Alissa Wilkinson
@alissawilkinson.bsky.social
Critic @nytimes.com. Author AFTERGLOW (forthcoming), WE TELL OURSELVES STORIES (Liveright) and SALTY (Broadleaf). Teaching writing and criticism (Whitworth MFA, NYU XE).
Pinned
THRILLED to be back at @liveright.bsky.social with @giaquinta.bsky.social for my next book! I'm convinced that if we're to retain our humanity in the face of mounting technocracies and forces that want to make us into little atomized profit units, we've got to re-engage with big, bold, communal art.
gain the whole world, lose his own soul, etc etc
Joyce Carol Oates may be the best poster of our time.
November 10, 2025 at 7:47 PM
gain the whole world, lose his own soul, etc etc
Reposted by Alissa Wilkinson
Hi writers! I’m looking to assign a couple of features for Slate before the end of the year. If you have anything in mind that you think would be a fit please send me a pitch! Jenée.Desmond- harris@slate.com or dm me.
RTs are appreciated so this can reach more people. Thanks!
RTs are appreciated so this can reach more people. Thanks!
November 10, 2025 at 6:06 PM
Hi writers! I’m looking to assign a couple of features for Slate before the end of the year. If you have anything in mind that you think would be a fit please send me a pitch! Jenée.Desmond- harris@slate.com or dm me.
RTs are appreciated so this can reach more people. Thanks!
RTs are appreciated so this can reach more people. Thanks!
Let Men Read Books
November 10, 2025 at 6:00 PM
Let Men Read Books
Reposted by Alissa Wilkinson
🧵
1/ The US Government has quietly removed a memorial to Black soldiers who died in World War II from the Netherlands American Cemetery in Margraten, South Limburg. The move follows a complaint from the right-wing Heritage Foundation to the American Battle Monuments Commission. ⬇️
November 9, 2025 at 3:20 PM
🧵
Reposted by Alissa Wilkinson
Reposted by Alissa Wilkinson
‘Frankenstein’ Review: Guillermo del Toro’s Creature Rises
www.nytimes.com
November 8, 2025 at 10:44 PM
This is a wild read (especially if you've ever worked in arts administration) but this bit made my eyes bug out
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/u...
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/u...
November 8, 2025 at 4:14 PM
This is a wild read (especially if you've ever worked in arts administration) but this bit made my eyes bug out
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/u...
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/u...
Repost: some off-Broadway shows - two extraordinary ones still up for a while (Oratorio for Living Things and Nothing Can Keep You from the Hand of God), and a few others - prove you can take the kid out of the church but you can't take the church music out of the kid
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/03/t...
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/03/t...
Has Theater Become Everybody’s Church?
www.nytimes.com
November 8, 2025 at 3:30 PM
Repost: some off-Broadway shows - two extraordinary ones still up for a while (Oratorio for Living Things and Nothing Can Keep You from the Hand of God), and a few others - prove you can take the kid out of the church but you can't take the church music out of the kid
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/03/t...
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/03/t...
Budding critics often ask me where they should pitch their work. I’d like to compile new list. What are some of your suggestions?
November 8, 2025 at 3:22 PM
Budding critics often ask me where they should pitch their work. I’d like to compile new list. What are some of your suggestions?
Reposted by Alissa Wilkinson
PUT YOUR SOUL ON YOUR HAND AND WALK is an astonishing documentary, not least because it is video calls filmed on another phone. Its main participant, Fatima Hassouna, died in an Israeli airstrike the day after the film was accepted to Cannes. I urge you to see it.
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/m...
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/m...
‘Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk’: An Extraordinary Voice (and Film)
www.nytimes.com
November 7, 2025 at 2:08 PM
PUT YOUR SOUL ON YOUR HAND AND WALK is an astonishing documentary, not least because it is video calls filmed on another phone. Its main participant, Fatima Hassouna, died in an Israeli airstrike the day after the film was accepted to Cannes. I urge you to see it.
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/m...
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/m...
As a movie critic I will never be psychologically capable of comprehending Grammy eligibility windows, it is beyond my mental capacity
November 7, 2025 at 5:33 PM
As a movie critic I will never be psychologically capable of comprehending Grammy eligibility windows, it is beyond my mental capacity
PUT YOUR SOUL ON YOUR HAND AND WALK is an astonishing documentary, not least because it is video calls filmed on another phone. Its main participant, Fatima Hassouna, died in an Israeli airstrike the day after the film was accepted to Cannes. I urge you to see it.
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/m...
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/m...
‘Put Your Soul on Your Hand and Walk’: An Extraordinary Voice (and Film)
www.nytimes.com
November 7, 2025 at 2:08 PM
PUT YOUR SOUL ON YOUR HAND AND WALK is an astonishing documentary, not least because it is video calls filmed on another phone. Its main participant, Fatima Hassouna, died in an Israeli airstrike the day after the film was accepted to Cannes. I urge you to see it.
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/m...
www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/m...
I don’t know all the statistics but it’s hard for me to imagine we wouldn’t swiftly move to do something about virtually any other device that did this kind of thing
November 7, 2025 at 4:39 AM
I don’t know all the statistics but it’s hard for me to imagine we wouldn’t swiftly move to do something about virtually any other device that did this kind of thing
I do not take cabs/cars much but I had to hop in a taxi tonight and can confirm: the screens now play, God help me, Newsmax
November 7, 2025 at 3:15 AM
I do not take cabs/cars much but I had to hop in a taxi tonight and can confirm: the screens now play, God help me, Newsmax
Reposted by Alissa Wilkinson
i just saw the 76 minute runtime
November 6, 2025 at 6:05 PM
i just saw the 76 minute runtime
I didn't get to write it, but if you like all the same things as me (movies about artists, 1970s New York, artsy flicks with brief super-meta moments, Ben Whishaw) then PETER HUJAR'S DAY is for you
November 6, 2025 at 6:03 PM
I didn't get to write it, but if you like all the same things as me (movies about artists, 1970s New York, artsy flicks with brief super-meta moments, Ben Whishaw) then PETER HUJAR'S DAY is for you
‘Die My Love’ Review: Jennifer Lawrence in a Mother of a Role
www.nytimes.com
November 6, 2025 at 2:46 PM
Hey, I’m leading the theater newsletter! www.nytimes.com/2025/11/03/t...
November 6, 2025 at 12:25 AM
Hey, I’m leading the theater newsletter! www.nytimes.com/2025/11/03/t...
I arrived home around 7:30p to discover my home full of merrymakers for a surprise birthday party and it’s been quite a night!
November 5, 2025 at 5:48 AM
I arrived home around 7:30p to discover my home full of merrymakers for a surprise birthday party and it’s been quite a night!
This is 42, which means Fish Cheeks martinis and my suggestion that you go vote with your brain.
November 4, 2025 at 8:15 PM
This is 42, which means Fish Cheeks martinis and my suggestion that you go vote with your brain.
Reposted by Alissa Wilkinson
This Saturday at the Los Feliz 3, I'll be moderating a Q&A for the best documentary of the year, MY UNDESIRABLE FRIENDS. (Tickets and info here: www.americancinematheque.com/now-showing/...) In the meantime, here's my interview with director Julia Loktev from over the summer.
'This Is What It Looks Like to Live Under Authoritarianism'
'My Undesirable Friends: Part 1 — Last Air in Moscow' director Julia Loktev discusses the five-hour documentary, life under Putin and lessons for U.S.
www.rollingstone.com
November 4, 2025 at 8:08 PM
This Saturday at the Los Feliz 3, I'll be moderating a Q&A for the best documentary of the year, MY UNDESIRABLE FRIENDS. (Tickets and info here: www.americancinematheque.com/now-showing/...) In the meantime, here's my interview with director Julia Loktev from over the summer.
Reposted by Alissa Wilkinson
A great day for New York, a city for everyone, except: people who don’t take their backpacks off on the subway, tourists and families who walk down the street in a horizontal line, people who stop in the middle of the street to look at their phones, you guys unfortunately have to go
November 4, 2025 at 2:36 PM
A great day for New York, a city for everyone, except: people who don’t take their backpacks off on the subway, tourists and families who walk down the street in a horizontal line, people who stop in the middle of the street to look at their phones, you guys unfortunately have to go
Obligatory note that Didion wrote an essay on Dick Cheney in NYRB (“Cheney: The Fatal Touch”) in 2007. It is more or less what you’d expect from that sentence.
www.nybooks.com/articles/200...
www.nybooks.com/articles/200...
Cheney: The Fatal Touch | Joan Didion
It was in some ways predictable that the central player in the system of willed errors and reversals that is the Bush administration would turn out to be
www.nybooks.com
November 4, 2025 at 2:01 PM
Obligatory note that Didion wrote an essay on Dick Cheney in NYRB (“Cheney: The Fatal Touch”) in 2007. It is more or less what you’d expect from that sentence.
www.nybooks.com/articles/200...
www.nybooks.com/articles/200...
If I watch pretty much any video on my Instagram feed for more than three seconds Zohran Mamdani will appear in it
November 4, 2025 at 1:21 AM
If I watch pretty much any video on my Instagram feed for more than three seconds Zohran Mamdani will appear in it