#adam kirsch

[luxe-pauvre]

Being a reader means cultivating a relationship with the world that, by most standards, can seem pointless and counterproductive. Reading is not profitable; it doesn’t teach you any transferable skills or offer any networking opportunities. On the contrary, it is an antisocial activity in the most concrete sense: To do it you have to be alone, or else pretend you’re alone by tuning out other people. Reading teaches you to be more interested in what’s going on inside your head than in the real world.

Adam Kirsch, Reading Is a Vice

[stardustsideblogg]

Kirsch quotes Rosaura Sanchez and Beatrice Pita: "for Mexicans in the US Southwest, Nakba came in 1848." (pg. 84 On Settler Colonialism)

This statement is so puzzling. It's in reference the Mexican-American War and the way it's framed, the quote makes Mexicans indigenous people being displaced by Americans.

But Mexico itself is a settler colonist country, being once part of the Spanish Empire. Surely the situation is more colonist country vs colonist country fighting over territory?

[dagwolf]

The Reality of Settler Colonialism - Boston Review

Writers like Adam Kirsch mock the idea to demonize critics of Israel. The phenomenon itself remains.

Excellent reading. I'll let you all pull quotes; there's so many good ones to grab.

[dk-thrive]

The time that had passed...had not passed for me; in a real sense I was in another world, the world of the book.

One of my strongest early memories of reading comes from fifth grade, when I was so engrossed in a book that I read right through a spelling test without noticing it was happening. I remember this incident partly because I was afraid I would get in trouble. But I think the real reason it stays in my memory after 40 years was the feeling of uncanniness. The time that had passed in the classroom had not passed for me; in a real sense I was in another world, the world of the book.

Being a reader means cultivating a relationship with the world that, by most standards, can seem pointless and counterproductive. Reading is not profitable; it doesn’t teach you any transferable skills or offer any networking opportunities. On the contrary, it is an antisocial activity in the most concrete sense: To do it you have to be alone, or else pretend you’re alone by tuning out other people. Reading teaches you to be more interested in what’s going on inside your head than in the real world.

— Adam Kirsch, from "Reading is a Vice" in The Atlantic, January 2, 2026.

[grandhotelabyss]

But I do think that it’s been an idea for the last 50 years or maybe even more that poetry is on the side of peace and justice and that writing a poem is itself a virtuous act. And one of the things I’m saying in this essay is that historically that’s not true. Historically, a lot of poetry and even some of the great poetry, is about violence and oppression and things that we wouldn’t countenance in actual life. I quote the Hazlitt essay in which he talks about Coriolanus and asks why it is that Shakespeare makes us sympathize with someone who’s this authoritarian general and who looks down on the common people. And yet it’s thrilling when he’s on the stage because, he says, poetry and power have something in common. Poetry likes things that are vivid and individual and dramatic, and in a way all those things are antithetical to democracy, which is about what is average and true for everyone and universal. It’s more prosaic. So I think it’s just worth keeping in mind that good politics don’t necessarily make a good poem; a good poem doesn’t necessarily have good politics.

Adam Kirsch

[universitybookstore]

One of the greatest American literary critics turns out to have been -- no suprise, really -- an admirable and amusing correspondent as well. New from FSG and editor Adam Kirsch, Life in Culture: Selected letters of Lionel Trilling.

[foreverlostinliterature]

The Global Novel by Adam Kirsch

A blog about books and book reviews

Hey guys! I have a new review up for a short little book called The Global Novel by Adam Kirsch, which explores the concept of what the ‘global novel is.’ I’m bad of summing up books, so I think the synopsis sums it up the best, describing it as a collection of essays exploring “urgent contemporary concerns -- climate change, genetic engineering, and immigration -- along with timeless themes, such as morality, society, and human relationships. Whether its stories take place on the scale of the species or the small town, the global novel situates its characters against the widest background of the imagination. The way we live now demands nothing less than the global perspective our best novelists have to offer.” This was a very thought-provoking read, so I definitely recommend you check it out!

[luxe-pauvre]

If we want to keep reading from going extinct, then the best thing we could do is tell young people what so many great writers readily admit: Literature doesn’t make you a better citizen or a more successful person. A passion for reading can even make life more difficult. And you don’t cultivate a passion for the sake of democracy. You do it for the thrill of staying up late to read under the covers by flashlight, unable to stop and hoping no one finds out.

Adam Kirsch, Reading Is a Vice