empathy
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The Rumpus Mini-Interview Project #60: Leah Kaminsky
Leah Kaminsky’s debut novel, The Waiting Room, depicts one fateful day in the life of an Australian doctor and mother, Dina, living in Haifa, Israel. Dina is trying to maintain normalcy as she goes about her work as a family…
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Song of the Day: “Lord, Help the Poor and Needy”
Maybe growing up with a father who was a Jehovah’s Witness caused Charlyn Marie “Chan” Marshall to develop a sensitivity to the plight of the unlucky and underprivileged. Then again, Marshall, who is widely known by her stage name Cat…
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The Rumpus Interview with Robin MacArthur
Robin MacArthur discusses her debut story collection Half Wild, life in rural Vermont, and how narrative—and fiction—is key to reaching across what divides us.
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The Rumpus Poetry Book Club Chat with Solmaz Sharif
Solmaz Sharif discusses her new collection Look, the difference between nearness and similarity, and the level of ownership we have over stories.
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The Rumpus Interview with Garrard Conley
Garrard Conley, author of the new memoir Boy Erased, discusses growing up in the deep South, mothers, writing for change, and political delusions.
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Spotlight: “Nuts: A True Story” by Peter Witte
It’s more likely, though, that someone saw everything and felt sympathy that, in the moment, they just didn’t communicate.
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The Rumpus Interview with Charles Bock
Charles Bock discusses his new novel, Alice & Oliver, the challenges of writing from experience, and how art and life can mirror one another.
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Autofiction and Empathy
Reading novels breaks down the boundary between “me” and “not me.” Over at the Atlantic, Nicholas Dames writes about a deeply worrying feeling that contemporary fiction isn’t living up to Cervantes’s standards, opting for nihilistic individualism rather than empathy.
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The Rumpus Interview with Rob Roberge
Rob Roberge talks about his new memoir, Liar, the differences between writing fiction and writing memoir, and why every narrator is an unreliable narrator.
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Teaching a Robot to Love
Last year physicist Stephen Hawking suggested that advanced artificial intelligence, or AI, could lead to the end of humanity. How are scientists working on this issue? Teaching robots empathy with books! Newsweek reports on the Quixote system, which teaches AI…
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Goodbye, Starman
It’s not an exaggeration to say that Bowie saved my life on more than one occasion. And now that he’s gone, I’m at a loss again.
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The Rumpus Interview with Sunil Yapa
Sunil Yapa discusses his debut novel, Your Heart is a Muscle the Size of a Fist, radical empathy, growing up surrounded by politics, and losing the first draft of his novel in Chile.