I’m not much of a podcast guy but I had SO much fun talking about @sinnersmovie.bsky.social on the @harryandjenpodcast.bsky.social and I think you can tell. It’s such a great movie and there’s so much to talk about! Spoilers abound so be sure to watch it first. open.spotify.com/episode/64Dm...

It’s @harvardbookstore.bsky.social Virtual Warehouse Sale day!

I was telling a friend in Portland that while I am very grateful if anyone buys my book, I am EXTRA grateful if they buy it from an indie bookstore! Firstly because I love supporting bookstores, and secondly because that’s likely the best shot I have for getting it onto store shelves…

A late summer dahlia from my garden #Flowers #Dahlias #MagentaMonday #MacroMonday #ColorADay #PinkMon #Bloomscrolling #BackyardBlooms #Anthophile #Photography #Edmonds

What a fucking G.

Only 3 more days to submit to the roundtable on Olga Tokarczuk's 18th Century that @kasiaiskasia.bsky.social and I are organizing for the 2026 ASECS. Your abstracts have to go through the ASECS portal, but please reach out to us individually if you're thinking of submitting & have any questions.

Wrote a little about Lisa Ko’s Memory Piece, which is a great story about female friendship and becoming an artist, and also an absolutely terrifying look at the dystopian future awaiting us. kasiareads.com/2025/09/17/m...

#18thc pals, pls RT: @kasiaiskasia.bsky.social & I are assembling a roundtable for the American Society for 18th-C Studies mting in Philly in April, on Olga Tokarczuk's 18th Century. Abstracts due 9/22. Pls help us think together about this fabulous novelist's wayward ways with our period & its 📚.

@prisonculture.bsky.social If you haven’t read this, by Toni Cade Bambara’s grandchild Zoe Bambara, I think you’ll appreciate it. ”We do what Grandma Toni taught my momma, and what my momma taught me. We talk to our neighbors.“ hoodcommunist.org/2025/07/25/t...

We didn't stop them, but we slowed them down. They got hundreds of us, but we kept them from getting hundreds more, and it wasn't violence or graffiti or insults that did the job, it was regular people getting involved. It was my neighbor the speech therapist, it was my friend the life-coach. 8/

Why? Well, for starters, 300 ICE agents have been moved to Chicago, leaving only about 300 in LA County which is about what we had before Trump took office. Why are they leaving? Because LA made their jobs TOO FUCKING HARD. LA Organized. LA sat on corners outside Home Depots with radios. 5/

Wrote a little about Danzy Senna’s Colored Television, which is a super interesting novel about artistic ambition and marriage kasiareads.com/2025/09/07/c...

Catch me promoting the @openletterbooks.bsky.social sale and some of my favorite #WiTMonth reads for @mid-theory.bsky.social!

Cramming in a few more #WiTMonth books — I wrote a little bit about A Singularity by Balsam Karam, tr. Saskia Vogel, pub. @feministpress.bsky.social I have been reflexively avoiding books lauded as “devastating” but I picked this up knowing nothing about it and it is really incredible.

“Chicago has long helped to keep alive tiny fields & esoteric areas of humanistic study... Without the univ’s support, & the continued training of grad students who can keep these bodies of kn going, entire spheres of human learning might eventually blink out.” www.theatlantic.com/culture/arch...

Camping with a bunch of friends and their kids. S: I hope no one gets hurt, I only brought one band-aid. T: Oh, I have several boxes. Me: I didn’t bring any band-aids. T, lovingly: nobody thought you did, Kasia. Me: I did bring tinned fish though! S: That tracks.

I wrote a little bit about Nan Da’s The Chinese Tragedy of King Lear, a complex and gripping read. kasiareads.com/2025/08/20/t...

A piece of good news!

A cool thing about copy-editors is that they can teach you that it’s HOME in, not HONE in

Another excellent #WiTMonth book (from @archipelagobooks.bsky.social) — wry, bristly, surprising. Scholastique Mukasonga is the rare author who lives up to the hype.

August is Women in Translation Month, aka #WITMonth and it’s something I really try to honor because I think it’s cool and important. So today I’m kicking things off with Years and Years by Hwang Jungeun, translated by Janet Hong, from @openletterbooks.bsky.social

Along with four other Jewish scholars of Jewish studies, I published an opinion piece in today’s Guardian about why we joined an amicus brief in Harvard’s case against the federal government. The article is here www.theguardian.com/commentisfre... #Palestine #Israel #Harvard #antisemitism

Making animated movies into live action: tiresome, unnecessary, lame Re-making every classic film into a muppet movie with a single human actor: sophisticated, erudite, revolutionary

A fab book that my Reading and Community class read an early draft of and loved!!!

I wrote a very short book about book clubs, a kind of memoir/essay, and it’s coming out in October! press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/bo...

Opened my email just now to learn THE BARBARA JOHNSON COLLECTIVE received enthusiastic final board approval — it will officially be in the world soon(ish)!!!!!!! @nathankhensley.bsky.social is the best co-editor. Can’t wait for these brilliant, gorgeous, sometimes gutting essays to appear in print.

I know these lists are generally terrible (and always almost entirely anglophone) but this one is so bad that I have to share. (Full disclosure, I have only read 19 of them) www.latimes.com/entertainmen...

The winner of the 2024 Barrios Book in Translation Prize is Gwendolyn Harper’s translation from the Spanish of “A Last Supper of Queer Apostles” by Pedro Lemebel! #NBCCAwards @penguinbooksusa.bsky.social

The winner of the John Leonard Prize, given to an outstanding first book in any genre, is “Feeding Ghosts: A Graphic Memoir” by Tessa Hulls! #NBCCAwards @fsgbooks.bsky.social

Wrote a little about No Other Land. See it if you can. kasiareads.com/2025/03/17/n...

I wrote about Morgan Talty’s Fire Exit, which I’m still thinking about weeks later. kasiareads.com/2025/03/12/f...

This is very cool!

my default response to books about the practice and state of western literary criticism is irritability and dismissiveness. the patience and thoughtfulness with which @kasiaiskasia.bsky.social approaches these books is a good lesson for me in how not to be such a grouch

If you are looking for a place to productively put some of your Ukraine-related rage and sorrow, you might contribute some funds to this organization doing life-saving work. Every little bit helps! chuffed.org/project/1187...

For the low low price of $495, you can learn… (I feel compelled to document this grifting for some reason)

Can literary criticism survive our influencer-driven culture? Our essay of the week calls for rejecting "academic vs. creative" or "literary vs. pop" to reimagine criticism as art, craft, and social conversation. By @kasiaiskasia.bsky.social in @thepointmag.bsky.social https://buff.ly/4bgVlD6

Cannot stop thinking about the emoji choice in this random homophobic stranger’s comment

Started writing this post about The Perfect Nine a month ago, and then life happened, so I guess it’ll just be a half-written post now. kasiareads.com/2025/02/24/t...

I’ve got a new essay in @thepointmag.bsky.social reviewing books by Michael Chaouli, Jonathan Kramnick, and Lauren Oyler, and talking about what I love about (reading about) literary criticism, and how I do not love The Discourse. thepointmag.com/criticism/a-...

This is terrible news. 🧪 "The Museum of the Earth, one of the last natural history museums in Upstate New York, faces an imminent threat of foreclosure after a group of donors failed to fulfill a $30 million pledge..." @judylucas.bsky.social ithacavoice.org/2025/01/muse...

I wrote about Porcelain War, which is an incredible film about artists in Ukraine that everyone should see. kasiareads.com/2025/01/13/p...

In an essay on WWB, Nathan H. Dize reimagines the genre of translator’s notes to recall how how life and translation have rhymed during his own career, often in wrenching ways. Read it at the link: https://buff.ly/3PtVWHt

What is the verb form of mmm-hmm? Like, he mmm-hmmed in response. Is there a word for this?

Wrote about Held, by Anne Michaels. Uneven but very beautiful. kasiareads.com/2025/01/09/h...

My Best of 2024 roundup: kasiareads.com/2024/12/31/b...

Wrote about Feeding Ghosts, by Tessa Hulls — a fantastic debut graphic memoir. kasiareads.com/2024/12/30/f...

Wrote a little about Téa Obreht’s Morningside. kasiareads.com/2024/12/27/t...

Wrote a little about Elizabeth O’Connor’s Whale Fall, which I thought was terrific. kasiareads.com/2024/12/25/w...

Wrote a little about Emily Bloom’s wonderful motherhood memoir. kasiareads.com/2024/12/22/i...