Parul Sehgal
Parul Sehgal is a staff writer at The New Yorker. Previously, she was a book critic at the Times, where she also worked as a senior editor and columnist. She has won awards for her criticism from the New York Press Club, the National Book Critics Circle, and the Robert B. Silvers Foundation. She teaches in the graduate creative-writing program at New York University.
Lorrie Moore’s Death-Defying New Novel
In “I Am Homeless if This Is Not My Home,” the writer slices through the conventions of literary form with violent precision, carving out new possibilities.
Jodie Comer Puts Her Talents on Trial
The actress often plays women defined by their mastery. In “Prima Facie,” she takes on her toughest role yet: a lawyer who defends men accused of sexual assault.
Why We Never Have Enough Time
In her new book, Jenny Odell argues that structural forces have commodified our moments, days, and years. Can our lost time be reclaimed?
Seventy-five Years After Indian Partition, Who Owns the Narrative?
Literature once filled in archival gaps by saying the unsayable. Now a younger generation is devising new modes of telling the story and finding new stories to tell.
In Sheila Heti’s Novel, Critics Could Save the World—or Destroy It
“Pure Colour,” Heti’s most mystical work yet, considers what judgment means in both art and life.
The Case Against the Trauma Plot
Fiction writers love it. Filmmakers can’t resist it. But does this trope deepen characters, or flatten them into a set of symptoms?
Is Amazon Changing the Novel?
In the new literary landscape, readers are customers, writers are service providers, and books are expected to offer instant gratification.
Lorrie Moore’s Death-Defying New Novel
In “I Am Homeless if This Is Not My Home,” the writer slices through the conventions of literary form with violent precision, carving out new possibilities.
Jodie Comer Puts Her Talents on Trial
The actress often plays women defined by their mastery. In “Prima Facie,” she takes on her toughest role yet: a lawyer who defends men accused of sexual assault.
Why We Never Have Enough Time
In her new book, Jenny Odell argues that structural forces have commodified our moments, days, and years. Can our lost time be reclaimed?
Seventy-five Years After Indian Partition, Who Owns the Narrative?
Literature once filled in archival gaps by saying the unsayable. Now a younger generation is devising new modes of telling the story and finding new stories to tell.
In Sheila Heti’s Novel, Critics Could Save the World—or Destroy It
“Pure Colour,” Heti’s most mystical work yet, considers what judgment means in both art and life.
The Case Against the Trauma Plot
Fiction writers love it. Filmmakers can’t resist it. But does this trope deepen characters, or flatten them into a set of symptoms?
Is Amazon Changing the Novel?
In the new literary landscape, readers are customers, writers are service providers, and books are expected to offer instant gratification.