RUMPUS BOOK CLUB EXCERPT: HYSTERIA REBOOT BY ELISSA BASSIST
An excerpt from The Rumpus Book Club's September selection, Hysterical by Elissa Bassist
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Rumpus Articles
If You Eat It, It Becomes Authentic: A Conversation About Red Sauce with Ian MacAllen
There is this moment where you must first cut yourself off from doing more research because that rabbit trail goes on forever in some cases . . . You have to ask yourself, “Do I have enough?”
The Lucky Ones
I live my life through the twin tenets of curiosity and close observation. I believe imagination and storytelling are central to our survival as a species—and yet, it’s my imagination that makes me jumpy.
RUMPUS BOOK CLUB EXCERPT: ALL THIS COULD BE DIFFERENT BY Sarah Thankam Mathews
An excerpt from The Rumpus Book Club's August selection, ALL THIS COULD BE DIFFERENT by Sarah Thankam Mathews
Wrestling with Ghosts: Joseph Han’s Nuclear Family
“Mostly,” this novel warns us, “the dead are at peace. But when they are not, this is when they may ask something of us, attempt to guide our lives to fulfill what they could not.”
From the Archive: Rumpus Original Fiction: Mustard Seeds
At the end of the week, which was long with sleepless nights, Miri picked her heart out of the kitchen sink, put it in a paper lunch bag, and took it to the witch.
Honoring the Past That Built Us: Talking with Kali Fajardo-Anstine
All of my writing is guided by the need to feel culturally seen and acknowledged as a vital part of the American identity.
If You’re Bengali, Food is the Center of Everything: An Interview with Madhushree Ghosh
But food is not just a tool for memory, but also important in terms of social justice issues which Indian Americans don’t talk about because we are the model minority. We don’t want to get in trouble.
Forms of Narrowing: Julie Otsuka’s The Swimmers
After the memorials, the funerals, the endless influx of flowers and casserole dishes and well-meaning texts, the collective retreats back into their lives and all that is left is the individual, grieving for months and years and perhaps even the rest of their own life.
Rumpus Original Fiction: Bloom
The bloom would not open until we arrived, but it was not waiting for us. It was a matter of timing. Each year in mid-March, the petals uncurled from their fetal sleeping positions, stretched out to face the sun.
A General Truth Through a Particular Lie: An Interview with the Creators of the Podcast Penknife
I personally find this myth of authenticity extremely insidious and damaging, because it often leads to purity tests and the constant need to prove one’s cred . . . rather than leading to constructive thought and action—