Literary Friction
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Literary Friction
A monthly conversation about books and ideas on NTS Radio hosted by friends Carrie Plitt, a literary agent, and Octavia Bright, a writer and academic. Each show features an author interview, book recommendations, lively discussion and a little music too, all built around a related theme - anything f...
Episodi recenti
157 episodiLiterary Friction - Year (and Decade) in Review 2023
It's time for our usual Year in Review show, but seeing as this is also our last EVER episode (sob!), we're shaking things up a little to bring you a...
Literary Friction - A Life of One's Own with Xialou Guo
What does it mean, to pursue a life of your own? And what is art and literature's role in figuring out what that might look like? This month we're del...
Minisode Forty-Five: Friendship
Our theme this month was suggested by our patron Maral, who asked us to do an episode about our friendship, because she’s interested in how our (very!...
Literary Friction - Desire with K Patrick
How do the people and things we desire shape our identities? And how do you render the physical intensity of desire on the page? Author K Patrick join...
Minisode Forty-four: Parenthood
Last year we made a minisode about mothers, and one about fathers, both of which began an ongoing conversation about parenthood and literature that we...
Literary Friction - Doppelgangers with Naomi Klein
What is it about doppelgangers that's so endlessly compelling? Who better to answer this question than the one and only Naomi Klein, who joined us to...
Minisode Forty-Three: Sad Girl Novels
Our theme this month was suggested by our patron Mary, who asked us to talk about so-called 'sad girl novels', and it turns out we have some strong op...
Literary Friction - Short Stories with Arinze Ifeakandu
What makes a brilliant short story? Are they better read as part of a collection or as a sharp shot on their own? How do you render fully formed chara...
RE-RUN: Author Special with Ocean Vuong
We first aired this episode back in July 2019, and it was recorded in the studio when Ocean was on the international tour for his novel On Earth We’re...
Minisode Forty-Two: Artificial Intelligence
Are you a techno-optimist or a techno-pessimist? Or even a total Luddite? Does Chat GPT excite you or completely freak you out? Our theme this month w...
Literary Friction - Dark Comedy with Lorrie Moore
Dark humour - do you love it or hate it? Do you find it cathartic or macho? Can humour ever be too dark, and is it a useful political tool? This month...
RE-RUN - Minisode Three: Red Flags
Octavia has been away on her book tour, so today we’re bringing you a re-run of one of our earliest minisodes from April 2019. It was a fun one, inspi...
Literary Friction - Romantic Comedy with Curtis Sittenfeld
From Pride and Prejudice to Detransition, Baby, the romcom can be an enduring source of great pleasure, fun and comfort. This month we’re thrilled to...
Minisode Forty: Author Special with Octavia Bright
Today’s show is an author special, and in the hot seat is our very own Octavia Bright. You probably know by now that Octavia’s first book This Ragged...
Literary Friction - Writing about Writers with Tan Twan Eng
Do you like reading about writers? What does good writing about the act of writing do? And what happens when you write a real writer into a novel? Our...
Minisode Thirty-nine: Cities
How do you feel about cities? Do you love the thrust and thrum of them, or are you more interested in escaping it? Do you like to read urban histories...
Literary Friction - Feminism with Sara Ahmed
What's the relationship between feminist writing and feminist activism? What does it mean to be a feminist killjoy, and what can we learn from her? Th...
Minisode Thirty-Eight: Book covers
Today our theme is… kinda judgy! Everyone says you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, but we all know everyone does. So, this month we thought we'd...
Literary Friction - Dancing Time with Jacqueline Crooks
Dancing can be about escape, about pleasure, but it can also be about protest. It can be a powerful means of expression, but how does writing capture...
Minisode Thirty-Seven: Etiquette
Our theme this month was inspired by a recent story in New York magazine about, as they described it, “How to text, tip, ghost, host, and generally ex...
Literary Friction - Journalism with Tania Branigan
When journalists write books, how do they balance the potentially tricky relationship between weaving a compelling narrative and sticking to the facts...
Minisode Thirty-six: Money
Money makes the world go round: it's an inescapable presence in our lives, and yet in a lot of cultures it's still a pretty big conversational taboo....
Literary Friction - The Lives of Others with Kathryn Scanlan
Portraits of real people abound in books. There are novels that use transcribed conversations, like Sheila Heti’s How Should A Person Be, or fiction b...
Minisode Thirty-Five: Food and Feasting
Our January theme is heavily influenced by this time of year. Because the winter months are full of different feast days and celebrations, and because...
Literary Friction - RE-RUN: Abstract Romanticism with Chris Kraus
We're on our end of year break, but didn't want to leave you without some LF to keep you company while you cook up your leftovers and potter around in...
Literary Friction - Year in Review 2022
Somehow it's already our last Literary Friction of 2022, which means as usual it's time for our year in review show, packed full of recommendations ju...
Literary Friction - Deception with Yiyun Li
When it comes to fiction, why are people so obsessed with authenticity and so appalled by literary deception? Does it matter who tells a story? And wh...
Literary Friction - Graphic Novels with Lizzy Stewart
In this show we're getting to grips with graphic novels. What's the history of this kind of storytelling? What narrative possibilities does the form o...
Literary Friction - Playing Games with Gabrielle Zevin
This month we’re delighted to welcome Gabrielle Zevin to Literary Friction. Gabrielle’s latest novel Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is an engros...
Rediscovery with Jamaica Kincaid and Stu Wilson (Picador Sponsored Episode)
For this minisode we’re doing something a little different - this episode is sponsored by publisher Picador, who this year have launched a new list of...
Minisode Thirty-Three: Correspondence
It's autumn in the UK and we're full of that back to school feeling - fresh pencils, new pens and notebooks - so what better time for a minisode about...
Literary Friction - RE-RUN: a Spoonful of Sugar with Leïla Slimani
We're on our summer break, which means we can re-run this excellent conversation we had with the French-Moroccan author Leïla Slimani in 2018. Leïla c...
Fandom with Sheena Patel
When does fandom tip over into unhealthy obsession? What are the power dynamics of being someone's fan, and how do they get exploited? This month auth...
Minisode Thirty-Two: A Short History of Literary Friction (Patreon Sneak Peek)
For this month's minisode, we thought we'd give our listeners a preview of some of the bonus minisodes that we're creating for our patreon subscribers...
Literary Friction Special - Elif Batuman
This month we're bringing you an author special with Elif Batuman, who joined Carrie in cyberspace to talk about her hilarious and original second nov...
Minisode Thirty-One: Parties
Spring is finally really happening here in the UK: the roses are out, we’ve swapped our coats for jackets, we even had dinner together outside the oth...
Minisode Thirty: Libraries
This minisode is a sister to our last one about bookshops - this month, we're talking about libraries. We love libraries! Those other places where you...
The Instant with Amy Liptrot
Whether it’s a single action that reverberates around a community, or the rupture of a break-up, literature is filled with memorable instants after wh...
Minisode Twenty-Nine: Bookshops
The theme for this minisode was suggested by our patron Maria and it's a subject very close to our hearts: bookshops. We love bookshops - those magica...
Satire with Pola Oloixarac
We love a good satire here at LF, so we're thrilled this month to bring you a show dedicated to the form. Argentine writer and novelist Pola Oloixarac...