Show Notes
In this episode of Private Life, Langdon Hammer reads Helen Vendler’s essay, “Chronicles of Love and Loss,” from the May 11, 1995, issue of The New York Review of Books. The essay reviews James Merill’s posthumous collection of poetry, A Scattering of Salts (1995), as well as his poem “The House Fly,” published in the May 13, 1982, issue of the Review. Langdon Hammer is the Niel Gray Jr. Professor of English at Yale and the author of James Merrill: Life and Art. He has reviewed biography and poetry for the Review and has written about the poet Elizabeth Bishop. Helen Vendler was an academic and literary critic, known for her contemporary poetry criticism. She was the Arthur Kingsley Porter University Professor Emerita in the Department of English at Harvard. Vendler was a contributor to the Review for more than forty years. You can read “Chronicles of Love and Loss” with a subscription to The New York Review of Books, which in addition to twenty issues a year, gives you access to our full archive since 1963, searchable on our website.
More from Private Life: A New York Review Podcast
In this episode of Private Life, Elaine Blair joins Jarrett Earnest to talk about feminism, sexuality, and television. They discuss her essay “The Loves of Lena Dunham” (published in the June 7, 2012, issue of the Review) in light of Dunham’s memoir, Famesick (2026), as well as the reputation of her HBO show, Girls. Earnest and Blair also talk about her essay “Fighting for Her Life” (from the June 27, 2019 issue), about Andrea Dworkin; how feminist thinking has shifted in the last few decades; and how cultural criticism reflects changing attitudes. Elaine Blair is a writer and contributor to The New York Review of Books. She has written for Harper’s, The New York Times, and The Paris Review. Next week’s episode will be a recording of “The Loves of Lena Dunham” read by the actress Ruby McCollister. You can read the essays discussed in this episode with a subscription to The New York Review of Books, which, in addition to twenty print issues a year, gives you access to our full archive since 1963.
In this episode of Private Life, Rachel Kushner reads an excerpt from Leslie A. Fiedler’s Love and Death in the American Novel (1960), which was reissued by New York Review Books in April. In Kushner’s selection, Fiedler writes about Mark Twain and the themes and characters of his books The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876) and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884). Kushner is best known for her novels Telex from Cuba (2008), The Flamethrowers (2013), and The Mars Room (2018). Her most recent novel is Creation Lake (2024). Leslie A. Fiedler (1917–2003) was a literary critic and novelist. His books include The Stranger in Shakespeare (1972), Freaks: Myths and Images of the Secret Self (1978), and Fiedler on the Roof: Essays on Literature and Jewish Identity (1991). Last week’s episode featured Edwin Frank in a conversation about Fiedler’s literary criticism and Love and Death in the American Novel. You can find Love and Death in the American Novel at nyrb.com or at your favorite bookseller.
In this episode of Private Life, Edwin Frank joins Jarrett Earnest to discuss Leslie A. Fiedler's Love and Death in the American Novel (1960), which was reissued by NYRB Classics in April. They discuss the preoccupations of Fiedler’s literary criticism, the process of putting together a collection of criticism, and Frank’s book Stranger than Fiction: Lives of the Twentieth Century Novel (2024). Edwin Frank is the editor of New York Review Books as well as the founder and editorial director of the NYRB Classics series. In addition to Stranger than Fiction, he has also released a collection of poems, Snake Train (2015). Leslie A. Fiedler (1917–2003) was a literary critic and novelist. He published two novels and three short story collections, as well as dozens of volumes of criticism, including The Stranger in Shakespeare (1972), Freaks: Myths and Images of the Secret Self (1978), and Fiedler on the Roof: Essays on Literature and Jewish Identity (1991). Next week’s episode will be a selection from Love and Death in the American Novel, read by the writer Rachel Kushner. You can find Love and Death in the American Novel at nyrb.com or at your favorite bookseller.
In this episode of Private Life, the actress Holland Taylor reads Renata Adler’s essay “The Perils of Pauline,” an expansive assessment of Pauline Kael’s film criticism from the Review’s August 14, 1980, issue. Taylor has been working on films, television, and Broadway since the 1960s. She is a nine-time Emmy nominee, winning once, in 1999, for her role as a judge on The Practice. She was nominated for a Tony Award in 2013 for playing Texas governor Ann Richards in Ann. Renata Adler is a journalist and film critic who was a staff writer at The New Yorker for four decades. Her books include A Year in the Dark (1969); Toward a Radical Middle (1970); Gone: The Last Days of The New Yorker (1999); and the novels Speedboat (1976) and Pitch Dark (1983), which were both reissued by NYRB Classics. Last week’s episode was an interview with Lucy Sante that discussed Adler’s essay and film criticism. You can read “The Perils of Pauline” and other essays with a subscription to The New York Review of Books, which, in addition to twenty print issues a year, gives you access to our full archive since 1963.
In the second season premiere of Private Life, host Jarrett Earnest is joined by the writer and critic Lucy Sante to discuss Pauline Kael’s career, pop culture writing, and Sante’s writing for the Review, where she has been a frequent contributor since the 1980s. The conversation focuses on “The Perils of Pauline” (published in the magazine’s August 14, 1980, issue), Renata Adler’s blistering assessment of Kael’s film criticism; the legacy of staff film critics; and Sante’s relationship with popular music from Elvis to The Velvet Underground. Lucy Sante is the author of Low Life: Lures and Snares of Old New York (1991), Six Sermons for Bob Dylan (2024), and the memoir I Heard Her Call My Name (2024). Her first essay for the Review, “Relic” (published in the December 17, 1981, issue), reviewed Albert Goldman’s controversial 1981 biography, Elvis. Sante taught writing and the history of photography at Bard College for twenty-four years. Next week’s episode will be a recording of Adler’s “The Perils of Pauline” read by the actress Holland Taylor. You can read the essays discussed in this episode with a subscription to The New York Review of Books, which, in addition to twenty print issues a year, gives you access to our full archive since 1963.