The Ars Nihil Interesting Things Roundup #5 (September - December 2023)

In this edition of the "Interesting Things Roundup": A lot, actually...

Here are the usual reminders:

• While much of what’s shown here was published during this period, there’s also a good number of old things. Everything linked is based on the fact I read/watched/listened to it during the past half-month.

• These links are posted mostly without comment but if I have anything to note about it, there’ll be an end note referenced. Otherwise, all opinions found in these links are strictly those of their creators and definitely not my own.

• Most of these links should be (mostly) safe-for-work but always use your best judgement.

Picture from Giovanni Battista Bracelli’s Bizzarie di Varie Figure (1624)

Articles, Listicles, and Other Reads

• "The Joyful, Punk World of Plant-Based Eating" by Lily Meyer (The Atlantic)

• "Want to make more friends? Start a club." by Rebecca Jennings (Vox)

• "A Map to One Piece’s Many Treasures" by Daniel Dockery (Vulture)

• "The Accidental Activist" by Jeff VanDerMeer (Esquire)

• "46 Books that Changed the World" by April Snellings (Mental Floss)

• "After 9/11, We Wanted the Old NYC. Instead We Got The Strokes." by Jesse Rifkin (Vice)

• "How the ‘Dirtbag Left’ Learned to Love Hunter Biden" by Calder McHugh (Politico)

• "Has Commercialization Killed Hip-Hop? It’s Complicated." by Zach Linly (HuffPost)

• "Preferring Biological Children Is Immoral" by Leo Kim (Wired)

• "Why Read Old Books?" by James Davis Nicoll (Tor.com)

• "A Country Shaped by Love and Fear" by Robert Zaretsky (The Atlantic)

• "Fish doorbells! Historic sandwiches! 50 of the weirdest, most wonderful corners of the web – picked by an expert" by Emma Beddington (The Guardian)

• "Is the populist right’s future... democratic socialism?" by Sean Illing & Sohrab Ahmari (Vox)

• "The Spectacular Life of Octavia E. Butler" by E. Alex Jung (Vulture)

• "Deciphering the Wagner Group's Love for Wagner" by Alex Ross (The New Yorker)

• "Was American Slavery Uniquely Evil?" by Eric Levitz (New York Magazine)

• "When Sci-Fi Anticipates Reality" by Lora Kelley (The Atlantic)

• "She Sacrificed Her Youth to Get the Tech Bros to Grow Up" by Lexi Pandell (Wired)

• "Is Cortisol The Reason You Keep Waking Up At 3 A.M.?" by Katie Camero (Bustle)

• "Everything You Should Know Before Talking to HR About a Problem at Work" by Alison Green (Vice)

• "Naomi Klein’s Journey Into the Unnerving World of Naomi Wolf" by Laura Marsh (The New Republic)

• "How to use less water: 15 essential tips – from beef burgers to megabutts to cutting back on clothes" by Emma Beddington (The Guardian)

• "What Should Art Criticism Do?" by Kemi Adeyemi, Tausif Noor, and Monica Uszerowicz (n+1)

• "The Hidden Brain Connections Between Our Hands and Tongues" by R. Douglas Fields (Quanta)

• "Liberalism in Mourning" by Samuel Moyn (Boston Review)

• "Chariots of Philosophical Fire" by Michael Gibson (City Journal)

• "The making of EP Thompson" by Madoc Cairns (New Statesman)

• "The Early History of Counting" by Keith Houston (Lapham's Quarterly)

• "The Secrets of Happiness & the Meaning of Life" by Michael Huemer (Fake Nous)

• "Why Success in Canada Means Moving to America" by Tajja Isen (The Walrus)

• "Harry Browne’s 17 Golden Rules of Financial Safety" by Venkata Sreekanth Sampath (The Tao of Wealth)

• "Things That Dream" by Brian Dillon (Granta)

• "‘It improves everything’: 17 reasons to love yoga – even if you are sceptical" by Zoe Williams (The Guardian)

• "Bernie Taupin Is Still Standing" by Jim Farber (Vulture)

• "Chaos, Comedy, and ‘Crying Rooms’: Inside Jimmy Fallon’s ‘Tonight Show’" by Krystie Lee Yandoli (Rolling Stone)

• "The widow and the murderer: a friendship born of tragedy" by Giles Tremlett (The Guardian)

• "Shostakovich in South Dakota" by Joseph Horowitz (The American Scholar)

• "Radical Attention" by Moira Donegan (Bookforum)

• "Against decluttering" by Britt Peterson (The Washington Post)

• "What the stories we tell about robots tell us about ourselves" by Constance Grady (Vox)

• "The Top 57 Episodes of ‘Star Trek,’ Ranked From Great to Perfect" by Adam B. Vary & Joe Otterson (Variety)

• "The 50 Worst Decisions in TV History" by Andy Greene (Rolling Stone)

• "Why furniture got so bad" by Rachel Kurzius (The Washington Post)

• "Why so many people are paying to get their paychecks" by Tatiana Walk-Morris (Vox)

• "The Artist Trying to Explain Kentucky’s ‘Meat Shower’ of 1876" by Marian Wang (

• "Silicon Valley’s vision for AI? It’s religion, repackaged." by Sigal Samuel (Vox)

• "56 Delightfully Unusual Words for Everyday Things" by Erin McCarthy (Mental Floss)

• "How Weird Was Frank Zappa?" by John Semley (The New Republic)

• "Earthquakes Are a Special Kind of Nightmare" by Robin George Andrews (The Atlantic)

• "The 49 modern wonders of the world, as named by the experts" by Katrina Lobley (Sydney Times-Herald)

• "The big idea: are memories fact or fiction?" by Sophia McBain (The Guardian)

• "Everyone Is a Girl Online" by Alex Quicho (Wired)

• "The Journalist and the Billionaire" by Shawn McCreesh (New York Magazine)

• "I Became A Monitor At A Sex Dungeon. Here’s What I Discovered There." by Tamsin Wressell (HuffPost)

• "Inside the Subreddit for Guys Desperate to Enlarge Their Penises" by Patrick Heardman (Vice)

• "These 38 Reading Rules Changed My Life" by Ryan Holiday

• "The Believer" by Isaac Chotiner (The New Yorker)

• "Democracy is the antidote to capitalism" by Sean Illing & Astra Taylor (Vox)

• "The Pirate Preservationists" by Jesse Walker (Reason)

• "Looking for Virginia Woolf’s Diaries" by Geoff Dyer (The Paris Review)

• "A Time for Consequences" by Bill Lueders (The Bulwark+)

• "The Charter-School Movement’s New Divide" by Cara Fitzpatrick (The Atlantic)

• "The Candy Man" by Margaret Talbot (The New Yorker)

• "The Twisty History of Montreal’s Outdoor Staircases" by Laura Kiniry (Atlas Obscura)

• “The Valley Girl, Like, Totally Deserved Better” by Soraya Roberts (The Atlantic)

• “Two Paths for the Novelist” by Laura Miller (Slate)

• "Is Homework Good for Kids?" by Anne Thériault (The Walrus)

• "How female Fauvists were some of history's most audacious painters" by Deborah Nicholls-Lee (BBC)

• "How to calm your nightmares" by Katy Jakle (Psyche)

• "‘The Bitter Invention of Satan:’ Coffee’s Caffeinated Quest Through Medieval Europe" by Olivia White (VinePair)

• "She Invented Being an Influencer — And Was Vilified for It" by Taylor Lorenz (Rolling Stone)

• "How I Got Paid to Live in Antarctica: FAQ about Working on the Ice" (Wander Eat Write)

• "Why now is the time to embrace the beaver" by Andrea Curtis (Cottage Life)

• "Every CEO Talks Like Elon Musk Now" by Nitish Pahwa (Slate)

• "We Are Not Just Polarized. We Are Traumatized." by Ana Marie Cox (The New Republic)

• "The Young Conservatives Trying to Make Eugenics Respectable Again" by Adam Serwer (The Atlantic)

• "The Undoing of a Great American Rock Band" by James Parker (The Atlantic)

• "How not to be fooled by viral charts" by Noah Smith (Noahpinion)

• "The Rise of the M.B.A. Novelist" by Celcilia Rabess (Wall Street Journal)

• "The curse of the cool girl novelist" by Charlotte Stroud (New Statesman)

• "The 50 greatest music videos of all time, ranked" by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

• "In the Nineteenth Century, Scientists Set Out to Solve the “Problem of American Storms”" by Alyson Foster (National Endowment of the Humanities)

• "Can the Harry Potter fandom carry on while ignoring J.K. Rowling?" by Allegra Rosenberg (Polygon)

• "Inside the Controversy Over the National Museum of the American Latino" by Olivia B. Waxman (Time)

• "AI Is a Lot of Work" by Josh Dzieza (New York Magazine)

• "How to Avoid Post-Vacation Stress" by Shanna B. Tiayon (Greater Good)

• "How to Pair Your Daily Exercise With Your Mood" by Tanner Garrity (InsideHook)

• "How to Create a Life Plan (With Action Plan and Tips)" by Leon Ho (Lifehack)

• "20 of the Most Thought-Provoking, Philosophical Science Fiction Books of All Time" by CJ Conner (BookRiot)

• "How to Be a More Interesting Person" by Barry Fralick

• "A new tech rebellion is taking shape. We can learn a lot from the Luddites" by Brian Merchant (Fast Company)

• "The Ludicrous, Depressing Appeal of the Crypto Guy" by Jacob Bacharach (The New Republic)

• "Gay Talese: I Wanted to Write About Nobodies" by Gay Talese (The Atlantic)

• "Never past your prime! 13 peaks we reach at 40 or later – from sex to running to self-esteem" by Emma Beddington (The Guardian)

• "How Comic Books Became Classics" by Stephanie Burt (The New Yorker)

• "Journalism and Democracy Are on the Cliff’s Edge" by Brian Hiatt (Mother Jones)

• "Why Is Every Internet Trend About Men or ‘Girls’?" by Kate Lindsey (GQ)

• "A Baker’s Secrets" by Dave Denison (The Baffler)

• "The Return of the Marriage Plot" by Rebecca Traister (The Cut)

• "Talk to Coldhearted Criminals" by Graeme Wood (The Atlantic)

• "Is the Greige Era of Design Ending?" by Nicole Schmidt (The Walrus)

• "“Whatever!”: In Defense of Anachronism in Ancient Rome" by James Hynes (LitHub)

• "What E’er Thou Art, Act Well Thy Part" by Brett & Kate McKay (The Art of Manliness)

• "All the Little Caesars" by Ferdinand Mount (The Atlantic)

• "Is America uniquely vulnerable to tyranny?" by Zack Beauchamp (Vox)

• "Are A.P. Classes a Waste of Time?" by Aaron R. Hanlon (The New Republic)

• "Quantum poetics" by William Egginton (Aeon)

• "How to say no" by Shayla Love (Psyche)

• "How Nasty Was Nero, Really?" by Rebecca Mead (The New Yorker)

• "One Piece's 25 Best Arcs, Ranked" by Tristan Stevens

• "How To Be Successful" by Sam Altman

• "Formula 1 Is Sweeping the Country. It Still Has a Long Way to Go." by Alex Kalogiannis (InsideHook)

• "The New Version of the Replacements’ Tim Is Quite Literally Revelatory" by Jack Hamilton (Slate)

• "The cult films of Japan’s legendary 80s production house, Directors Company" by James Balmont (Dazed)

• "Critically Cringe: On Susan Neiman’s “Left Is Not Woke”" by Samuel Clowes Huneke (LA Review of Books)

• "The South’s Jewish Proust" by Blake Smith (Tablet)

• "How to capture your thoughts and ideas" by Sébastien Dubois

• "In the Shallows" by Becca Rothfeld (The Yale Review)

• "The 25 Best Performance Art Pieces of All Time" by Dale Eisinger (Complex)

• "It's not just you. LinkedIn has gotten really weird." by Rob Price (Business Insider)

• "It’s Time for a Glorious, Uncompromising Re-Politicizing of Wine" by John McCarroll (Punch)

• "The Curator of Climate Change" by Guy Dixon (The Walrus)

• "The Mother Trap" by Merve Emre (The New Yorker)

• "The Outsiders: Why Black Audiences Love Italian American Screen Icons" by Morgan Jerkins (Vanity Fair)

• "Will the economy finally un-weird itself?" by Emily Stewart (Vox)

• "Why the First Amendment protects liars" by Jeff Kosseff (The Verge)

• "Why is the prompter strolling around the stage? Meet the secret heroes of German theatre" by Philip Oltermann (The Guardian)

• “‘Our drummer used human tibia bones’: the hellish birth of Brazil’s heavy metal scene” by Alex Deller (The Guardian)

• "Narcissists can't stand these traits. Here's how to become immune to narcissists." by Charles Trepany (USA Today)

• "Where the New Identity Politics Went Wrong" by Yascha Mounk (The Atlantic)

• "59 Dos and Don’ts for Getting Dressed Right Now" by the editors of GQ (GQ)

• "10 Rules for a Better Beard" by Adam Hurly (GQ)

• "11 Grocery Shopping Mistakes That Are Costing You Money" by Patty Lee (Food Network)

• "Inside the very strange, very expensive race to “de-age”" by Whizy Kim (Vox)

• "How the fight between tech founders and influencers shaped the internet" by Rebecca Jennings (Vox)

• "The Origins of the Socialist Slur" by Heather Cox Richardson (The Atlantic)

• "The pentatonic scale is the most important scale for guitarists – and these 40 licks will take your rock and blues chops to the next level" by David Gerrish (Guitar Techniques)

• "Dan Harmon Is Ready to Talk About All of It (Including the Justin Roiland Drama)" by Lacey Rose (The Hollywood Reporter)

• "‘We are just getting started’: the plastic-eating bacteria that could change the world" by Stephen Buranyi (The Guardian)

• "The secret world of breast cancer: 17 surprising things I wish I’d known" by Hilary Osborne (The Guardian)

• "Flat places" by Noreen Masud (Aeon)

• "The Fascination of Flaming June" by Alison Hokanson (The Met)

• "A Handheld History Celebrates the Time We Spent With Screens" by Linda Codega (Gizmodo)

• "The secrets to sorority admission? Perfect highlights and an image consultant" by Charlie McCann (The Economist)

• "The Season of Mist and Mellowness: John Keats' Autumnal Love and the Writing of His Last Great Ode" by Ellen Vrana (The Examined Life)

• "Station to Station" by David Platzker (Artforum)

• "Vergil’s secret message" by Julia Hejduk (Aeon)

• "Leisure and Liberality" by Elizabeth C. Corey (First Things)

• "The Great Psychedelic Experiment" by Natasha Boyd (Pioneer Works)

• "15 icons of electric guitar tone – and how they can inspire your playing" by Jon Bishop (Total Guitar)

• "Meet ‘Dogxim,’ the world’s first known dog-fox hybrid—and a genetic oddity" by Meaghan Mulholland (National Geographic)

• "The Prisoner and the Pen" by John J. Lennon (Esquire)

• "A Hand From One Page, A Bomb From Another: Rethinking “Spy vs. Spy”" by Gyasi Hall (Longreads)

• "The Darker Side of Leonard Cohen" by Myra Bloom (The Walrus)

• "The largest Hindu temple on American soil will soon open its doors" by Richa Karmarkar (The Washington Post)

• "How to think about ethical dilemmas" by Timm Triplett (Psyche)

• "Free Speech and Bad Meats" by Katie Kadue (The Public Domain Review)

• "An autistic man was surfing the internet on his dad’s sofa. Then the FBI turned up" by Stephanie Clifford (The Economist)

• "Naturalists Unknown" by Perri Klass (The American Scholar)

• "Two young missionaries made headlines. Two new docs look at why." by Alissa Wilkinson (Vox)

• "The Early Days of American English" by Rosemarie Ostler (Lapham's Quarterly)

• "How to Build a Memory Palace" (Art of Memory)

• "How to defuse catastrophic thoughts" by Lucia Tecuta (Psyche)

• "Facing a tedious to-do list? This trick could make it easier" by Shayla Love (Psyche)

• "The Top 100 Best TV Shows of All Time" by the staff of IGN (IGN)

• "She Reeled Us In With The Odyssey. Now: The Hard Stuff." by Johanna Hanink (Slate)

• "Why Silicon Valley’s biggest AI developers are hiring poets" by Andrew Deck (Rest of World)

• "Who Gets to Be Mentally Ill?" by K.J. Aiello (The Walrus)

• "A Square, Flat Earth and Round Heaven Meant the World to Ancient China" by James Hannam (Atlas Obscura)

• "The Generative Joys of Bookbinding" by Jennifer Savran Kelly (The Millions)

• "7 habits to live a healthier life, inspired by the world's longest-lived communities" by Allison Aubrey (NPR)

• "I Was So Wrong About Texas Roadhouse" by Maggie Hennessy (Bon Appétit)

• "The Difference Between Taste Vs. Flavor, According To An Expert" by Matthew Spina (Tasting Table)

• "30 musicians on the album that changed their life as a kid" by the staff of Classic Rock

• "The New War on Porn is Winning" by Lux Alptraum (New York Magazine)

• "I looked at the plans for the new city proposed by Silicon Valley elites. They're really terrible." by Adam Rogers (Business Insider)

• "Do you suffer from bibliomania? John W. Doull does — and his Dartmouth bookstore proves it" by Andrew Sampson (CBC)

• "The Strange Blissfulness of Storms" by Sarah Scoles (Nautilus)

• "You Don’t Need to Suffer to Make Art—But It Can Help" by Sarah Rose Etter (Electric Literature)

• "The Last Homesteads" by Andrew Moore (The New Republic)

• "Waiting for Form" by Tyler Malone (Poetry Foundation)

• "The best book covers of 2023 are the ones you’ll never see" by Zachary Petit (Fast Company)

• "101 hidden gems: the greatest films you’ve never seen" (Sight & Sound)

• "Why This Math Professor Objects to Diversity Statements" by Conor Friedersdorf (The Atlantic)

• "The philosophy of anarchism, explained" by Sean Illing & Sophie Scott-Brown (Vox)

• "The Virus Inside Your TV" by Isaac Butler (Slate)

• "The Judiciary Has Policed Itself for Decades. It Doesn’t Work." by Brett Murphy and Kirsten Berg (ProPublica)

• "‘Weapons of mass migration’: how states exploit the failure of migration policies" by Ruben Andersson and David Keen (The Guardian)

• "What 24 Hours Looks Like in Three Prisons" by Kwaneta Harris, Sara Kielly, and Heather C. Jarvis (Slate)

• "What We Learn from the Lives of Critics" by Parul Sehgal (The New Yorker)

• "‘It’s a Tyranny of Mike’" by Adriane Quinlan (Curbed)

• "When the New York Times lost its way" by James Bennet (The Economist)

• "We’re all addicted to cheap stuff — and Temu knows it" by Whizy Kim (Vox)

• "How to Lose a Library" by Carolyn Dever (Public Books Review)

• "The Rise of Narrative and The Fall of Persuasion" by Leon Wieseltier (Liberties)

• "Who Are Ready to Rouse Up Leviathan?" by Ed Simon (The Baffler)

• "The ridiculously stupid reason the US is letting animals spiral toward oblivion" by Benji Jones (Vox)

• "How Do You Even Sell a Book Anymore?" by Tajja Isen (The Walrus)

• "What Losing My Two Children Taught Me About Grief" by Colin Campbell (The Atlantic)

• "The polaroids of a 70s It Girl" by Zoe Whitfield (i-D)

• "How TikTok Trends May Be Setting Gender Back By Decades" by Adam England (The Daily Beast)

• "A Secluded Runway, a Turkish Spymaster and No Guns: the New World of Hostage Exchanges" by Joe Parkinson, Drew Hinshaw, James Marson, and Aruna Viswanatha (The Wall Street Journal)

• "The Humanities Have Sown the Seeds of Their Own Destruction" by Tyler Austin Harper (The Atlantic)

• "The Chic Young Divorcée" by Róisín Lanigan (The Fence)

• "Am I One of the Last Living Relatives of a Literary Legend?" by Kathryn Schulz (The New Yorker)

• "Club Culture Isn't Dead – It's Evolving" by Eloise Hendy (Vice)

• "The 100 Greatest TV Shows of All Time" by the staff of Variety (Variety)

• "The Age Gappers" by Lila Shapiro (The Cut)

• "“You Better Be as Good as Letterman!” Conan O’Brien’s Wild First Year: An Oral History" by Andrew Buss (Vanity Fair)

• "Epic Fail" by Gordon LaForge (Slate)

• "Pondering the biggest orb" by David Pierce (The Verge)

• "The Personal, Political Art of Board-Game Design" by Matthew Hutson (The New Yorker)

• "“He was incapable of saying anything fond about anyone or anything. Affection didn’t exist in his life, only weird sex”: how Frank Zappa survived the 70s" by Mark Ellen (Classic Rock)

• "Blood, Guns, and Broken Scooters: Inside the Chaotic Rise and Fall of Bird" by Amy Martyn (WIRED)

• "Anne Boleyn’s blunders" by Rowan Williams (The New Statesman)

• "“Made in America” Never Meant More Ethical" by Derek Guy (The Nation)

• "Ultimate Breaks & Beats: An Oral History" by Robbie Ettelson (Cuepoint)

• "'Ultimate Breaks & Beats' and Rap Music's Golden Era" by Jay Quan (Rock The Bells)

• "Enough With Girl Dinner, Let's Bring Back The Amuse-Bouche" by Eliza Dumais (Munchies)

• "Why is Dad So Mad?" by Daniel Engber (The Atlantic)

• "We Need to Talk About Reactionary Centrists" by Aaron Huertas

• "The Defense of Liberty Can’t Do Without Identity Politics" by Jacob T. Levy (Niskanen Center)

• "10 (Not Entirely Crazy) Theories Explaining the Great Crime Decline" by Dana Goldstein (The Marshall Project)

• "Gladwell for Dummies" by Maureen Tkacik (The Nation)

• "Misogynist Incels and Male Supremacism" by Megan Kelly, Alex DiBranco, & Dr. Julia R. DeCook (New America)

• "The Oh-So Predictable Milton Friedman" by Angus Burgin (Democracy)

• "Zola understood our lust for shopping" by Agnes Callard (UnHerd)

• "The Free-Speech Debate Is a Trap" by Andrea Long Chu (New York Magazine)

• "The female gaze: 100 overlooked films directed by women" (Sight & Sound)

• "How Putin’s Right-Hand Man Took Out Prigozhin" by Thomas Grove, Alan Cullison, and Bojan Pancevski (The Wall Street Journal)

• "A guide to difficult conversations for people who hate confrontation" by Allie Volpe (Vox)

• "Why Black Jesus Made My Grandmother Uncomfortable" by A.J. Verdelle (The Atlantic)

• "The Return of the Pagans" by David Wolpe (The Atlantic)

• "I’ll never stop blogging: it’s an itch I have to scratch – and I don’t care if it’s an outdated format" by Simon Reynolds (The Guardian)

• "Welcome to Feral Week" by Luke Winkie (Slate)

• "The Joy of Slap" by Andy Cush (GQ)

• "Love, laughter and lifelong memories: 19 amazing facts every dog-lover needs to know" by Zoe Williams (The Guardian)

• "The Untold Story of Elliott Smith’s Teenage Band" by Jayson Greene (Pitchfork)

• "33 Books to Read Before You’re 30, According to Vogue" (Vogue)

• "Don’t quit booze – just drink differently: 15 ways to change your life without trying all that hard" by Sarah Phillips (The Guardian)

• "Rubbing the Right Way: The Infectious Sounds and Long Evolution of Zydeco Music" by Ian McNulty (FrenchQuarter.com)

• "Vinyl is back for good and that’s exciting. Don’t let the greed of big labels ruin it" by John Harris (The Guardian)

• "These were some of 2023’s worst destinations for overtourism. Here’s how to avoid the crowds next year" by Blane Bachelor (CNN Travel)

• "Cornel West Is the Charlatan of the Year" by David Masciotra (The New Republic)

• "Poetry, a Matter of Life and Death" by Nick Ripatrazone (The Bulwark+)

• "The True Story of the ‘Ferrari’ Crash That Changed Racing Forever" by Kent M. Wilhelm (GQ)

• "How Corporate America’s Obsession With Creativity Wrecked the World and Brought Us Elon Musk" by Timothy Noah (The New Republic)

• "Is Bandcamp as We Know It Over?" by Philip Sherburne (Pitchfork)

• "Gen Z Is Leaving Dating Apps Behind" by Jason Parnham (Wired)

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