
Sasha Weiss: "Mischief in the Pages"
Sasha Weiss is a writer and the deputy culture editor at The New York Times Magazine. Previously she was the literary editor at The New Yorker and an editor at The New York Review of Books. _________________________________ The Critic and Her Publics Hosted by Merve Emre • Edited by Michele Moses • Music by Dani Lencioni • Art by Leanne Shapton • Sponsored by Alfred A. Knopf The Critic and Her Publics is a co-production between the Shapiro Center for Creative Writing and Criticism at Wesleyan University, New York Review of Books, and Lit Hub. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy…
22 Apr 2025 · 42 min
Radhika Jones: "Past the Illusion"
Radhika Jones is the fifth editor-in-chief of Vanity Fair. She previously held senior editorial roles at The New York Times, Time, and The Paris Review. She also was the managing editor at Grand Street, an editor at Artforum, and the arts editor of The Moscow Times, where she began her career. Jones holds a B.A. from Harvard University and a Ph.D. in English and comparative literature from Columbia, where she has also taught courses in writing and literature. Born in New York City, she grew up in Cincinnati and Ridgefield, Connecticut. _________________________________The Critic and Her…
8 Apr 2025 · 41 min
Zakiya Dalilah Harris: "Satire and Sensitivity"
Zakiya Dalila Harris received her MFA in creative writing from The New School. Her debut novel, The Other Black Girl, was an instant New York Times bestseller and is now a critically acclaimed Hulu Original Series. Her essays and book reviews have appeared in Cosmopolitan, The Guardian, The New York Times, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband._________________________________The Critic and Her PublicsHosted by Merve Emre • Edited by Michele Moses • Music by Dani Lencioni • Art byLeanne Shapton • Sponsored by Alfred A. KnopfThe Critic and Her Publics is a…
25 Mar 2025 · 37 min
Fergus McIntosh: "One Wonders"
Fergus McIntosh is the head research editor at The New Yorker and runs the magazine's fact-checking department._________________________________The Critic and Her PublicsHosted by Merve Emre • Edited by Michele Moses • Music by Dani Lencioni • Art byLeanne Shapton • Sponsored by Alfred A. KnopfThe Critic and Her Publics is a co-production between the Shapiro Center for Creative Writing and Criticism at Wesleyan University, New York Review of Books, and Lit Hub. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
11 Mar 2025 · 36 min
Jackson Howard: "Risk It All"
Jackson Howard is an editor and writer from Los Angeles who lives in Brooklyn.He’s Senior Editor at Farrar, Straus and Giroux and its imprints MCD and AUWA (headed by Questlove), where he acquires and edits a broad range of fiction and nonfiction. Writers he has published include Judith Butler, Brontez Purnell, Catherine Lacey, Bryan Washington, Laura van den Berg, Sarah Schulman, Jonathan Escoffery, Fernando A. Flores, Susan Straight, Imogen Binnie, Shon Faye, Henry Hoke, Thomas Grattan, Venita Blackburn, Missouri Williams, and many others. Books he has edited have won or been nominated for…
25 Feb 2025 · 41 min
Meghan O'Rourke: "The Glitzy Bits"
Meghan O'Rourke is a writer, poet, and editor. She is the author of the New York Times bestseller The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness (2022); the bestselling memoir The Long Goodbye (2011); and the poetry collections Sun In Days (2017), which was named a New York Times Best Poetry Book of the Year; Once (2011); and Halflife (2007), which was a finalist for the Patterson Poetry Prize and Britain’s Forward First Book Prize. O’Rourke is the recipient of numerous awards, including a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Radcliffe Fellowship, a Whiting Nonfiction Award, the May Sarton Poetry…
11 Feb 2025 · 36 min
Kaitlyn Greenidge: "Making Artifacts"
Kaitlyn Greenidge is the author of Libertie and We Love You, Charlie Freeman, one of the New York Times Critics' Top 10 Books of 2016. Her writing has appeared in the Vogue, Glamour,the Wall Street Journal, Elle, Buzzfeed, Transition Magazine, Virginia Quarterly Review, The Believer, American Short Fiction and other places. She is the recipient of fellowships from the Whiting Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, the Lewis Center for the Arts at Princeton University and the Guggenheim Foundation. She is currently Features Director at…
28 Jan 2025 · 36 min
Emily Greenhouse: "Your Whole Self"
Emily Greenhouse is the editor of the New York Review of Books. She is the former managing editor of The New Yorker.For the full episode transcript, visit the NYRBRecorded September 17, 2024 at the Shapiro Center at Wesleyan UniversityEdited by Michele MosesMusic by Dani LencioniArt by Leanne ShaptonSponsored by Alfred A. KnopfThe Critic and Her Publics is a production of the Shapiro Center for Creative Writing and Criticism at Wesleyan University, New York Review of Books, and Literary Hub. See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at…
29 Nov 2024 · 48 min
The Lit Hub Podcast: Nov 29, 2024
We've got some exciting news regarding the future of The Critic and Her Publics—and here to bring it to you is the latest episode of Literary Hub's The Lit Hub Podcast. If you don't know The Lit Hub Podcast, it's the in-house show at Lit Hub, hosted by podcasts editor Drew Broussard. This week features Merve Emre talking about what's next for TCAHP as well as Lit Hub's editor-in-chief Jonny Diamond on why supporting independent media is important and a raucous round-table of Lit Hub staff talking about awards season.Be sure to subscribe to The Lit Hub Podcast for more bookish fun—and to stay…
E11 · 9 Jul 2024 · 41 min
Christine Smallwood: "Why Do You Do It This Way?"
Christine Smallwood is the author of La Captive (Fireflies Press, 2024) and the novel The Life of the Mind (Hogarth, 2021), which Time magazine named one of the top ten fiction books of the year. Her essays, reviews, and profiles have been published in Harper’s, The New York Review of Books, The New Yorker, Bookforum, and The New York Times Magazine, where she is a contributing writer. She holds a PhD in English from Columbia University and is a core faculty member of the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research, where she teaches courses on the nineteenth-century novel and other…
E10 · 25 Jun 2024 · 40 min
Carina del Valle Schorske: "The Tuning Fork in the Ear"
Carina del Valle Schorske is a writer, translator, and wannabe backup dancer. Her debut essay collection, The Other Island, is forthcoming from Riverhead Books. It was recently awarded a Whiting Creative Nonfiction Grant. She writes about Caribbean culture, literary politics, diasporic dramas, and the songs she can’t stop singing to herself. Her essays have been published many places including The Believer, The Cut, The Point, and the New York Times Magazine, where she is now a contributing writer. As a translator, she focuses on Puerto Rican poetry, especially the work of Marigloria Palma.…
E9 · 11 Jun 2024 · 48 min
Maggie Doherty: "The Problem of Other Minds"
Maggie Doherty is the author of The Equivalents: A Story of Art, Female Friendship, and Liberation in the 1960s (2020), which won the Marfield Prize for Arts Writing and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Biography. Her writing has appeared in The New Yorker, the New York Review of Books, the New York Times, and the Nation, among other publications. Recorded April 9, 2024 at the Shapiro Center at Wesleyan UniversityEdited by Michele MosesMusic by Dani LencioniArt by Leanne ShaptonSponsored by the Shapiro Center for Creative Writing and Criticism at Wesleyan…

About The Critic and Her Publics

The Critic and Her Publics is a English arts & books podcast from Merve Emre. Melo plays each episode straight from the publisher's own feed — no ads added, no account needed — and remembers where you stopped, in this browser only.

Publisher: Merve Emre
Language: English
Category: Arts & Books
New episodes: Every two weeks
Typical length: 41 min
Latest episode: 8 Sep 2026
Feed: RSS — paste into any podcast app
Apple Podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/podcast/id1726935144

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