Longform

Eric Lach is a staff writer at The New Yorker, where he covers New York. His latest article is “The Mayor and the Con Man.” “I think about my own trajectory, my little generation of journalists—it was easier to get jobs reporting on national politics than to get a job reporting on something that you could see and go to and that is a really strange thing, the relief and the joy that I feel like when I can just take the subway twenty minutes to go see something interesting for a story or talk to somebody interesting or explore physically and not just feel like I’m making phone calls and Googling. It’s a very different kind of work, but it’s just not something that was super available.” Show notes: @Eric Lach Lach on Longform Lach’s New Yorker archive 08:00 "Eric Adams Says He Has Swagger. What Else Does He Have?" (New Yorker • Jan 2022) 12:00 "What is Eric Adams’s Plan for the Riker Island Crisis?" (New Yorker • Jan 2022) 13:00 "Eric Adams Wants to Compstat New York City" (New Yorker • May 2021) 15:00 “E

Willa Paskin, a former TV critic, is the host of the podcast Decoder Ring. “I want it to feel like a trap door. When you push on a trap door, there’s like a little spring. If it’s the right idea, you start to look into it, and you’re like, Oh, it’s giving a little.” Show notes: @willapaskin 00:00 Paskin's Slate archive 00:00 Paskin's Salon archive 00:00 Paskin's Vulture archive 00:00 Decoder Ring (Slate) 00:00 "The Invention of Hydration" (Decoder Ring • Slate • Apr 2021) 00:00 "Cellino & Barnes, Injury Attorneys, 800-888-8888 " (Decoder Ring • Slate • Dec 2022) 01:00 "The Sideways Effect" (Decoder Ring • Slate • May 2022) 03:00 "Why I Became a TV Critic" (Slate • Jan 2016) 38:00 "The Laff Box" (Decoder Ring • Slate • Apr 2018) 38:00 "The Blue Steak Experiment" (Decoder Ring • Slate • Dec 2020) 40:00 "Chuck E. Cheese Pizza War" (Decoder Ring • Slate • Jun 2019) 40:00 "The Cabbage Patch Kids Riots" (Decoder Ring • Slate • Nov 2020) 42:00 "Selling Out" (Decoder Ring • Slate • Aug 2021) 42:00 "

Abraham Josephine Riesman is a journalist who writes often for New York and is the author of True Believer: The Rise and Fall of Stan Lee. Her second book, Ringmaster: Vince McMahon and the Unmaking of America, will be published in March. “You’re sure that there’s a level of unreality, but you’re not sure that it’s all fake. There’s stuff there that seems either plausible or sometimes you go ‘there’s no way you could fake that.’ And sometimes you’re right, and a lot of times you’re somewhere in the middle. It’s not as easily distinguished as saying this is fact and this is fiction, this was scripted and this was improvised, whatever. You can’t make those distinctions easily, and one of the things I sort of hope comes out of the book—if it has any impact at all—is to try to get us past this false binary of true and false.” Show notes: @abrahamjoseph abrahamriesman.com Riesman on Longform Riesman’s New York Magazine archive 16:00 "She Was WWE’s First Female Referee. She Says Vince McMahon Raped Her." (New

Jonah Weiner is a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine and co-author of the newsletter Blackbird Spyplane. “It's a version of myself. It's a hyperbolic version of myself. And I think it keeps it fun for me. It doesn't feel like a job. Ideally, it keeps it fun for readers. And I think that there actually is this function where X out of 10 people coming to it, their eyes are going to cross and they're going say, I'm out. No thanks. And that's fine, because the Y out of 10 who stick around feel that much more in on something and it just makes it feel like a funky, special place.” Show notes: @jonahweiner jonahweiner.com Weiner on Longform 00:00 Weiner on Longform Podcast 01:00 "Prying Eyes" (New Yorker • Oct 2012) 01:00 Blackbird Spyplane (Jonah Weiner and Erin Wylie • Substack) 06:00 "Don’t Take This Hunk at Face Value" (New York Times • Mar 2011) 11:00 "Michael Mann’s Damaged Men" (New York Times Magazine • Jul 2022) 23:00 "Wonders of Tokyo" (Blackbird Spyplane • Nov 2022) 23:00 "It’s

Delia Cai is the senior vanities correspondent for Vanity Fair and publishes the media newsletter Deez Links. Her debut novel Central Places is out this week. “This was in like, 2011, where I think actual journalists were still trying to figure out ‘Is it gross to be a brand?’ And at least in school, they were all about it. They’re like, ‘You need a brand, you need to think about what your niche is going to be, you need to think about engaging your audience.’ We had to make websites, we had to blog, and of course, all of us being college students, we started using our blogs to write about each other. We used Twitter to talk shit about each other in a very thinly veiled way. So really, it was the best training for being online.” Show notes: @delia_cai deliacai.com Cai’s Vanity Fair archive Deez Links archive 15:00 Cai’s blog 27:00 "Three Generations of Blue's Clues Hosts Are Still Cool With Being Your Best Friend" (Vanity Fair • Dec 2022) 37:00 "She Invented Adulting. Her Life Fell Apart. She Wants You

Peggy Orenstein is a journalist and author. Her latest book is Unraveling. “The challenge is… to not want to say, I need to know what the book is about. I need to have my chapters. I need to know what exactly I'm looking for. Because it's really scary to just go out and report and have trust that there's going to be interesting things and that if you just keep going, you're going to find them. So to not foreclose possibility and options and ideas is the biggest reporting challenge for those sorts of books for me.” Show notes: @peggyorenstein peggyorenstein.com 01:00Girls & Sex (Harper • 2016) 01:00 Boys & Sex (Harper • 2020) 01:00 Cinderella Ate My Daughter (Harper • 2012) 01:00 Waiting for Daisy (Bloomsbury • 2007) 01:00 Unraveling (Harper • 2023) 14:00 Salt: A World History (Mark Kurlansky • Penguin Books • 2003) 18:00 "Mourning My Miscarriage" (New York Times Magazine • Apr 2002) 21:00 Schoolgirls: Young Women, Self-Esteem and the Confidence Gap (Anchor • 1995) 25:00 "Champion of the Deep" (New

Jonathan Goldstein is an audio producer and the host of Heavyweight. “I wasn’t taking myself very seriously, initially. I liked working with my friends and family because I think I was a little more comfortable with them. Then in the second season people were writing in with real problems, and they were looking at me as a kind of expert. It was terrifying to meet with these people and see the look of hopefulness in their eyes. ... I realized I need to step it up and even if I didn’t feel like an expert—an expert in an invented field that doesn’t really exist—that I’d really have to take that on with seriousness.” Show notes: @J_Goldstein Goldstein’s Heavyweight archive 02:00 "Plan B" (Ira Glass • This American Life • Feb 2002) 10:00 Goldstein’s This American Life archive 14:00 Lenny Bruce is Dead (Counterpoint Press • 2006) 16:00 "I Know What You Did This Summer" (Ira Glass • This American Life • Aug 2001) 17:00 "Other People’s Problems" (Jonathan Goldstein • CBC • Sept 2020) 19:00Goldstein’s Wiretap

Katy Vine is an executive editor for Texas Monthly. “This is a huge state. There’s so much, and it’s different everywhere you look. You just go to Houston and there’s worlds within worlds within worlds just within the one city. You go to San Antonio and you’re in a different country, and you go to Dallas, you’re in a totally different country. … It’s wild to me. It’s endlessly fascinating.” Show notes: @Katy_Vine Vine on Longform Vine’s Texas Monthly archive 07:00 "Family Circus" (Texas Monthly • Aug 2002) 16:00 "Just Desserts" (Texas Monthly • Jan 2016) 20:00 "The Wildest Insurance Fraud Scheme Texas Has Ever Seen" (Texas Monthly • Sep 2020) 23:00 "Plenty of Ammo" (Texas Monthly • Aug 2001) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Khabat Abbas is an independent journalist and video producer from northeastern Syria, and the winner of the 2021 Kurt Schork News Fixer Award. ”I can see from my experience that there is a gap between the editors, who are kind of elites in their luxury offices, and the amazing journalists who are in the field, who all sympathize with what they are seeing on the ground and want to cover [it], but they have to satisfy the editors. And this is how we end up having little gaps in the ways of covering in general. It's not a matter of like, they shaped it in this way. The problem, I think, it’s bigger. How this industry is working, how this industry is deciding what they should cover.” Show notes: @khabat_abas Kurt Schork Awards in International Journalism 34:00 "'Belief Allows Us to Move Forward,' Said One Female Soldier in Battle Against ISIS" (ABC News • July 2017) 40:00 "The Former 'Caliphate Capital' Is Haunted by Fears of an ISIS Comeback" (Washington Post • May 2020) 43:00 "How ISIS Women and Their Chil

Chloé Cooper Jones is a philosopher and journalist whose work has appeared in GQ, The Verge, The Believer and many other publications. Her new book is Easy Beauty. ”I literally didn't talk to anyone in my life about disability until I was, like, 30. Ever. Not my husband, not my friends, as little as possible to my own mother. I had this very bad idea that what I needed to do in every single social situation was wait until people could unsee my body…. And it was all in service of trying to be truly recognized or truly seen. And, of course, what was happening is I was involved in a complete act of self erasure because my body and my real self are related…. There is no real me without my physical self…. I did not think I was going to ever write about this, but once I started, it felt like I met myself for the first time.” Show notes: @CCooperJones chloecooperjones.com  Cooper Jones on Longform 00:00 Easy Beauty (Avid Reader Press/Simon & Schuster • 2022) 01:00 "Fearing for His Life" (The Verge • Mar 2019)

David Wolman is the author of six books and a magazine features writer who has written for Wired, Outside, and The New York Times. His latest article is ”Vanished in the Pacific.” “I feel like conversations about characters, character development, strong characters gets a little nauseating in my field sometimes because it’s like, of course — you need that like you need periods at the ends of sentences. Do we really have to keep saying it? But in this conversation it’s worth saying, because there are great ideas out there where the sources or the characters just really weren't there and then you’re tucking your tail in between your legs to look for the next one.” Show notes: @davidwolman david-wolman.com 03:00 Aloha Rodeo (Wolman and Julian Smith • Harpers Collins • 2020) 09:00 "The Ultimate Counterfeiter Isn't a Crook—He's an Artist" (Wired • May 2012) 13:00 "The Cold War" (Wolman and Julian Smith • Epic Magazine • Sept 2015) 21:00 Atellan Media 31:00 The End of Money (Da Capo • 2013) Learn more abo

Clint Smith is a poet and a staff writer for The Atlantic. His most recent book is How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America and his latest feature is “Monuments to the Unthinkable.” “I've been to a lot of places that carry a history of death and slaughter and murder. I've been on plantations. I've been in execution chambers. I've sat on electric chairs. I've been on death row. But I have never experienced anything like what I experienced walking through the gas chamber in Dachau. I mean, there's reading books about the Holocaust, and then there's that. And that is something that I hope to continue doing for the rest of my life: putting my body where these things happen. Because it completely transforms your understanding of what it was like.” Show notes: @ClintSmithIII clintsmithiii.com Smith on Longform Smith's Atlantic archive 00:00 How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America (Little Brown • 2021) 01:00 "Monuments to the Unthinka

Grant Wahl was the founder of Fútbol with Grant Wahl, a longtime writer for Sports Illustrated, and the author of The Beckham Experiment and Masters of Modern Soccer. He died on December 10, covering the World Cup in Qatar. This interview was recorded in January 2016. “I never would have predicted I would do soccer full time. And that’s happened. I’d love to say that this was all planned and inevitable but it really wasn’t.” Show notes:  Fútbol with Grant Wahl Wahl's Sports Illustrated archive “Soccer Journalist Dies at World Cup After Collapsing at Argentina Game” (The New York Times) “RIP Grant Wahl” (Chris Wittyngham, Fútbol with Grant Wahl) “Remembering Grant Wahl: A Sterling Example of How to Work With Principle” (Sports Illustrated) “Remembering Grant Wahl, a champion of American soccer” (The Atlantic) “Live like adored soccer writer Grant Wahl and smell those roses” (Indy Star) “There was something Bourdain-like about the big, soccer life Grant Wahl led” (Los Angeles Times) “Grant Wahl'

Ryan O’Hanlon is a soccer writer for ESPN. His new book is Net Gains: Inside the Beautiful Game’s Analytics Revolution. “It wasn’t just that I was burned out from two years at The Ringer, it was being burned out from nine years of just freakin’ bobbing up and down to keep my head above water, and changing the water every year.” Show notes: @rwohan ryanohanlon.com O’Hanlon’s article archive 05:00 Net Gains (Abrams Books • 2022) 13:00 O’Hanlon’s Run of Play archive 13:00 O’Hanlon’s Grantland archive 13:00 O’Hanlon’s The Ringer archive 22:00 O’Hanlon’s The Good Men Project archive 22:00 O’Hanlon’s Buzzfeed archive 22:00 "Living the Yahoo! Answers Lifestyle" (Buzzfeed • Jun 2012) 23:00 "A Q&A With Red Bulls Goalie and Yonkers Native Ryan Meara" (New York • April 2012) 26:00 No Grass in the Clouds 26:00 O’Hanlon’s Outside archive 33:00 "Bill Simmons Suspended by ESPN for Tirade on Roger Goodell" (Richard Sandomir • New York Times • Sept 2014) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastch

Bradley Hope and Tom Wright are former journalists at The Wall Street Journal, the co-founders of journalism studio Project Brazen, and the co-authors of the book Billion Dollar Whale. Their new podcast is Corinna and The King. Hope’s new book is “The Rebel and the Kingdom.” “We’re a little bit skeptical of just jumping into the big story of the day with something that doesn’t feel differentiated. It needs to have character, storytelling — it can’t just be a great topic, or an important topic, even.” Show notes: @bradleyhope @TomWrightAsia Hope’s Wall Street Journal archive Wright’s Wall Street Journal archive 06:00 Billion Dollar Whale (Hachette Books • 2019) 09:00 Project Brazen 10:00 Blood and Oil (Hope and Justin Sheck • Hachette Books • 2020) 19:00 Fat Leonard (Project Brazen • 2021) 25:00 Persona: The French Deception (Evan Ratliff • Verified • 2022) 47:00 "Road Trip! American Student Joins Rebels in Fight for Qaddafi Stronghold" (Hope • The National • Aug 2011) Learn more about your ad cho

Hanif Abdurraqib is a poet, essayist, and critic whose work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times Magazine and many other publications. His latest book is A Little Devil in America: In Praise of Black Performance. “I learn from hearing my elders tell stories. There’s an inherent knowing of yourself as a vessel for narration who also has to—is required to—hold the attention of others at all costs. And that’s essentially what I’m trying to do. The broader project of my writing is almost a constant pleading of: Don’t leave yet. Stay here with me for just a little bit longer.” Show notes: @NifMuhammad abdurraqib.com Abdurraqib on Longform 02:00 A Little Devil in America (Random House • 2021) 09:00 Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung (Lester Bangs • Anchor • 1988) 10:00 The Crown Ain’t Worth Much (Button Poetry • 2016) 14:00 They Can’t Kill Us Until They Kill Us (Two Dollar Radio • 2017) 20:00 Go Ahead in the Rain: Notes to A Tribe Called Quest (University of Texas Press • 2019) 25:00 Sta

Audie Cornish is a journalist and the former host of NPR’s All Things Considered. Her new CNN Audio podcast is The Assignment. “I think there is journalism inherent in an interview. Like the interview itself should be considered a piece of journalism. It isn't always. Sometimes the vibe is that it’s a little window dressing or that it's personality driven and I don't subscribe to that. I think that it has its own journalism. It's my journalism.” Show notes: @AudieCornish Cornish's NPR archive 01:00 The Assignment (CNN Audio • 2022) 25:00 "Letters: 'Music Curator' Diplo" (NPR • Jun 2012) 36:00 Cornish’s Twitter thread (Jan 2022) 43:00 Serial (Serial Productions) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Taffy Brodesser-Akner is a staff writer at the New York Times and the creator of the new Hulu television series Fleishman Is in Trouble, based on her bestselling novel. “I took the cast out to dinner … And the way they began talking to each other, which was very intimate, was like a punch in the stomach. Because I had always thought that I got people to open up to me [in celebrity profiles]. And I was like, Oh, no, I got them to answer questions differently than maybe they had before. … And that was a little devastating to me.” Show notes: @taffyakner taffyakner.com  Brodesser-Akner on Longform 00:00 Brodesser-Akner on Longform Podcast (#126) 00:00 Brodesser-Akner on Longform Podcast (#350) 01:00 Brodesser-Akner's New York Times archive 01:00 Brodesser-Akner's GQ archive 01:00 Fleishman Is in Trouble (Hulu • 2022) 01:00 Fleishman Is in Trouble (Random House • 2020) 04:00 "Billy Bob Thornton on Bad Santa 2, Ungrateful Fans, and Why He Won't Direct Anymore" (GQ • Nov 2016) 09:00 "Jimmy Buffett Do

Nancy Updike is a founding producer and senior editor at This American Life. Jenelle Pifer, a former Longform Podcast editor, is a senior producer at Serial. Their new three-part podcast, hosted by Updike and produced by Pifer, is We Were Three. Updike: “I say it’s a story that’s a bit about COVID, but really about a family, and that’s the closest I’ve gotten to a short version. I don’t know. Why is that? I never have a short version of something I’m working on—never.” Pifer: “We were doing a lot of talking about, for Nancy, what are the driving questions you tend to be attracted to? There were a few things we came up with, one of which was that you tend to gravitate toward stories where somebody is in the middle of something that they don’t know what to make of yet, and you kind of just want to sit with them and see what direction they walk in, or what they say, or what meaning they put onto something.” Show notes: @jenellepifer jenelle-pifer.com Updike’s This American Life archive Updike’s New York Time

Andy Kroll is an investigative reporter for ProPublica. His new book is A Death on W Street: The Murder of Seth Rich and the Age of Conspiracy. “I think a book has ruined me for writing hot takes and spicy Twitter dunks and all of these other one- and two-dimensional bits of ephemera. I wasn't really a big fan of it in the first place, but I can't do it anymore. A book forces you to look at the world in a much more fine grained, humane, empathetic way, and there's no going back from that.” Show notes: @AndyKroll andy-kroll.com Kroll on Longform Kroll's ProPublica archive Kroll's Rolling Stone archive 01:00 A Death on W Street: The Murder of Seth Rich and the Age of Conspiracy (PublicAffairs • 2022) 21:00 "Ted Cruz’s Secret Weapon to Win the Right" (National Journal • Jun 2015) 22:00 "Ted Cruz’s Howitzer" (New Republic • Jan 2016) 22:00 "The Staying Power of Nancy Pelosi" (The Atlantic • Sep 2015) 22:00 "The Last Days of Jerry Brown" (California Sunday Magazine • Mar 2018) 31:00 "Seth Rich, Slain DN