Violet Lucca, Author at Harper's Magazine

From this author

[Podcast]

Pulp Fiction

In the stacks: on the tristate collectors of yesterday’s future

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Joe Kloc

[Podcast]

From the Audio Archive: Rachel Kushner

Revisiting our 2018 interviews with Lidija Haas and Rachel Kushner

by Rachel Kushner, Lidija Haas, Violet Lucca,

[Podcast]

Richard E. Maltby Jr.’s Cryptics

It’s all a game to me: speaking with the master puzzle maker

by Richard E. Maltby Jr., Violet Lucca, Roddy Howland Jackson,

[Podcast]

The Good Witches of Pennsylvania

Braucherei, a form of healing used in Amish and Mennonite communities, might seem like an appropriately antiquated practice for a traditional culture. But the writer Rachel Yoder returned to her…

by Rachel Yoder, Violet Lucca,

[Podcast]

The Doomsday Machine

It’s not morning in America: on the persistent threat of nuclear winter

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Jackson Lears

[Podcast]

After the Titan

An author reflects on his own experience in an amateur submersible

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Matthew Gavin Frank

[Podcast]

The DIY Submariner

Realizing the eternal dream of journeying into the briny depths—on your own terms

by Violet Lucca, Matthew Gavin Frank,

[Podcast]

The Kissinger Centennial

All about the birthday boy—and Christopher Hitchens’s case against him

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Daniel Bessner

[Podcast]

The Writers’ Strike, or: the Writers Strike

On the WGA versus the studios and streamers

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Tom Bissell

[Podcast]

Tucker Carlson and National Conservatism

On Trumpism after Trump

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Thomas Meaney

[Podcast]

A “Native American Church” Without Native Americans

Authenticity, appropriation, good intentions, and profiteering

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Sierra Crane Murdoch

[Podcast]

On David Foster Wallace

Reconsidering the man, the meme, and the writing

Host Jon Baskin, Violet Lucca,Guest Lauren Oyler

[Podcast]

Panic Attack

An author lucidly describes the experience—and the difficulty of understanding it as a teenager pre-internet

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Michael W. Clune

[Podcast]

The Crisis of Work

It’s more complicated than “take this job and shove it”

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Hari Kunzru, Erik Baker

[Podcast]

There’s Another Ex-President Who Needs to Be Arrested!

Lewis Lapham discusses George W. Bush, the Iraq War, and democracy

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Lewis H. Lapham

[Podcast]

Trump Arrested

The author of The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War explains why 45’s arrest isn’t the spectacle you think it is

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Jeff Sharlet

[Podcast]

The Enduring Allure of Pilgrimage

On the road again

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Lisa Wells

[Podcast]

Changing Views on Climate Change

Fairweather friends of the planet: climate journalism’s abrupt swing from apocalypse to dreamland

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Kyle Paoletta

[Official Business]

A Note About Our New Log In System

How to use our easier and more secure log in system

by Violet Lucca,

[Podcast]

The Trouble with Israel’s Supreme Court

On the ongoing culture war that’s reshaping the country, and the proposed changes to its judiciary

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Bernard Avishai

[Podcast]

The Ethics of Pet Ownership

What is it to be happy? Dissecting the long life of a pet frog

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Anne Fadiman

[Podcast]

Books! The Podcast

On the state of publishing and the failed merger of Simon & Schuster and Penguin Random House

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Christian Lorentzen

[Podcast]

The Future of the War on Terror

Over the horizon: on U.S. military strategy in Niger

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Caitlin L. Chandler

[Podcast]

Homelessness, Empty Houses, and Eric Adams

Moving past criminalization in Philadelphia and elsewhere

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Wes Enzinna

[Podcast]

The Antitrust Case Against Google

AdSense and Sensibility: on the Biden Administration’s efforts to break up Google’s monopoly

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Barry Lynn

[Podcast]

Apocalypse Nowish

Why every generation thinks it’ll be the last

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Michael Robbins

[Podcast]

The Search for Perfect Sound

Now hear this: the ephemeral and unquantifiable essence of music

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Sasha Frere-Jones

[Podcast]

Casanova

The thoughtful prick: the man, the myth, and the mythmaking

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Clare Bucknell

[Podcast]

Nabokov’s Berlin

A happy eternal recurrence: on the author’s relationship to fatherhood and time

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Ryan Ruby

[Podcast]

Sarah Smarsh on the Midterms

A view from outside the Beltway of what’s at stake this election

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Sarah Smarsh

[Podcast]

Animal Rights

The heart of the heartland: on the methods and laws factory farms would rather we didn’t know about

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Elizabeth Barber, Matt Johnson

[Podcast]

The Right to Not Be Pregnant

Reframing and strengthening fundamental pro-choice arguments

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Charlotte Shane

[Podcast]

Louise Bourgeois

On the artist, her life and work, and the experience of seeing

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Claire-Louise Bennett

[Podcast]

What Happened to Cecil Rhodes’s Nose?

On problematic statues and new approaches to writing about lingering historical trauma

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Hedley Twidle

[Podcast]

Addiction, Recovery, and Experimental Brain Surgery

New ways of thinking about substance abuse, treatment, and sobriety

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Zachary Siegel

[Podcast]

Christopher Hitchens

Examining the commentator’s pre-internet celebrity, writing, and legacy

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Christian Lorentzen, Maureen Tkacik, Luke Savage

[Podcast]

Guardians of Memory

Working as though everything depended on you: the delicate, dangerous task of preserving religious manuscripts in conflict zones

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Fred Bahnson, Father Columba Stewart

[Podcast]

Empire Burlesque

Living through the twilight of American global power

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Daniel Bessner

[Podcast]

Tree Sleuths

Flat-pack forensics: how scientists are dissembling black market lumber

by Lauren Markham,Host Violet Lucca,

[Podcast]

The Victim Cloud

The greatest scam in history might be the stigma against those who’ve been defrauded

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Hannah Zeavin

[Podcast]

Army of Shadows

Over there: breaking through myths about the Ukrainian foreign legion

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Seth Harp

[Podcast]

Ottessa Moshfegh on Lapvona

It takes a village: the author discusses her latest novel

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Ottessa Moshfegh

[Podcast]

The Matter of War

On the front lines in Ukraine

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Nicole Tung

[Podcast]

Down the Hatch

On the past and future of the carnival, one of America’s great institutions

by David Hill,Host Violet Lucca,

[Podcast]

In the Land of Living Skies

Why it’s important to live in the dark

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Suzannah Showler

[Podcast]

Ghosting the Machine

In the uncanny valley of the dolls: Sam Lipsyte investigates digisexuality in Las Vegas

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Sam Lipsyte

[Podcast]

Who Killed Louis Le Prince?

Ghost in the machine: on the origins of cinema

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Nat Segnit

[Podcast]

Notes on the State of Jefferson

Range wars: a secessionist movement reveals the cracks in American democracy

Host Violet Lucca,Guest James Pogue

[Podcast]

I Multiplied Myself

Better living through avoiding it entirely: on the life and work of Fernando Pessoa

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Benjamin Kunkel

[Podcast]

Night Shifts

Perchance to dream engineer: on new research into our sleeping minds

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Michael W. Clune

[Podcast]

The Eros Monster

The thrilling, all-consuming, irrational, and outright awful experience of bad romance

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Agnes Callard

[Podcast]

Bright Flight

Illuminations: on fireflies, natural systems, and the complex field of complexity science

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Vanessa Gregory

[Podcast]

Your Own Devices

Does your phone really belong to you if you can’t repair it?

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Elizabeth Evitts Dickinson

[Podcast]

Voice Lessons

Gaining a better understanding of elite athletes’ inner monologue, and of our own mental landscape

Host Violet Lucca,Guest T. M. Luhrmann

[Podcast]

National Treasure

On the explosive talent of Nicolas Cage

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Dan Piepenbring

[Podcast]

Separate and Unequal

The past is always present: examining quotidian life under Jim Crow to reveal its structures

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Adolph Reed Jr.

[Podcast]

Free Country

With open arms: on permitless carry and the new generation of guns rights activists

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Rachel Monroe

[Podcast]

Another Green World

The big ship: on space exploration, climate change, and a new experiment at Biosphere 2

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Jessica Camille Aguirre

[Podcast]

Findings + “An Errand”

The scientific method: on the process of writing short stories, literary nonfiction, and one of Harper’s Magazine’s most well-known sections

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Rafil Kroll-Zaidi

[Podcast]

Routine Maintenance

Death to life hacking: on the value and freedom offered by habit

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Meghan O’Gieblyn

[Podcast]

A Firm Hand

Inside McKinsey and its attempt to reduce violence at Rikers Island

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Ian MacDougall

[Podcast]

The Odor of Things

Nobody knows about noses: unpacking new research on our ability to smell

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Scott Sayare

[Podcast]

Desperately Seeking Sebald

Odyssey and oracle: reassessing the iconic German author’s work

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Lauren Oyler

[Podcast]

A Posthumous Shock

Rethinking the ways we perceive trauma in the past and present

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Will Self

[Podcast]

Ad Astra

The space between us: assessing the potential for conflict in space

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Rachel Riederer

[Podcast]

Good Mother

On trauma, Native parenthood, and decolonizing journalism

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Sierra Crane Murdoch

[Podcast]

“Put on the Diamonds”

On the act of eating one’s words (and worse): Vivian Gornick and Sigrid Nunez discuss the experience of humiliation

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Vivian Gornick, Sigrid Nunez

[Podcast]

To Be a Field of Poppies

Compost yourself: on the social, psychological, and ecological implications of rethinking what happens to our bodies after we die

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Lisa Wells, Ann Neumann

[Podcast]

Bad News

Nostalgia for something that never was: deconstructing the power of disinformation

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Joseph Bernstein

[Podcast]

When the Raids Came

A deeper view of life in Afghanistan during (and after) wartime

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Andrew Quilty

[Podcast]

Seven Steps to Heaven

The voice: on Jon Fosse’s Septology

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Wyatt Mason

[Podcast]

Men in Dark Times

The banality of misreading Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Rebecca Panovka

[Podcast]

Waterlog and Green Green Green

Surf and turf: Leanne Shapton on Roger Deakin’s swimming memoir and Gillian Osborne on her wild essay collection

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Leanne Shapton, Gillian Osborne

[Podcast]

Home Country

False cognates: on the diversity and shared experiences within the Latino community

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Héctor Tobar

[Podcast]

A Complicating Energy

I never knew I needed you: the detrimental effects of isolation and the importance of strangers

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Elisa Gabbert

[Podcast]

The Man Who Loved Presidents

Thomas Frank on The Soul of America

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Thomas Frank

[Podcast]

Hard Bargain

On the ground during the unionization effort in Bessemer, Alabama

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Daniel Brook

[Podcast]

Prayer for a Just War

Don’t keep calm and carry on: a new way of thinking about action on climate change

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Greg Jackson

[Podcast]

Stages of Grief

History will recall: ACT UP, COVID-19, and the arts

Host Violet Lucca,Guest William Deresiewicz, Sarah Schulman

[Podcast]

The Anxiety of Influencers

How to gain followers and influence people: TikTok superstars and the perils of our algorithm-driven society

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Barrett Swanson

[Podcast]

The Lightning Farm

Cruel and unusual: as more states abolish capital punishment, what will happen to federal prisoners sentenced to die?

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Caroline Lester

[Podcast]

Birds of a Feather

Crafting an Endangered Species Act that could better respond to the climate crisis

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Zach St. George

[Podcast]

Lost in Thought

Against a one-size-fits-all approach to meditation and mental health

Host Violet Lucca,Guest David Kortava

[Podcast]

Town of C

Talking pictures: Richard Rothman and Lyle Rexer

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Richard Rothman, Lyle Rexer

[Podcast]

The Crow Whisperer

Don’t Dolittle: on the need to reassess our relationship with animals

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Lauren Markham

[Podcast]

The Possessed

No Ouija board required: on Philip Roth’s writing, legacy, and a new biography

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Joshua Cohen

[Podcast]

False Prophets

Beg, borrow, or steal: the questionable business of artifacts

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Madeleine Schwartz

[Podcast]

Complexity

QAnon and the mechanics of belief

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Hari Kunzru

[Podcast]

“If Only I Could Begin Again!”

The power of memoir

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Vivian Gornick

[Podcast]

Skin in the Game

A market-based solution to the student-debt crisis may have financial repercussions that are just as burdensome

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Avi Asher-Schapiro

[Podcast]

State of Exception

The permanently temporary status of Syrian refugees in Lebanon

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Alexander Dziadosz

[Podcast]

Making Meaning

You may know what you want, but you may not know what you need

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Garth Greenwell

[Podcast]

America’s Game

The art, violence, mystery, and failure of the XFL

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Kent Russell

[Podcast]

The Big Tech Extortion Racket

Unsubscribe from all: how to stop Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Uber from controlling our lives

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Barry C. Lynn

[Podcast]

A Litany for Survival

It shouldn’t take a village: on giving birth as a black woman in America

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Naomi Jackson

[Podcast]

Bright Power, Dark Peace

The poetry of Robinson Jeffers finds new relevance in the age of climate catastrophe

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Erik Reece

[Podcast]

In Plain Sight

The movement to hold Syrian war criminals to account in foreign courts

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Annie Hylton

[Podcast]

On Moral Injury

In the field: the burgeoning understanding of moral injury

by Violet Lucca,Guest Janine di Giovanni

[Podcast]

False Dawn

The constant surprise of COVID-19

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Khadijah Queen

[Podcast]

We Shall Not Be Moved

Community land trusts and the promise of more equitably grown food

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Audrea Lim

[Podcast]

Bogland

Peat, bogs, and the Irish imaginary

Host Violet Lucca,Guest William Atkins

[Podcast]

This Is Not a Test

Man-made disasters: the benefits and limitations of emergency preparedness

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Barrett Swanson

[Podcast]

Grand Designs

Better living through affordable housing

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Ian Volner

[Podcast]

Tests of Time

Making a magazine during a pandemic

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Christopher Beha

[Podcast]

The Pessimistic Style in American Politics

Government of the people? Thomas Frank on the history of populism and anti-populism

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Thomas Frank

[Podcast]

Constant Delighted Astonishment

Everybody loves a clown, so why don’t you? On Jacques Tati

by Geoffrey O’Brien,Host Violet Lucca,

[Podcast]

Dream State

Mask on: pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong return to the streets

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Yi-Ling Liu

[Podcast]

The Money Question

Peeling back the layers of the Federal Reserve—and thinking through potential reforms

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Christopher W. Shaw

[Podcast]

Dreams of Stone

Transcendent moments of memory, authorship, heritage, and religion among the churches of Lalibela

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Ishion Hutchinson

[Podcast]

Good Guys with Guns

Rethinking America’s not-so-complicated relationship with guns

Host Violet Lucca,Guest James Pogue

[Podcast]

The Old Normal

Into the morass: a historical view of America’s disastrous foreign policy

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Andrew J. Bacevich

[Podcast]

Vicious Cycles

No news isn’t an option: a consideration of the function and meaning of the news media

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Greg Jackson

[Podcast]

Selective Hearing

Towards a critical understanding of podcasts

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Hugh Eakin

[Podcast]

“My Gang Is Jesus”

Believe it or not: the simultaneous rise of gang membership and evangelical Christianity in Rio de Janeiro

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Alex Cuadros

[Podcast]

Trumpism After Trump

More than four more years? A look at the philosophy and die-hard adherents of National Conservatism

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Thomas Meaney

[Podcast]

Oceans Apart

The Comoro Islands are a microcosm of the global climate crisis to come

by Violet Lucca,Guest Tommy Trenchard

[Podcast]

Click Here to Kill

Hiring a hitman online isn’t just speculative fiction

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Brian Merchant

[Podcast]

Body Language

More than the right word: on telling a genderqueer narrative

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Alex Marzano-Lesnevich

[Podcast]

Men at Work

Beyond a primal scream: the problems with trying to solve the problem of toxic masculinity

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Barrett Swanson

[Podcast]

Left of Europe

Untangling the Brexit question with a panel of activists and leftists from around the United Kingdom

Host Violet Lucca, Ashley Smith,Guest Cat Boyd, James Foley, David Renton, Richard Seymour

[Podcast]

To Serve Is to Rule

The not-so-good ol’ days: considering the WASP supremacy

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Doug Henwood

[Podcast]

The Call of the Drums

Where the barbarians are: the Hungarian right’s obsession with a false history

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Jacob Mikanowski

[Podcast]

The Last Frontier

Range life: the not entirely romantic existence of homesteaders in the San Luis Valley

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Ted Conover

[Podcast]

The Abortion Bans

A discussion about the recent spate of legislation that seems to threaten a woman’s right to choose

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Rachel Nolan, Madeleine Schwartz, Brigitte Amiri

[Film]

Fewer Readers, More Tensions

Olivier Assayas’s latest film holds on to the old world while recognizing the new

by Violet Lucca,

[Podcast]

The Myth of White Genocide in South Africa

An ongoing racial and economic crisis in a republic that reflects our own

Host Violet Lucca,Guest James Pogue

[Podcast]

How to Start a Nuclear War

Any day could be doomsday—and why that’s bad

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Andrew Cockburn

[Podcast]

Living in the Vanguard of Climate Change

How mega-fires—and the blinkered perspectives demanding flawed management of them—are raising the stakes for everyone

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Richard Manning

[Podcast]

The Death of New York City

In this inaugural episode of The Harper’s Podcast, Kevin Baker and Jeremiah Moss discuss the decline of New York City

Host Violet Lucca,Guest Kevin Baker, Jeremiah Moss

[Weekly Review]

Weekly Review

Sarah Huckabee Sanders is asked to leave a farm-to-table restaurant in Virginia, North Carolina’s bathroom bill returns, and Rodrigo Duterte calls god “stupid”

by Violet Lucca,

[Article]

A Day in Castle Garden

by Violet Lucca,