The Best Show You Aren’t Watching
The Internet is the new Television. But way better! Childrens’ Hospital is a Web series written, directed, and starred in by Rob Corddry. David Wain (Wet Hot American Summer, The State, Stella,…
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Elissa Bassist
115 posts
Elissa Bassist edits the Funny Women column and teaches humor writing. Her next class is "How to Write a Comedic Memoir" on 3/30. She wrote Hysterical, a semi-finalist for The Thurber Prize for American humor, and is co-writing Inside Jokes: A Comedy and Creativity Guide for All Writers with Caitlin Kunkel (out in 2026). Her newsletter is Tragedy Plus Time.
Paul Rudd in a Deleted Scene from The Ten
“$3.50 for a cappuccino? Do I get a bowl of soup with that too?”
The Rumpus Interview with Michael Showalter
“I am writing an ‘important’ memoir about not being able to write an important memoir. It winds up being kind of a novel-length comedic essay on insecurity and procrastination.”
We’re Elite
Publishing is failing us, and it is failing. The lamentable irony is that its foundation rests upon satisfying readers by assuming we’d like to read whatever crap is one level…
Something the Internet Can’t Do
Rodrigo Corral Design offers one reason we shouldn’t lose print media. These books, these beautiful, vibrant, resplendent books, remind us what it feels like to be human, to interact directly…
A Call for Writing Advice
Q: How Do You Crank Up to Write? A: “Discipline.” John Updike did it all the time, Richard Ford did it early in the morning, Nathaniel Hawthorne did it nonstop,…
A Call for the Rebirth of Literary Magazines
“. . . This is a critical time not just for Granta but also for the future of the literary journal as an art form. It is no longer enough…
City Cyclops
Jon Adams, author of the Truth Serum books, presents City Cyclops, “the only comics in the world that will make you forget about your mom’s new boyfriend.” Perfect. The comics…
The Many Types of Trilobites
“As the privatization and patenting of scientific knowledge rapidly grows, overall scientific literacy continues to be very low,” claims The Small Science Collective. The SSC and and its Blog Sister…
A Baker’s Dozen of My Feelings about David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest
“Like most North Americans of his generation, Hal tends to know way less about why he feels certain ways about the objects and pursuits he’s devoted to than he does…
Complex Innovative Literary Prize
The Warwick Prize for Writing is an “innovative new literature prize that involves global competition, and crosses all disciplines. The Prize will be given biennially for an excellent and substantial…
Best of Shouts & Murmurs (from the past year or so)
The Shouts & Murmurs section of the New Yorker is reliably witty, wry, and short. For some, it is the pre-game to reading the magazine, and for others, the best…