fiction/non/fiction

fiction/non/fiction
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fiction/non/fiction

Hosted by Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan, fiction/non/fiction interprets current events through the lens of literature, and features conversations with writers of all stripes, from novelists and poets to journalists and essayists.

  1. 6D AGO

    S8 Ep. 29: Vauhini Vara on AI, Art, and Memory

    Acclaimed novelist and journalist Vauhini Vara joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V Ganeshananthan to discuss her new essay collection, Searches: Selfhood in the Digital Age. Vara talks about the rise of the loser tech bro, internet privacy, Google search logs, the power and limits of turning one’s collected personal data into art, and whether a recently publicized AI-authored short story is actually good.  To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/. This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, Hunter Murray and Vanessa Watkins. Selected Readings: Vauhini Vara Searches This Is Salvaged The Immortal King Rao “Ghosts,” The Believer  Others: A Declaration of the Independence of Cyberspace  Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed, and Lost Idealism by Sarah Wynn-Williams “OpenAI’s metafictional short story about grief is beautiful and moving,” by Jeanette Winterson, The Guardian “‘A computer’s joke, on us’: writers respond to the short story written by AI,” The Guardian  Vauhini Vara on the Perils and Possibilities of Artificial Intelligence Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 6, Episode 17 Alex Reisner on Covering Books3 and Fighting Piracy Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 7, Episode 1 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    57 min

  2. APR 10

    S8 Ep. 28: Sheila Sundar on International Scholars

    Following ICE’s detention of Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil and the sudden revocation of hundreds of student visas across the country, professor and novelist Sheila Sundar joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about the targeting of international university students, especially those involved in pro-Palestine speech or protests, by the Trump administration. Sundar reflects on a childhood spent partly among intellectuals travelling between countries, and explains how this led to her recent novel, Habitations, in which the protagonist leaves her home in South India for graduate school at Columbia. Sundar discusses international students’ contributions to American intellectual life and how the current assault on diversity damages academia. She also talks about how work-restrictive policies treat international students as “takers” who are not welcome to integrate fully into American society. Sundar reads from Habitations. To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/. This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, Hunter Murray and Vanessa Watkins. Selected Readings: Sheila Sundar Habitations (2024) Yellow Curtains The Massachusetts Review (2023) Diplomacy  Virginia Quarterly Review (2022) The Death of Tyler Clementi The Threepenny Review (2021) Others: Meghan O’Rourke on The End of the University, Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 8, Episode 27 Nearly 150 Students Have Had Visas Revoked and Could Face Deportation - The New York Times Secretary of State Marco Rubio Remarks to the Press Trump Immigration Policies Increase Peril For International Students Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    48 min

  3. APR 3

    S8 Ep. 27: Meghan O’Rourke on The End of the University

    Essayist, poet, and Yale Review editor Meghan O’Rourke joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about her recent New York Times piece, “The End of the University as We Know It.” O’Rourke discusses the situation at Columbia University; the Trump administration’s attacks on other universities, including the threats to deport international students for participation in pro-Palestine protests; the false notion of the radical college campus; and how the political balance on campuses has actually shifted in recent years. She also reflects on how the Cold War reshaped these institutions and made them national assets; the financial relationship between the university and the state; and why schools can’t just spend their endowments. O’Rourke reads from her essay. To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/. This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell. Selected Readings: Meghan O'Rourke Opinion | The View Inside Trump’s Assault on Universities - The New York Times: The End of the University as We Know It by Meghan O’Rourke The Yale Review | Meghan O'Rourke Yale’s Unsafe Spaces | The New Yorker The Invisible Kingdom (2023) Sun in Days (2019) Once (2013) The Long Goodbye (2012) Halflife (2008) Others: Creating the Market University | Princeton University Press by Elizabeth Popp Berman 20 Colleges With the Biggest Endowments | The Short List: Colleges | U.S. News Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    59 min

  4. MAR 27

    S8 Ep. 26: Alex Higley on True Failure and Shark Tank

    Novelist Alex Higley joins host V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about his new novel, True Failure, in which a man fired from his job decides not to tell his wife what happened and attempts to change his fortunes by applying to join the cast of a Shark Tank-like show. Higley discusses how he experiences the news in Trump 2.0; lying as avoidance and as emotional refuge; and two big American lies (that an individual can succeed on his own and that we can’t collectively organize to make change). He also talks about Shark Tank as a curated and tidy presentation of entrepreneurship and capitalism, and his choice to have his protagonist focus not on what he will sell or invent, but on how he can bluff his way to what he wants. Higley reads from True Failure. To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/. This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell. Selected Readings: Alex Higley True Failure (2025) Old Open (2017) Cardinal and Other Stories (2017) Others: Choice by Neel Mukherjee Cue the Sun! by Emily Nussbaum Dana Spiotta Being There (Film, 1979)  Shark Tank The Apprentice  Big Brother  Organizing My Thoughts Today in Tabs Sally Franson and Emily Nussbaum on Reality TV Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 7, Episode 42 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    46 min

  5. MAR 20

    S8 Ep. 25: Edmund White on The Loves of My Life

    Novelist, memoirist and biographer Edmund White joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about his recent book, The Loves of My Life: A Sex Memoir. White talks about the changes he has witnessed the LGBTQ+ community go through over the years and the hostility the transgender population faces under the Trump-Vance regime. He discusses a general concern older members of the community have about losing Social Security and health coverage should gay marriage become Trump’s next target, as well as this administration's attempt to erase queer language from governmental archives. White previews his forthcoming novel about Louis XIV’s gay brother titled Monsieur and reads from The Loves of My Life. To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/. This podcast is produced by V.V. Ganeshananthan, Whitney Terrell, Ian Johnson, Hunter Murray, and Vanessa Watkins.  Selected Readings: Edmund White  The Loves of My Life (2025) The Humble Lover (2025) Nocturnes for the King of Naples (2024) A Previous Life (2023) A Saint from Texas (2022) The Unpunished Vice (2018) The Flaneur (2015) Inside a Pearl (2015) Jack Holmes & His Friend (2012) City Boy (2010) A Boy Story (2009) Marcel Proust - A Life (2009) Anthologies, Foreword & Others: The Passion of Gengoroh Tagame (2022) A Luminous Republic (2020) The Stonewall Reader (2019) Such Small Hands (2017) The Violet Quill Club, 40 Years On - The Gay & Lesbian Review by David Bergman, January-February 2021 Felice Picano, Champion of Gay Literature, Is Dead at 81 - The New York Times Edmund White and Emily Temple on Literary Feuds, Social Media, and Our Appetite for Drama Fiction/Non/Fiction Season 2, Episode 4 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    43 min

  6. MAR 13

    Curtis Sittenfeld on Show Don’t Tell

    Bestselling fiction writer Curtis Sittenfeld joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about her new collection of stories, Show Don’t Tell. Sittenfeld discusses the title story, which depicts graduate students in creative writing competing for funding, and its connections to her time at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, when that practice was common. She also considers how President Trump’s attacks on DEI reveal some people’s true natures, and what it means to write about “the hypocrisy of being a person.” Finally, she explains why she thinks of time as a plot twist, and reflects on returning to the protagonist of her debut novel, Prep, Lee Fiora, who reappears in the new collection’s final story, which features her thirtieth high school reunion. Sittenfeld reads from Show Don’t Tell. To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/. This podcast is produced by Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan. Selected Readings: Curtis Sittenfeld Show Don’t Tell (2025) Romantic Comedy (2023) Rodham (2021) The Best American Short Stories 2020 (ed. with Heidi Pitlor) You Think It, I’ll Say It (2019) Eligible (2016) Sisterland (2013) American Wife (2008) The Man of My Dreams (2006) Prep (2005) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    49 min

  7. MAR 6

    Karen Weingarten/Abortion Stories Before Roe v. Wade

    Professor Karen Weingarten joins co-hosts Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan to talk about a new anthology she has edited, Abortion Stories: American Literature Before Roe v. Wade. Weingarten reflects on the complicated history of abortion, the varied use of abortifacients, abortion’s ties to eugenics and state control of bodies, and the rise of the anti-abortion movement. She discusses how access to abortion facilitates other kinds of resistance, and explains how the book came to include authors like Maria Sybilla Merian, Langston Hughes, Dorothy Parker, Lucille Clifton, and Eugene O’Neill alongside oral histories from formerly enslaved persons and groundbreaking politicians like Shirley Chisholm. She talks about the stories she hopes to see represented in post-Dobbs writing and reads from her foreword to the anthology. To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/. This podcast is produced by Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan. Selected Readings: Karen Weingarten Abortion Stories: American Literature Before Roe v. Wade Pregnancy Test Abortion in the American Imagination: Before Life and Choice, 1880-1940 Others Dirty Dancing Fast Times at Ridgemont High The Cider House Rules The Mothers The Art of Subtext Jessica Valenti Abortion: Our Bodies, Their Lies, and the Truths We Use to Win Peyton Place Men Without Women by Ernest Hemingway (which includes “Hills Like White Elephants” Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    49 min

  8. FEB 27

    Novelists Suzette Mayr and Kai Thomas on Canada Versus Trump

    Canadian authors Suzette Mayr and Kai Thomas join co-hosts V.V. Ganeshananthan and Whitney Terrell to discuss the repercussions of President Trump’s recent threats to annex and tax Canada. They talk about the possible empowerment of the Canadian right as a result of Trump’s extreme remarks, as well as measures their communities are taking to unify in the current political environment. Mayr and Thomas read from their recent novels, The Sleeping Car Porter and In the Upper Country.  To hear the full episode, subscribe through iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app (include the forward slashes when searching). You can also listen by streaming from the player below. Check out video versions of our interviews on the Fiction/Non/Fiction Instagram account, the Fiction/Non/Fiction YouTube Channel, and our show website: https://www.fnfpodcast.net/ This podcast is produced by Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan. Selected Readings: Suzette Mayr The Sleeping Car Porter  Dr. Edith Vane and the Hares of Crawley Hall Monoceros Venous Hum The Windows Moon Honey  Kai Thomas In the Upper Country Others: 2025 4 Nations Face Off | NHL.com | NHL Justin Trudeau's speech in response to Trump's tariffs | CBC News The Last Black Town in the West |The Daily Yonder Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters  | Library of Congress There's only one winner in a trade war... | This Hour Has 22 Minutes (YouTube) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

    52 min
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4.9
out of 5
77 Ratings

About

Hosted by Whitney Terrell and V.V. Ganeshananthan, fiction/non/fiction interprets current events through the lens of literature, and features conversations with writers of all stripes, from novelists and poets to journalists and essayists.

Information

  • Creator
    fiction/non/fiction
  • Years Active
    2017 - 2025
  • Episodes
    287
  • Rating
    Explicit
  • Copyright
    © Whitney Terrell, V.V. Ganeshananthan, 980309
  • Show Website
    fiction/non/fiction

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