After about two years of writing essays, I learned about something I will hereby in these pages name the Passive-Aggressive Writer’s Conundrum: People, particularly non-writers, are an optimistic, delusional bunch. If you mention people in an unflattering way without naming them, they will never recognize themselves in your story— even if you name actual details of circumstances surrounding the stories.

Over at the Paris Review, Taffy Brodesser-Akner considers Taylor Swift’s success to be the “perfected realization of every writer’s narrowest dream: To get back at those who wronged us” and reflects on the differences between what musicians and writers can get away with.