August 26, 2025 • 44 mins
Essayist Shaan Sachdev contemplates what it means to be a writer & how to be a writer in the context of today's world; discusses the impact of unconscious bias in corporate journalism; and shares his process for writing on everything from gay bathhouse culture to geopolitical conflicts. It's a sexy and cerebral episode that even includes a little discourse on Queen Bey..."Bounce on that sh***, dance..."
After this episode, check out Shaan's Beyonce podcast "Diva Discourse" on Apple, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
--
Shaan Sachdev is an essayist, cultural critic, journalist, and writer based in New York. He writes about a range of topics including philosophy, America's preoccupations with race thinking, masculinity, biases in media, city life, and his two favorite divas, Beyoncé and Hannah Arendt.
--
Shaan's Work mentioned in the show:
"Steamography" (Strange Matter)
"Portrait of the Technocrat as a Stanford Man" (New England Review, Pushcart Prize Winner, Best American Essays 2024 Runnerup)
"Hysterical Empathy" (The Point)
"God Save the Top"(The Point)
"The Gaza Generation" (LA Review or Books)
"The Key to Beyoncé’s Lasting Success" (Slate)
--
Also mentioned in this episode:
The Writer's Room
Winners Takes All by Anand Giridharadas
--
Follow the show in Instagram @itsallwritepod.
Email us at itsallwritepod@gmail.com
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Shaan (00:00):
One thing that causes me perennial existential crisis as
(00:03):
a writer is how thin the line isbetween writer and non-writer.
Everybody writes, not everybodypaints or sings or makes films,
and so I feel like other genresof art are more comfortably
sequestered in this kind ofspecialization of just a sheer
medium.
so I'm just like why am I awriter?
(00:24):
And in a way all I am is aspeaker or a thinker or an
expressor.
It's like saying I'm an exister,right.
Or I'm a just, yeah.
I'm a be-er.
Ariana (00:36):
Hi, I'm Ariana McLean.
Meryl (00:38):
I'm Meryl Branch Mc Tiernan.
Ariana (00:40):
And you're listening to, it's All Write.
Meryl (00:42):
A podcast about the writing life and those who live
it.
I am so thrilled to announcethat my novel What You should
Worry About is under contract tobe published by Akashic Books
this coming summer of 2026.
Yay.
Yay.
Yay.
And today we have, my friendShaan Sachdev here.
(01:03):
Hi Shaan.
Ariana (01:03):
Hi Shaan.
Shaan (01:04):
Hello.
How amazing that the work paidoff?
Meryl (01:06):
Yes.
Yeah.
The work, apparently it can payoff.
So thank you.
if you li listen back to ourfirst episode in May, I was a
bitter whore and now I am just awhore.
Ariana (01:20):
Alright.
Alright.
Meryl (01:22):
Um, Shaan is a writer and essayist based in New York City,
who writes about a range ofsubjects including philosophy,
political bias, the military,industrial complex, queer city
life, and his two favoritedivas, Hannah Arendt and
Beyonce.
He's recently written for theNew York Times, the Wall Street
Journal, Slate, Salon, the NewRepublic and others.
(01:44):
He also co-hosts Diva Discourse,a Beyonce centered podcast.
Ariana (01:47):
Thank you so much for, for being here.
So you write about such a rangeof topics from geopolitical
issues to sexual issues to sex,sexual enjoyment, but with the
same seriousness and with thesame amount of um, research,
(02:09):
you'd kind of put the sameattention to to all topics that
you do.
So how would you describe yourwriterly persona?
Shaan (02:16):
It's a lovely question, and it's also a flattering
observation because it feelslike there's some being rewarded
just in you acknowledging that.
I went to grad school to studycultural criticism.
I did a master's at NYU in that.
And what we learned was how tobe a specialist in the art of
non-specialization.
(02:37):
So how to almost feignspecialization which you can't
do if you're gonna write about awide range of subjects.
And I think I wanted to become awriter partly so I could think
about anything I wanted.
And I'm doing that byspecializing in things for three
(02:57):
months at a time.
But my persona, I would say isyes, somebody who just wants to
think about anything that comesto him.
But that I think partly alsoreflects the audacity of
writing.
There's something problematicabout that.
I concede
Ariana (03:13):
What do you mean by, sorry, what do you mean by
problematic?
Shaan (03:16):
I think maybe it's problematic to feign
specialization.
The upside to all this is thatyou, unlike a scholar who
becomes so specialized and soinsular, that you lose the
ability to communicate to thepublic because you begin to, use
arcane language and you're notconsidering style and
presentation.
The upside to being a culturalcritic and essayist is you draw
(03:39):
on the expertise of others topresent something beautifully to
the public.
But the downside and the thingI'm saying is problematic is
that.
In a way, the line between beinga writer and a non-writer is so
thin that what I'm basicallysaying is, look, I wanna talk
about anything I wanna talkabout.
And the question becomes whatgives you the right to, and I
think that begins to intersectwith the idea of are you
(04:01):
qualified, are you an expert?
At what point are you allowed towrite about something for a huge
publication?
Meryl (04:08):
Like how much research, how much education are you part
of that cu cultural group?
Those, all those kinds ofelements.
Shaan (04:14):
Exactly.
Ariana (04:15):
This is fascinating topic.
'cause'cause right now there'sthe opposite is also happening
where it's like, don't trust theexperts.
Right.
So you have these, I feel likethe,
Meryl (04:23):
like TikTok culture.
Ariana (04:24):
Yeah.
So it's like on one hand peopleare questioning what makes you
qualified to talk about this?
But then on the other hand, oh,you're an expert.
They're, there's some sort ofconspiracy.
They're part of the elite.
You're trying to get elite.
Yeah.
Part of the elite.
Interesting that you broughtthat up.
'cause I feel like there's thattug of war happening right now
So how do you, fit into thatspace?
Just personally, like whenyou're going to write something
(04:45):
and you, like, how do you findthat confidence?
Meryl (04:48):
Or do you ever feel like this is not a topic that's right
for me or that I should take on?
Shaan (04:52):
I think, okay, so I think there's two parts to this
answer.
The first is that there is adifference between taking a
video of yourself ranting aboutsomething and engaging in the
activity of formally coheringyour thoughts in an elaborate
and organized manner.
When you do the latter, whenyou're not necessarily on
TikTok, but you're writing anessay, you realize that you are
(05:15):
required to have a certaindegree of protracted engagement
with the subject that willnecessarily involve expertise.
I think you begin to appreciateexpertise, not as conspiracy,
but just as having dwelled forlong enough in a subject.
But Meryl, to your question,when I have, say I have an idea,
(05:36):
like I wanna write about how,which I did recently for the New
York Times, like how difficultit is to walk through New York
City, the first thing I'll do isask, okay, who else has written
about this?
I might find that so many peoplehave that there's no point in
writing it.
And so at that point, it's whatnew can I bring?
The,
Meryl (05:54):
so that's your first step in deciding That's, yeah.
Interesting.
Shaan (05:57):
I think the very first step is what exactly do I want
to say?
Is it just, is it one thought orcan this thought be fleshed out?
Because on the other hand, evenif people have written about it,
if you can write about somethingthat's already been written
about and bring a kind of newstyle to it, and even just say
it with different words, I thinkthere is some value to that.
Ariana (06:15):
Yeah, snaps.
Shaan (06:16):
And it's actually very easy.
It's like this idea of there'sinfinite amount of sentences you
can configure with the Englishlanguage.
There's also an infinite numberof ways that a thought about
something can be configured.
Sometimes just the beauty or thethe kind of contemplative
approach you take to somethingthat's been taken many times I
think can still be worth puttingout in public.
But but Ariana, your initialquestion was how do I negotiate
(06:39):
the contemporary tension betweenexpert and non-expert?
Was that kind of, it
Ariana (06:43):
wasn't it?
I didn't actually pose thatquestion'cause it felt a little
big, but I would love if youhave thoughts on that.
It was more of an observation ofthe existence we're all living
in.
Shaan (06:51):
Yeah, having worked in traditional news media for a
long time primarily just to makea living.
In addition to being a writer,you learn that the people who
work in authoritative positionsoften are just trading in
prefabricated information.
They're taking reports, they'retaking scientific reports and
(07:11):
academic reports and what hasconsidered authoritative
history, and they're justregurgitating it.
Meryl (07:15):
And they're not taking a spin.
They're not taking, they're not,it's impartial, so to speak,
Shaan (07:20):
yeah.
And whether or not it'simpartial, I feel like, is
almost a more complicatedquestion.
I think what I'm trying toconvey is more that it's that
they are not engaging with it.
They're holding it at adistance, and for them, they're
also just working a nine tofive.
They just wanna get the day overwith, and yet, from the outside,
they might be viewed as thesinister.
Yeah, crystallizers of what theoverarching narrative is.
Meryl (07:41):
Interesting.
Shaan (07:41):
And then on the other side, you might have someone
like me who's not an expert andnot working at an institution
and not even interested in justpulling that stuff to use
blindly, but who wants to take along walk and think about it at
length and really get lost inthe idea in a way that might
make a lot of technicalknowledge, secondary not
(08:02):
primary.
And so I think the lovely thingabout being like a cultural
writer is being able to fusethose worlds and those who are
really skeptical of experts, infact my aversion is less in the
idea that there's somethingsinister at play and more in the
idea of what I was, talkingabout in this primary instance
(08:23):
that they're not looking uponthe things that they're experts
on with any wonder.
They're not getting lost in it.
It's just this sanitizedrelationship you know?
Meryl (08:36):
Do you have a favorite piece that you've written, I
guess in recent years?
Shaan (08:41):
It's so funny because when I apply to residencies and
when people ask oh, can I readsomething?
I have to pick a favorite I, ofcourse, as any writer ought to
maybe I feel ashamed, slightlyashamed of everything I've
written, right?
Yeah.
Right.
It's like this I can do better.
The essay that got the mostrecognition, or that at least
helped my career the most wascalled Portrait of the
Technocrat as a Stanford Man.
(09:03):
And, it won a Push Guard Prize.
It got shortlisted for BestAmerican essays.
And it actually just was bornout of heartbreak.
My, my boyfriend broke up withme and I decided to write a
revenge essay.
And it was rejected by 25reviews.
And finally the New EnglandReview, which is run out of
Middlebury, it's this beautifulsmall journal basically said we
(09:25):
like it, but there's an issue.
And they've pointed out theissue that I think other places
had found with it, which wasthat I wasn't acknowledging my
own elitism and criticizinganother elite person.
Interesting.
Which was so true.
And and in my anger, I didn'tacknowledge that.
Meryl (09:39):
Right.
You have to implicate yourselftoo in order for people to be on
your side.
Shaan (09:44):
Exactly.
That's exactly right.
Yes.
And so they actually they werenice enough to say, we'll,
publish this if you can fixthat.
And they did.
And it ended up being, I think.
A pretty strong essay.
I remember sending it to youwhen it came out, Meryl.
Oh yeah.
Meryl (09:54):
Loved it.
Yeah.
Shaan (09:55):
But I think that's, I think that's a good example of a
mix of genres.
It's personal essay, it'spolitical analysis, it's
philosophy.
There's some literary criticism.
Meryl (10:03):
I, I also just read this morning your Steamroom-ography
piece, which I have to say itwas so suspenseful.
Like that was really hard to do.
It was a piece about bathhouseculture using actually going
into a bathhouse and then givinglike a long history, but in the
midst of sexy what's gonnahappen, suspense.
(10:26):
So I feel like that was a reallygreat way to have people learn
about something while also beingcompletely engaged in the story.
Shaan (10:33):
That's, it's, first of all, I have to just say it's so
flattering that you guys haveread anything.
And I like, I feel like oftenwhen I hear people being
interviewed, I'm like.
They should at least take amoment to acknowledge that this
is like a huge exercise and likeflattery and narcissism.
So thank you for allowing me totalk about my tiny little
career.
Yeah.
With that piece,Steamroom-ography was written
for a non-queer audience becauseI think for the most part, gay
(10:57):
guys queer people are like morefamiliar both with the
phenomenology of the experienceitself and have some idea of the
history.
And yet I realized that everytime I came out of this
experience and talked to myfriends about it, who weren't
part of this little world, theywere always shocked.
And it was years and years ofhearing people be like, wait,
that happens.
I wrote it in the second personto put the non cruiser into the
(11:19):
cruiser shoes and just the ideaof, yeah,
Meryl (11:20):
I didn't even notice that.
That's so funny.
Ariana (11:22):
it felt like it started more of a personal essay.
I don't know, creative essay.
I don't know.
There's so many words, but yeah.
But then it got into, but then Iwas like, learning about all
this history and taking us to Ithink we, you go back to the 19
hundreds or something and I wasjust like, oh, wow.
This is yeah.
Right.
So what gives it a nice context?
Meryl (11:42):
Maybe Gen Z guy will figure it out, but he won't know
that this he's part of a longhistory.
Shaan (11:48):
Yeah.
And in that sense, I think thereis something for even queer
sub-cultures to gain fromreading the essay.
But I think it's also a goodexample of this idea that there
are a lot of people who'vewritten really seminal work
about this history.
So what I'm just doing is takingtheir work.
Right.
I'm not doing primary research.
And this, in a way, this worksas a case study for what we were
talking about earlier where I'mtaking Allan Bérubé's work,
(12:12):
who's written about bathhouses,and I'm taking George Johnson.
I'm taking like all these peoplewho've really studied
specifically New York.
But the one little increment I'mmaking is even in an age of
technological experience whereyou don't need to cruise
manually.
There's still such a thrill indoing so that it's, it exists
even in these sanitized,privatized spaces.
(12:32):
That's just a little thesis.
And I'm like okay, so how canyou take that though and turn it
into an essay using otherpeople's research?
And one thing you do is youcreate a prestige, but the other
is you're so invested in theexperience of that increment
that you can just make almostlike an art product out of it,
right?
Like an artistic statement.
And so there's a lot of feigned,there's a lot of faux expertise
in it.
(12:52):
I did spend like a few monthsresearching before I started,
and I think I learned as I wasresearching that, oh, there is
something to also note aboutthis circular pattern here, that
bath houses emerged organicallythen we're disassembled because
of the AIDS crisis and then hadto find a new home informally,
elsewhere.
And so we're back to the prebathhouse era.
I think that little bit is meattempting humbly to contribute
(13:16):
something small to this cannon,but I think the strength of that
essay lies in, I'd hope, I thinkit's more in the art of the
sentences than in the overallpolitical contribution.
Ariana (13:25):
I love the little vignettes, like we're in the
bathhouse and you're like, youcan feel the steam and the steam
figuratively and metaphor.
Sorry.
Figuratively and literally Ineed, was sitting
Meryl (13:35):
outside in the park and I was getting hot and I'm like,
oh, we're hot.
We're going the show.
I gotta go to the
Ariana (13:39):
bath.
Shaan (13:41):
My, my grandmother said she stopped reading at the Moray
eels bit.
And I was like, that's fair.
Meryl (13:53):
Do you ever worry about anything that you put out there?
How family and friends and anyrelationship that you have to
read about this personal stuff
Shaan (14:03):
Sex wise?
No.
Meryl (14:04):
Interesting.
Ariana (14:05):
I was gonna say, and we could expand that to, I think a
lot of writers are eitherfeeling censored or they are
censoring themselvespreemptively.
And so do you feel that pressureor do you find, how do you
maneuver in this world thatwe're living in this reality,
Meryl (14:23):
looking at your work, one might say, oh, he doesn't censor
himself at all.
It's so honest and brave and outthere, but I feel like that's
probably, I don't know.
Is that true?
Shaan (14:32):
This almost this question to me feels like something a
really good therapist would askme, I think, part of it is that
writing is necessarily anarcissistic act.
I think it's very funny whenpeople say, oh, I'm just writing
to write.
I'm not writing to be published.
It's a lie because you arepublishing what you're writing.
Like you are very aware of that.
And there's a huge differencebetween writing in public and
(14:54):
writing in private.
And I think that I do have aconfessional impulse and I do
personally, without havingthought it through, just feel
like art above life always.
So I'm willing to, I'm willingto steal, I'm willing to write
about people and write aboutmyself.
But I have absolutely felt theneed to censor because I'm still
in, I think, the outerparameters of what one would
(15:14):
call an emerging writer.
Not having yet published myfirst book.
And when I started writing inearly 2020, I had some kind of
contrarian approaches to the waythat identity and racial
politics were being discussed.
I think as an immigrant to thiscountry, who was neither.
Black, Latino or white.
I felt like I had specificexperiences that didn't clearly
(15:35):
or neatly map onto what wasbeing said.
And it was at a time when if youeven dissented in a microcosmic
sense, you were punished.
And and I'm speaking here as aprogressive in a very
progressive world.
I'm not thinking about theconservative world, which I'm
not even sure if they read, but
Meryl (15:50):
they we're safe.
Yeah.
Right,
Shaan (15:51):
right.
So like this is I'm talkingabout an intramural drama here,
and so I did have to proceedcarefully and I wrote a piece
for the point in 2021 calledHysterical Empathy that I had to
think long and hard about somethings in that and whether I
wanted to write that down.
And I ended up doing it, andthen it ended up going well.
There was a piece I wrote a yearor two ago called God Save the
Top.
(16:12):
And there were some paragraphsthere when it was being written
that were.
Taking an almost impishly,reductive view of what man and
woman is.
And I did it.
I did it as part of theperformance of the writer.
And the editors were concernedabout how that might be viewed
among communities and advocatesof communities that didn't agree
with that binary.
And so they asked me to, therewere some paragraph.
Meryl (16:34):
Can you tell can you give a little tiny little log line
about what the piece is about?
Oh, of course.
Shaan (16:38):
God bless the top is, it's a piece that looks at the
ethnography of gay sexualpositions, but it also takes a
personal root into why I preferthe passive sexual role rather
than the dominant one.
And the thesis of the piecesthat the true gay man is always
a bottom, that the true sexualdivide between men doesn't lie
and gay and straight, butbetween penetrators and
penetrate.
(16:59):
And so that was a piece where Ihad to actually take some
paragraphs out.
And this is how quickly timemoves.
Just two years ago, it was a lottrans issues had a certain
fraught in the progressivecircles that they don't right
now, because now they're undersiege from the outside in a way
that is united the progressivefront.
But I, at this point I'm veryworried about writing about
(17:21):
politics at this point.
Now, censorship and fear are topdown.
They're not bottom up.
They're coming from thegovernment.
When I wrote a piece a few yearsago about Ukraine and Russia,
that took the position that NATOand the US were culpable in what
was happening.
I got some death threats,weirdly.
Wow.
But it was from like randompeople who were just like, I
know where you live and we'regonna get you.
(17:42):
And I was like okay, these arelike freelance, gorillas.
That's fine.
At this point now, when youactually have federal agents
detaining people for whatthey've written at student
papers, there's a differentclimate of fear.
And so I have a piece coming outin one week exactly on Gaza, and
the Holocaust.
It's a 7,000 word piece for theLA Review of Books that is
(18:03):
partly a review of PankajMishra's new book The World
After Gaza.
And it looks at how theHolocaust has been
instrumentalized and exploitedby Israel, and it uses primarily
Jewish scholars to make thatcase.
But it's a long meditation onhow we got to this point.
And I'm very nervous.
I'm so nervous that I'mwondering to myself, do I write
this under my name as animmigrant, as a naturalized
(18:25):
citizen?
Is it safe?
To write about this
Meryl (18:27):
and primarily from the government.
Like the concern would be fromTrump, not from people.
Absolutely not People.
Shaan (18:33):
Not from I'm not worried about people, I'm not worried
about friends, I'm not worriedabout online angry people that
is so cosmetic.
And actually I feel like peoplewho are still railing against
that just don't have muchperspective because it's not
that scary at the end of theday.
Meryl (18:45):
Like what?
So what someone hates you whocan like Yeah,
Shaan (18:47):
exactly Right.
But the idea but to have your
Meryl (18:49):
immigration status and, yeah.
No, but
Ariana (18:52):
we have masked men who are disappearing people right
now.
Like it's a serious,
Shaan (18:56):
and I remember, I mean before I was a citizen flying in
as a passport holder who had alot of Arab passport stamps.
'cause I grew up in the MiddleEast.
I would get, every single time Iflew through JFK, I would get
moved to a back room andinterrogated.
It was just like this is Bush'sWar on Terror era.
And it was like so normalizedand then it disappeared.
But it reminds you that that'sthe real paradigm of fear, like
(19:17):
it's when it's turned down, noton
Meryl (19:18):
Twitter to Yeah.
Shaan (19:19):
and I think that there is, there are enough of us.
There is like a large portion ofpeople who are like, fuck this.
And I think there's almost toomany to all be rounded up.
Ariana (19:27):
Yeah.
I have to believe that's stillthe majority.
Shaan (19:29):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I will say, on the note ofGaza, it's interesting because
you couldn't talk about it from,for a long time.
Yeah.
Especially in newsrooms.
And so now, even though there issome censorship, it is still at
the forefront of the politicalimagination globally in a way
that it never has was.
Yeah.
Britain, France are about torecognize,
Ariana (19:45):
yeah.
Shaan (19:46):
Palestine as a state, there's a lot of progress being
made, even in, but of course theprice has been the elimination
of Gaza.
But at the same time, on theother side, we were talking
about how quickly the politicalclimate changes and the social
climate changes.
2020 to 2023 was a bigdifference.
2023 to now is a big difference.
If, God willing, AOC becomespresident or something like that
(20:07):
happens in the next term.
A lot of this will be pedaldback.
And so while this is reallyhorrifying and very scary.
We have to remember that thereare cycles and that if we record
this in three years, we could behaving a totally different
conversation.
And I think it's important toparse the difference between a
timely scare and a larger humancondition.
Yeah.
Or political condition or, yeah.
Ariana (20:25):
whenever I'm feeling quite down and helpless and
powerless, it's what's the wordthat everyone says?
This shall pass.
Like nothing is permanent.
Change is the only constant.
And it's just change ishappening so much quicker now, I
think because of, technology andthe internet and all that jazz
but also for the good, I don'tknow, what you said made me
(20:47):
think of that.
Okay, things have gotten reallyquickly, I consider bad, but it
could also quickly becomebetter.
Shaan (20:55):
I will just say that, when Reagan was president, they
were a series of astonishingfinancial deregulation enacted
that didn't have thesensationalism that Trump's do.
I think partly because we justdidn't exist in a climate where
everyone was watching andcommenting at the same time.
And I guess that leads me toask, are, are things happening
at a fast pace or are we just isthat just the perception we have
(21:16):
because of the way we engagewith the world?
Yeah.
If like we were not online andnever went online and we just
went about our lives in New YorkCity, would we see much of a
difference?
We'd see little things that weredifferent.
Look, my sister lives on a farmin Virginia.
It's an intentional community of40 families.
And it's not culty at all.
It's hippie, but there's a lotof like older progressives who
are, who never leave this farm.
(21:36):
And yet when I go over to theirhouses for dinner, are in the
state of hand ringing anguishbecause of what they saw on a
screen and all around them isnothing but beautiful forest us.
And they're like, the world isending, right?
There's no more land left.
Trump is ruining the world.
And I'm like, it's important.
It's certainly important.
I say this as a writer and as acritic and as a, a political
writer.
It's certainly important to knowwhat's happening, but I don't
(21:56):
think it's important to totallyuntether yourself from the what
actually human experience.
Experience.
Yeah.
Meryl (22:07):
Can you tell us about the book you're working on?
Ariana (22:09):
Yes.
Shaan (22:11):
Yes, I will.
And I had a conversation withmyself on the way here about how
much I should talk about andyou'll figure out why in a sec.
But I've worked in, I've workedin corporate news for a long
time.
I've worked at CNN Fox, CBS andI spent so much time in
mainstream newsrooms just tomake a living.
I was there just not reallyinvested in what was happening
(22:32):
because I knew I wanted to be awriter.
And at the time, for a lot ofit, I wanted to write
philosophy.
So it was a total disconnect.
But sitting in the newsroom, Ilearned that so much of what
from the outside ischaracterized as sinister or
conspiratorial is actuallyconducted by people who are
completely unaware of whatthey're doing.
They're completely unaware thatthey're that they're doing
(22:53):
anything that's not good.
They think they're doing God'swork.
And from the very top down, I'mtalking about the very highest
levels of these organizationsthat I've sit in on meetings
with.
There is simply no cognizance ofthe idea that what they're doing
is perpetuating a reallyproblematic world and national
order.
And so the book I wanted towrite is a way to make use of
all these years I've spent innewsrooms by putting out the
(23:16):
thesis that what pervadescorporate media and mainstream
media is unconscious bias, notconscious bias, that the people
who work there don't knowthey're biased and that they
internalize bias primarily bythe language they use to talk
about the world.
When they use words liketerrorist or gorilla or official
source or formal source orinformal source without really
(23:38):
thinking about what those mean,they perpetuate a national world
order.
That's the book I've beenmeaning to write.
However about a month before myfirst residency.
Which was in Wyoming in April Iwas
Meryl (23:50):
You've been on how many residencies since April?
Just two.
Just two.
Just two.
You have another one coming up,right?
Shaan (23:55):
I have another, I have three more coming up.
Ariana (23:56):
Three more.
That's amazing.
So you're living in a spacewhere you're dedicated to
writing this book, bouncing fromresidencies, I shouldn't say
bouncing, experiencing differentresidencies.
Shaan (24:05):
I like bouncing it sounds like fun.
Beyonce's song, river dancesong, shit.
Dance.
Yeah.
No, very much it's my year of,it's like my year of the
opposite of rest and relaxation,but there is some of that in
there too.
It's really magical
Meryl (24:16):
thinking and magic.
Shaan (24:18):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's yeah, the year of thefrenetic Penman it's I'm moving
between residencies and inbetween stopping in New York and
Virginia where my sister lives,so I'm just constantly moving.
But, so a year a month before Ileft for Wyoming, I had I was
thinking through a feud I washaving with a very close friend
of mine, and it suddenlyoccurred to me that I had to
write about it to understand it.
(24:39):
And suddenly out of nowhere Iwas hit with this idea to write
a novel that was not just aboutthis friend, but about a series
of, it was a series of portraitsof writers in New York.
And I've never written fiction,I've ever written, never written
a novel.
And I just realized I had nochoice because it would not
leave me.
And so that is and I'm not evensure if I'm supposed to be
(25:02):
saying this.
Meryl (25:03):
I love this plot twist.
I did not expect this.
I know this is fun.
But also just judging by, what'sit called?
Steam room ology.
Like you can write fiction likethat reads like fiction.
Shaan (25:15):
You think so?
Meryl (25:16):
Yes.
Like your nonfiction feels solived in and feels like it could
easily be translatable.
Ariana (25:24):
Yeah.
You have the artistry oflanguage like you expressed your
that you pay attention to that.
And I feel like that's fiction.
Shaan (25:31):
That's really interesting.
I think as a nonfiction writerwriting fiction, I've learned
that the line is a little biteerily nebulous because I'm
writing it as nonfiction.
I'm writing it as a collectionof creative nonfiction, essays,
learning that you can get awaywith doing that.
Yeah.
It's if I could just write aportrait of you and change your
name.
And it works, but it's beingwritten in a kind of
intellectual way that i'mwondering how it will come
(25:53):
across when it's done, butthat's what I'm doing.
However, my next residency, I'mofficially the nonfiction writer
in residence, and I have to givea number of public
presentations, and so I'm goingto pivot to my nonfiction book
Meryl (26:04):
so that you'll shelve the fiction for until after that
residency.
Ariana (26:08):
Or you'll write late at night.
Exactly.
Meryl (26:11):
That's what you're used to.
That's your
Ariana (26:12):
your muse or your like your side piece.
Yeah.
Meryl (26:16):
You've been doing it with your news writing and your
nonfiction, so for a
Shaan (26:20):
while, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think it's hard to give upsomething you've started.
So I think I'll write it becausethe nonfiction will be a lot of
research, not writing.
It's gonna be like a year ofresearch.
So I'll be able to continue thenovel.
Ariana (26:36):
You've worked in these corporate news spaces, but then
you've also written a lot thatyou've pitched to different
publications.
We were curious about yourprocess of pitching ideas to, I
don't wanna call themnon-traditional, but the
non-corporate publications.
Shaan (26:52):
Yeah, there's actually I almost feel like I get excited
when helping friends pitch toplaces because in a way it's
it's almost the straightequivalent of collecting sports
cards or something.
Like I love this idea of oh,let's look at a deck and see
what'll work.
There in an age where we aresadly being fragmented into kind
of individual, platforms wewrite just for ourselves,
(27:14):
obviously I'm thinking aboutsubstack.
I do still feel like there'sthis magic to publications and
even if they have a smallcirculation and even if they
have an a volunteer staff, whichis very sad, and even if they
can barely pay their writersanything, something about the
cultural nexus and thecollective intention to run a
publication that publishesliterary pieces is just, I just
(27:35):
think it's this magical thing.
So I do believe that it's worthtrying to publish with journals
and reviews and magazines, and
Meryl (27:44):
I a hundred percent agree.
Yeah.
There's something to beingaccepted, to having the stamp of
approval to go beyond your ownaudience.
Shaan (27:52):
Exactly.
And to work with people who arededicated, even though editors
can be tedious sometimes to workwith people who are dedicated
ultimately to this project.
And to, to giving your work toothers.
And also look, if we all haveour own substack in 10 years,
we'll have to just recreate thislandscape once again by
consolidating, because no one isgonna subscribe to 10,000
(28:13):
different writers.
It's never gonna work.
Ariana (28:15):
It's like streaming services now.
Meryl (28:16):
Like it's a fucking nightmare.
My whole email, it's I'm like, Idon't even know who these people
are.
Somehow I'm on their list.
Yeah.
Should I read it or should Ijust delete all of them?
Shaan (28:25):
Totally.
Yeah.
And it, and I think it alsodissolves the line between
formal and informal writing.
There's no longer this, at leastquasi process of, let's think
about this, let's look at ittogether.
Let me show it to somebody else.
Let's invest in putting it outin, in our pages.
So I say all that becausewhenever I'm pitching or I'm
helping a friend pitch, I thinkit's lovely to look at the
places that remain and ask,okay, who would this be good
(28:47):
for?
And there are a lot of lovelysmall reviews that are run out
of they're run out of universitysometimes, like the New England
Review is run out of middlebury,for example or the Hedgehog
Review is run outta theUniversity of Virginia.
They're not for
Meryl (28:59):
Southampton Review from Stony Brook.
Shaan (29:01):
There you go.
Right?
Yeah.
And they're not for students.
They're actually for establishedand sometimes esteemed writers
they're just part of theuniversity apparatus, and so
they have the funding for it.
And so, I do tend to start withthe big places just because
there is like an inkling ofcareerism still that I have to
cater to just for my owntenability as a writer.
So I'll start with the five bigplaces as in my mind.
(29:24):
And if it's not good enough topitch to the Atlantic or Harpers
or, I'll just be like, okay,let's start at a magazine that
has a smaller circulation.
But you also have to know that,for example, the New York Times
will never publish somethingsuper literary or super long
form or super voicey.
Steamroom-ography.
I pitched to a ton of places.
I actually started writing itwith the approval of an editor
(29:45):
at Guernica and then Guernicashut down.
Meryl (29:47):
Are they still shut?
They're just gone forever.
Shaan (29:49):
They're gone.
Oh,
Meryl (29:50):
wow.
I remember that there was anissue and yeah, everyone quit
and then I guess they,
Shaan (29:55):
I thought it was very silly.
God, I just think quitting.
That was ridiculous.
Meryl (29:58):
That was absurd.
Shaan (29:59):
I agree.
And it, the piece, I thought thewhole thing was an example of
leftist hysteria in a way that'sself-defeating.
Like why dissolve an institutionor, a magazine that does such
good work.
Because one person wrote a piecethat was ultimately sympathetic
to Palestine.
I'm writing, I'm, saying this assomeone who's like a hardcore
supporter of Gaza.
It was just, it was very silly,but, so I, the piece ended up
(30:19):
being killed and I wrote thewhole thing.
Wow.
And it was very depressing.
So it's very difficult to pitcha whole piece.
It's always better to start witha kernel.
And I wrote it unconventionallyknowing that it fit Guernica.
And so I pitched it everywhere.
Everybody said no.
And then finding this lovely newmagazine started by a cohort out
of Princeton called StrangeMatters.
(30:39):
And they're like a Socialistmagazine.
They loved it.
And so they took it on board.
But it was like, that was aninstance of me not having
planned a place.
Often I'll first pitch and thenwrite from there.
So for example, I just pitched apiece that is seems to be in the
work for New York Magazine ontraveling while Brown and
Bearded in the age of Mamdaniand in the age of Kash Patel.
(31:03):
So you have the head of the FBI,who's brown and bearded, the
likely mayoral, victor of NewYork City, brown and bearded,
and I, yet, I still get pulledover to airports.
And so my question is are westill using the right metrics?
25 years on?
Surely there's another indicatorof someone who's sinister that
just being brown and bearded,but they're
Meryl (31:18):
gonna love it.
Bald and white.
White.
Shaan (31:22):
The most likely person to have a firearm at security at an
airport is a white southern man.
Meryl (31:28):
Right.
Shaan (31:28):
So it's then that's like an official, statistic.
So it's really funny.
But, so for example, that's apiece that I'm not gonna write
in a literary way because it'sfor New York Magazine.
I'll write, it'll be funny andvoicey and punchy, but you have
to I think it, it helps to knowwho you're writing for so you
can write accordingly.
Yeah.
Ariana (31:43):
Mm-hmm.
So as you are working on yourown books right now, Do you have
an audience in mind for, let'ssay, your novel, for example?
Or are you just using your ownvoice?
Shaan (31:55):
I think with the nonfiction book, I have an
audience in mind because I'vethought about it for so many
years.
Yeah.
This novel is like this weirdthing that came out of nowhere
that I'm just writing because Ireally wanna write it.
And I think that my aspirationalaudience is a type of person
who'd read like a book by RachelCusk or by Garth Greenwell which
(32:18):
is like a higher brow literaryaudience.
And I'm saying that with someirony in the sense that I have
no idea if I can pull that off.
And I'm also I told myself,look, just write this as simply
as you can.
And I started writing it and Iwas like, I'm so fucking florid
in the way I write.
Like I'm just so baroque and soold fashioned in such a
ridiculous way.
And that has come out and mymentor looked at a little bit of
(32:42):
it and was like, look, even ifyou tried to write in the most
gmail-ish way, you're stillgonna be so old fashioned calm
down, so I'm trying to do thatand I think it's working.
So with the novel, it's hard tosay with the nonfiction book,
this is an era where nonfictionwriters actually have an easier
time than novelists do.
I think of a book by AnandGiridharadas called Winners Take
(33:05):
All that was published a fewyears ago about how
philanthropists are perpetuatingthe financial world order by
just putting band-aids over it.
And that was written with thisreally lovely mix of personal,
political and political analysisand then I think of others like
Naomi Klein and Maggie Nelson,and I'm, and I think of merging
those voices a little bit.
(33:26):
'cause you ultimately, you wannabe inspired, but you still want
to write in a way that is trueto yourself, enhances or
vilifies your individual quirks,
Ariana (33:35):
and I feel like it is really nice right now.
I think a lot of contemporarynonfiction books are really
pushing the bounds of what theform can take, which is really
cool.
Shaan (33:45):
Absolutely.
Breaking formula can be soliberating and refreshing.
It's nice to pick up anonfiction book and be like, oh,
this isn't just laborious text.
There's something differentgoing on here and something
literary.
And Maggie Nelson does that sowell.
Yeah, she does.
Yeah.
Ariana (34:03):
And where are you going next?
If you next?
Shaan (34:06):
So I was in Wyoming, then I was in Washington State.
Next is Texas.
I've never been to the state.
Okay.
That's a small, very artsy towncalled Corsicana.
And I'll be there for twomonths.
Wow.
Which will be really nice.
And then after that, I'm inSpain.
I'm in the house that TrumanCapote wrote In Cold Blood, and
it's right on the Mediterranean,on the cliff.
And that'll be reallyinteresting, I think there for a
(34:26):
month
Ariana (34:27):
Your little luxurious treat at the end of your your
tour.
Shaan (34:31):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Then after that a friend of minehas a house in Hungary and he's
just basically opened it up tome for a month.
So I'll be there.
Wow.
And then back to Wyoming, andthen I finish.
Yeah.
Meryl (34:39):
Whoa.
Can you tell us how yourexperience has been in general
through these through theseresidencies?
Like what it's done for you?
Shaan (34:48):
Yeah.
Actually I feel like this couldbe a good starting point for
that could be the genesis of ourfriendship, Meryl, which is
perfect in a way, the oldest,urban and largest urban writer's
colony in the country.
The writer's room.
Shout out to the writer's room.
Shout out to Donna Brodie, thedirector.
okay, so the writer's room is,it's in Greenwich Village and
it's a 24 hour space forwriters, and it's quiet and it's
(35:09):
amazing.
And I joined in 2014 in January,2014.
So I've been a member for over adecade, and it's because I just
couldn't, for the life of mewrite in my room I couldn't
write in a space that that wasso close to my bed and where I
could masturbate as much as Iwanted.
No, could hold me accountablefor same problem.
And I, so I just found like somedistance traveling somewhere
(35:31):
committed me to that space.
And that model has always workedvery well for me.
Residencies are like a reallyintensified version of a writing
space because you are put in themiddle, often of a rural
environment.
You're given your own space andyou have nothing to do but write
and you don't have any of thedistractions of everyday life.
So there's no gym, there's nogrocery shopping.
(35:52):
They give you everything.
The one I just did had a chefwho deliver lunches to my room
every day at noon.
And then there's dinners madeevery night.
Breakfast is made for you aswell.
And so what you get done in fourweeks can be the equivalent of,
three or four months in thecity.
It's such intensive work.
That being said, it's alsodangerous.
Like you can burn out, you canexhaust yourself.
That can almost be thisintellectual adrenal fatigue
(36:14):
where every pore of you has beendrained.
There can be drama with theother residents.
It's like a reality TV showwhere there's there can be some
weird people you're stuck with.
But I just feel like if you havean idea and you're ready to
really hunker down, it isincredibly liberating to just
have nothing but that to do.
And I was writing at my best, Iwas writing like 2000 words a
day, every day.
(36:34):
It was really nice.
Ariana (36:40):
So you have your own podcast, Diva Discourse in which
you focus on one song for eachepisode.
Right.
So how did that come to be?
Tell us about your love forBeyonce, because I also love
Beyonce and we can also talkabout Cowboy Carter
Shaan (36:55):
No, it's, that's so great.
The title of the podcast, DivaDiscourse, kind of gestures
towards my obsession and mypodcast co-hosts obsession.
His name is Enzo Escobar, verygood friend of mine.
There's this tradition of gaymen having divas that they
worship, and it started out withopera singers and then it moved
(37:16):
to Broadway stars and actresses,and now it exists primarily in
the form of the female pop star.
And the way you look upon themis not as a peer or even an
aspiration, but a Goddess,someone who's untouchable.
And just in a way the femaleform in femininity is this, it's
the, this kind of exalteduntouchable, glamorous way of
living that the gay man can onlyaspire towards or imitate in
(37:38):
drag, in, in the drag sense.
And so divas become this, likethis paragon.
And when you look at femalesingers and pop stars, just
nobody, if you're a gay man andyou don't watch a Beyonce,
that's fine.
It just shows to me that youdon't really understand music
very well
Ariana (37:54):
or just, goddess hood.
Exactly.
Right, right.
Shaan (37:57):
Like,
Ariana (37:57):
where are you?
Who are you?
It's
Shaan (37:59):
Yeah, you just, you have some lesser religion, but she
can do everything in a way thatis so superhuman and so
glamorous and so glamorized thatI found her irresistible.
it was really when she startedtouring post the Beyonce
experience of the I Am WorldTour onwards, where I feel like
she became such a master of hercraft singing so flawlessly that
(38:19):
her live albums are just as goodas a recorded albums with all
the flourishes of what she doeslive, which is often not just
off the cuff, but really thoughtout mixes of her songs, which as
we saw during Cowboy Carter,reach this incredible zenith of
a 30 year discography I go onand on.
But my friend Enzo and I I wrotea piece in Slate about Beyonce
(38:41):
for her 40th birthday that heread before we became friends.
And so he was like, we becamefriends at this at the Beyonce
connection.
'cause he was like, I love hertoo.
Can we talk about her?
And we became really closefriends and people who would
listen to us speak about herwere like, you guys should just
put mics in front of you.
Mm-hmm.
And so we just, were like, okay,let's just do that.
Let's just talk about one songand do that.
And we found that it was reallyfun but also we put clips of
(39:03):
what we're talking about,whether it's her live
performances or her songs orother people's songs.
And I feel like there, so thereare these nicely textured 20 to
30 minute episodes.
But with Beyonce herself, I justcan't, I thought during her
Renaissance world tour that Iwas seeing kind of the end of
this glorious chapter of herlive performances because she
had stopped dancing and sherevealed during the Renaissance
(39:24):
World tour film that it'sbecause in 2009, during a
rehearsal, she was flown intometal stairs in a way that
injured her knee so badly thatshe just couldn't dance in the
same way But looking at CowboyCarter, not only is she dancing
once again, even though her kneeis still injured, but she's
shown us that she can actuallyhave this glory on stage that's
post dance.
(39:45):
The album was so conducive tosomething that was not just her
dancing, even though she hadamazing choreography when she
did.
I think it's her best tour.
I, oh my God.
I saw it.
I paid like my rent to see itand I cried so hard.
Did you see it?
I cried.
Ariana (40:00):
Oh my God.
So the opening number, I justgot this huge rush and it was
like tears.
'cause I've seen people cry atconcerts.
I'm like, I've never been thatperson.
But I was just like, like what?
They, when they started withRequiem I was American Requiem.
I was just like, I was flooded.
And then all those little bitsin between with that are just
homages to all the people who'vecome before and who have created
(40:23):
American music and all theseBlack people and the struggle
and all this stuff.
And it was just like, it was solayered.
I also thought it wasperformance art.
This wasn't a concert, this wastheater.
It really was
Shaan (40:35):
totally performance art and like concept art and high
art film.
And the way that she paid homageto those that came before her
was so not like laborious orgestural.
It felt like part of acelebration where you weren't
like, oh, I'm being lectured to,you were electrified by the
footage of her performingalongside video of James Brown
and others.
It was amazing and then sheflies around the stadium in a
car, which was eventuallyswapped out for a golden horse
(40:58):
after a scare in Houston wherethe car almost toppled her over.
But she like flies around thestadium.
She came so close to us seeingknow 16 carriages.
I was sobbing so hard that I waslike with Enzo, we were holding
each other's like sobbing and mycousin next to me was like, do I
need to call the EMS?
I was like shaking andconvulsing.
Yeah.
I
Ariana (41:15):
was with my mom, my brother and his and his wife
who's pregnant.
And all of us were just like, wejust felt blessed, like when she
came around in that car and wecould like nearly touch her.
Shaan (41:27):
She's so good that all she has to do is get up there
and suddenly, you your urge tobe contrarian just dissipates in
the face of her glory.
Ariana (41:35):
Yeah.
Yep.
I'm part of the religion.
Meryl's, like
Shaan (41:39):
one of those daughters who's been like dragging along
to church being like, oh, fine.
There was one more thing Iwanted to say that, One thing
that I think causes me perennialexistential crisis as a writer
is how thin the line is betweenwriter and non-writer.
(42:01):
Everybody writes, not everybodypaints or sings or makes films,
and so I feel like other genresof art are more comfortably
sequestered in this kind ofspecialization of just a sheer
medium.
Every time a doctor or anassistant or anyone, even a
family member emails mesomething that's well written.
I'm just like why am I a writer?
(42:22):
You can write a well-writtenemail and you're a doctor or a
lawyer or whatever you are.
Like, I have nothing but justthis writing.
And in a way just feels likewhat all I am is a speaker or a
thinker or an expressor.
Writing and speaking is the airthat we all breathe in.
And so how do you, what givesyou the right to call yourself a
writer?
It's like saying I'm an exister,right.
Or I'm a just, yeah.
(42:42):
I'm a be-er.
And so that is something that Ifeel like besieges me now and
then because I feel likethere's, just in the promiscuity
of the medium, there comes ahigher threshold of of
validation of having to proveyourself as being able to call
yourself a writer.
And I think there's an answer toit.
Meryl (43:01):
I have good news though.
I hear basically in everyconversation I'm in now, people
are using AI to write.
They do not feel comfortableeven writing an email.
And so I think that if wecontinue to not use AI and
continue to write from ourheads, we are going to become
really special soon.
Shaan (43:18):
I love that.
I really love that.
In fact, I love theproliferation of AI because I
feel like we will be the specialones in a generation if we still
Meryl (43:28):
trust ourselves to write and and not use it.
I think we're gonna be really,the top of the world.
Shaan (43:34):
I love that, and thank you for bringing me into the
contemporary because I wasspeaking with LADA and thinking
about that, and you're totallyright.
And all I would add to that isthat one other thing that
distinguishes the writer orgives the writer the right to
distinction is the sheerpersistence and will to continue
writing.
It's one thing to write anemail, it's one thing to write
(43:55):
incidentally, it's another tosit down and write.
And I think in sitting down andintentionally writing, you also
do something with your mind andwith the coherence of expression
that is unique to the craft,that is a little bit different
from anything else.
When you speak for an hour, it'svery different than speaking off
the cuff for a few sentences.
Right.
Your ideas reach a kind ofcrescendo.
(44:16):
And so what I would say to endthat is it's all right to call
yourself a writer.
Ariana (44:27):
Follow us, like us.
Leave a review on wherever youget your podcast.
It's all right.
You can follow us on Instagram@itsallwritepod.
Write spelled W-R-I-T-E'causeit's a pun.
You can also email us at It'sAll right pod@gmail.com.
We'd love to hear from you andyeah,
Meryl (44:45):
thanks for listening.
One thing that causes me perennial existential crisis as
(00:03):
a writer is how thin the line isbetween writer and non-writer.
Everybody writes, not everybodypaints or sings or makes films,
and so I feel like other genresof art are more comfortably
sequestered in this kind ofspecialization of just a sheer
medium.
so I'm just like why am I awriter?
(00:24):
And in a way all I am is aspeaker or a thinker or an
expressor.
It's like saying I'm an exister,right.
Or I'm a just, yeah.
I'm a be-er.
Ariana (00:36):
Hi, I'm Ariana McLean.
Meryl (00:38):
I'm Meryl Branch Mc Tiernan.
Ariana (00:40):
And you're listening to, it's All Write.
Meryl (00:42):
A podcast about the writing life and those who live
it.
I am so thrilled to announcethat my novel What You should
Worry About is under contract tobe published by Akashic Books
this coming summer of 2026.
Yay.
Yay.
Yay.
And today we have, my friendShaan Sachdev here.
(01:03):
Hi Shaan.
Ariana (01:03):
Hi Shaan.
Shaan (01:04):
Hello.
How amazing that the work paidoff?
Meryl (01:06):
Yes.
Yeah.
The work, apparently it can payoff.
So thank you.
if you li listen back to ourfirst episode in May, I was a
bitter whore and now I am just awhore.
Ariana (01:20):
Alright.
Alright.
Meryl (01:22):
Um, Shaan is a writer and essayist based in New York City,
who writes about a range ofsubjects including philosophy,
political bias, the military,industrial complex, queer city
life, and his two favoritedivas, Hannah Arendt and
Beyonce.
He's recently written for theNew York Times, the Wall Street
Journal, Slate, Salon, the NewRepublic and others.
(01:44):
He also co-hosts Diva Discourse,a Beyonce centered podcast.
Ariana (01:47):
Thank you so much for, for being here.
So you write about such a rangeof topics from geopolitical
issues to sexual issues to sex,sexual enjoyment, but with the
same seriousness and with thesame amount of um, research,
(02:09):
you'd kind of put the sameattention to to all topics that
you do.
So how would you describe yourwriterly persona?
Shaan (02:16):
It's a lovely question, and it's also a flattering
observation because it feelslike there's some being rewarded
just in you acknowledging that.
I went to grad school to studycultural criticism.
I did a master's at NYU in that.
And what we learned was how tobe a specialist in the art of
non-specialization.
(02:37):
So how to almost feignspecialization which you can't
do if you're gonna write about awide range of subjects.
And I think I wanted to become awriter partly so I could think
about anything I wanted.
And I'm doing that byspecializing in things for three
(02:57):
months at a time.
But my persona, I would say isyes, somebody who just wants to
think about anything that comesto him.
But that I think partly alsoreflects the audacity of
writing.
There's something problematicabout that.
I concede
Ariana (03:13):
What do you mean by, sorry, what do you mean by
problematic?
Shaan (03:16):
I think maybe it's problematic to feign
specialization.
The upside to all this is thatyou, unlike a scholar who
becomes so specialized and soinsular, that you lose the
ability to communicate to thepublic because you begin to, use
arcane language and you're notconsidering style and
presentation.
The upside to being a culturalcritic and essayist is you draw
(03:39):
on the expertise of others topresent something beautifully to
the public.
But the downside and the thingI'm saying is problematic is
that.
In a way, the line between beinga writer and a non-writer is so
thin that what I'm basicallysaying is, look, I wanna talk
about anything I wanna talkabout.
And the question becomes whatgives you the right to, and I
think that begins to intersectwith the idea of are you
(04:01):
qualified, are you an expert?
At what point are you allowed towrite about something for a huge
publication?
Meryl (04:08):
Like how much research, how much education are you part
of that cu cultural group?
Those, all those kinds ofelements.
Shaan (04:14):
Exactly.
Ariana (04:15):
This is fascinating topic.
'cause'cause right now there'sthe opposite is also happening
where it's like, don't trust theexperts.
Right.
So you have these, I feel likethe,
Meryl (04:23):
like TikTok culture.
Ariana (04:24):
Yeah.
So it's like on one hand peopleare questioning what makes you
qualified to talk about this?
But then on the other hand, oh,you're an expert.
They're, there's some sort ofconspiracy.
They're part of the elite.
You're trying to get elite.
Yeah.
Part of the elite.
Interesting that you broughtthat up.
'cause I feel like there's thattug of war happening right now
So how do you, fit into thatspace?
Just personally, like whenyou're going to write something
(04:45):
and you, like, how do you findthat confidence?
Meryl (04:48):
Or do you ever feel like this is not a topic that's right
for me or that I should take on?
Shaan (04:52):
I think, okay, so I think there's two parts to this
answer.
The first is that there is adifference between taking a
video of yourself ranting aboutsomething and engaging in the
activity of formally coheringyour thoughts in an elaborate
and organized manner.
When you do the latter, whenyou're not necessarily on
TikTok, but you're writing anessay, you realize that you are
(05:15):
required to have a certaindegree of protracted engagement
with the subject that willnecessarily involve expertise.
I think you begin to appreciateexpertise, not as conspiracy,
but just as having dwelled forlong enough in a subject.
But Meryl, to your question,when I have, say I have an idea,
(05:36):
like I wanna write about how,which I did recently for the New
York Times, like how difficultit is to walk through New York
City, the first thing I'll do isask, okay, who else has written
about this?
I might find that so many peoplehave that there's no point in
writing it.
And so at that point, it's whatnew can I bring?
The,
Meryl (05:54):
so that's your first step in deciding That's, yeah.
Interesting.
Shaan (05:57):
I think the very first step is what exactly do I want
to say?
Is it just, is it one thought orcan this thought be fleshed out?
Because on the other hand, evenif people have written about it,
if you can write about somethingthat's already been written
about and bring a kind of newstyle to it, and even just say
it with different words, I thinkthere is some value to that.
Ariana (06:15):
Yeah, snaps.
Shaan (06:16):
And it's actually very easy.
It's like this idea of there'sinfinite amount of sentences you
can configure with the Englishlanguage.
There's also an infinite numberof ways that a thought about
something can be configured.
Sometimes just the beauty or thethe kind of contemplative
approach you take to somethingthat's been taken many times I
think can still be worth puttingout in public.
But but Ariana, your initialquestion was how do I negotiate
(06:39):
the contemporary tension betweenexpert and non-expert?
Was that kind of, it
Ariana (06:43):
wasn't it?
I didn't actually pose thatquestion'cause it felt a little
big, but I would love if youhave thoughts on that.
It was more of an observation ofthe existence we're all living
in.
Shaan (06:51):
Yeah, having worked in traditional news media for a
long time primarily just to makea living.
In addition to being a writer,you learn that the people who
work in authoritative positionsoften are just trading in
prefabricated information.
They're taking reports, they'retaking scientific reports and
(07:11):
academic reports and what hasconsidered authoritative
history, and they're justregurgitating it.
Meryl (07:15):
And they're not taking a spin.
They're not taking, they're not,it's impartial, so to speak,
Shaan (07:20):
yeah.
And whether or not it'simpartial, I feel like, is
almost a more complicatedquestion.
I think what I'm trying toconvey is more that it's that
they are not engaging with it.
They're holding it at adistance, and for them, they're
also just working a nine tofive.
They just wanna get the day overwith, and yet, from the outside,
they might be viewed as thesinister.
Yeah, crystallizers of what theoverarching narrative is.
Meryl (07:41):
Interesting.
Shaan (07:41):
And then on the other side, you might have someone
like me who's not an expert andnot working at an institution
and not even interested in justpulling that stuff to use
blindly, but who wants to take along walk and think about it at
length and really get lost inthe idea in a way that might
make a lot of technicalknowledge, secondary not
(08:02):
primary.
And so I think the lovely thingabout being like a cultural
writer is being able to fusethose worlds and those who are
really skeptical of experts, infact my aversion is less in the
idea that there's somethingsinister at play and more in the
idea of what I was, talkingabout in this primary instance
(08:23):
that they're not looking uponthe things that they're experts
on with any wonder.
They're not getting lost in it.
It's just this sanitizedrelationship you know?
Meryl (08:36):
Do you have a favorite piece that you've written, I
guess in recent years?
Shaan (08:41):
It's so funny because when I apply to residencies and
when people ask oh, can I readsomething?
I have to pick a favorite I, ofcourse, as any writer ought to
maybe I feel ashamed, slightlyashamed of everything I've
written, right?
Yeah.
Right.
It's like this I can do better.
The essay that got the mostrecognition, or that at least
helped my career the most wascalled Portrait of the
Technocrat as a Stanford Man.
(09:03):
And, it won a Push Guard Prize.
It got shortlisted for BestAmerican essays.
And it actually just was bornout of heartbreak.
My, my boyfriend broke up withme and I decided to write a
revenge essay.
And it was rejected by 25reviews.
And finally the New EnglandReview, which is run out of
Middlebury, it's this beautifulsmall journal basically said we
(09:25):
like it, but there's an issue.
And they've pointed out theissue that I think other places
had found with it, which wasthat I wasn't acknowledging my
own elitism and criticizinganother elite person.
Interesting.
Which was so true.
And and in my anger, I didn'tacknowledge that.
Meryl (09:39):
Right.
You have to implicate yourselftoo in order for people to be on
your side.
Shaan (09:44):
Exactly.
That's exactly right.
Yes.
And so they actually they werenice enough to say, we'll,
publish this if you can fixthat.
And they did.
And it ended up being, I think.
A pretty strong essay.
I remember sending it to youwhen it came out, Meryl.
Oh yeah.
Meryl (09:54):
Loved it.
Yeah.
Shaan (09:55):
But I think that's, I think that's a good example of a
mix of genres.
It's personal essay, it'spolitical analysis, it's
philosophy.
There's some literary criticism.
Meryl (10:03):
I, I also just read this morning your Steamroom-ography
piece, which I have to say itwas so suspenseful.
Like that was really hard to do.
It was a piece about bathhouseculture using actually going
into a bathhouse and then givinglike a long history, but in the
midst of sexy what's gonnahappen, suspense.
(10:26):
So I feel like that was a reallygreat way to have people learn
about something while also beingcompletely engaged in the story.
Shaan (10:33):
That's, it's, first of all, I have to just say it's so
flattering that you guys haveread anything.
And I like, I feel like oftenwhen I hear people being
interviewed, I'm like.
They should at least take amoment to acknowledge that this
is like a huge exercise and likeflattery and narcissism.
So thank you for allowing me totalk about my tiny little
career.
Yeah.
With that piece,Steamroom-ography was written
for a non-queer audience becauseI think for the most part, gay
(10:57):
guys queer people are like morefamiliar both with the
phenomenology of the experienceitself and have some idea of the
history.
And yet I realized that everytime I came out of this
experience and talked to myfriends about it, who weren't
part of this little world, theywere always shocked.
And it was years and years ofhearing people be like, wait,
that happens.
I wrote it in the second personto put the non cruiser into the
(11:19):
cruiser shoes and just the ideaof, yeah,
Meryl (11:20):
I didn't even notice that.
That's so funny.
Ariana (11:22):
it felt like it started more of a personal essay.
I don't know, creative essay.
I don't know.
There's so many words, but yeah.
But then it got into, but then Iwas like, learning about all
this history and taking us to Ithink we, you go back to the 19
hundreds or something and I wasjust like, oh, wow.
This is yeah.
Right.
So what gives it a nice context?
Meryl (11:42):
Maybe Gen Z guy will figure it out, but he won't know
that this he's part of a longhistory.
Shaan (11:48):
Yeah.
And in that sense, I think thereis something for even queer
sub-cultures to gain fromreading the essay.
But I think it's also a goodexample of this idea that there
are a lot of people who'vewritten really seminal work
about this history.
So what I'm just doing is takingtheir work.
Right.
I'm not doing primary research.
And this, in a way, this worksas a case study for what we were
talking about earlier where I'mtaking Allan Bérubé's work,
(12:12):
who's written about bathhouses,and I'm taking George Johnson.
I'm taking like all these peoplewho've really studied
specifically New York.
But the one little increment I'mmaking is even in an age of
technological experience whereyou don't need to cruise
manually.
There's still such a thrill indoing so that it's, it exists
even in these sanitized,privatized spaces.
(12:32):
That's just a little thesis.
And I'm like okay, so how canyou take that though and turn it
into an essay using otherpeople's research?
And one thing you do is youcreate a prestige, but the other
is you're so invested in theexperience of that increment
that you can just make almostlike an art product out of it,
right?
Like an artistic statement.
And so there's a lot of feigned,there's a lot of faux expertise
in it.
(12:52):
I did spend like a few monthsresearching before I started,
and I think I learned as I wasresearching that, oh, there is
something to also note aboutthis circular pattern here, that
bath houses emerged organicallythen we're disassembled because
of the AIDS crisis and then hadto find a new home informally,
elsewhere.
And so we're back to the prebathhouse era.
I think that little bit is meattempting humbly to contribute
(13:16):
something small to this cannon,but I think the strength of that
essay lies in, I'd hope, I thinkit's more in the art of the
sentences than in the overallpolitical contribution.
Ariana (13:25):
I love the little vignettes, like we're in the
bathhouse and you're like, youcan feel the steam and the steam
figuratively and metaphor.
Sorry.
Figuratively and literally Ineed, was sitting
Meryl (13:35):
outside in the park and I was getting hot and I'm like,
oh, we're hot.
We're going the show.
I gotta go to the
Ariana (13:39):
bath.
Shaan (13:41):
My, my grandmother said she stopped reading at the Moray
eels bit.
And I was like, that's fair.
Meryl (13:53):
Do you ever worry about anything that you put out there?
How family and friends and anyrelationship that you have to
read about this personal stuff
Shaan (14:03):
Sex wise?
No.
Meryl (14:04):
Interesting.
Ariana (14:05):
I was gonna say, and we could expand that to, I think a
lot of writers are eitherfeeling censored or they are
censoring themselvespreemptively.
And so do you feel that pressureor do you find, how do you
maneuver in this world thatwe're living in this reality,
Meryl (14:23):
looking at your work, one might say, oh, he doesn't censor
himself at all.
It's so honest and brave and outthere, but I feel like that's
probably, I don't know.
Is that true?
Shaan (14:32):
This almost this question to me feels like something a
really good therapist would askme, I think, part of it is that
writing is necessarily anarcissistic act.
I think it's very funny whenpeople say, oh, I'm just writing
to write.
I'm not writing to be published.
It's a lie because you arepublishing what you're writing.
Like you are very aware of that.
And there's a huge differencebetween writing in public and
(14:54):
writing in private.
And I think that I do have aconfessional impulse and I do
personally, without havingthought it through, just feel
like art above life always.
So I'm willing to, I'm willingto steal, I'm willing to write
about people and write aboutmyself.
But I have absolutely felt theneed to censor because I'm still
in, I think, the outerparameters of what one would
(15:14):
call an emerging writer.
Not having yet published myfirst book.
And when I started writing inearly 2020, I had some kind of
contrarian approaches to the waythat identity and racial
politics were being discussed.
I think as an immigrant to thiscountry, who was neither.
Black, Latino or white.
I felt like I had specificexperiences that didn't clearly
(15:35):
or neatly map onto what wasbeing said.
And it was at a time when if youeven dissented in a microcosmic
sense, you were punished.
And and I'm speaking here as aprogressive in a very
progressive world.
I'm not thinking about theconservative world, which I'm
not even sure if they read, but
Meryl (15:50):
they we're safe.
Yeah.
Right,
Shaan (15:51):
right.
So like this is I'm talkingabout an intramural drama here,
and so I did have to proceedcarefully and I wrote a piece
for the point in 2021 calledHysterical Empathy that I had to
think long and hard about somethings in that and whether I
wanted to write that down.
And I ended up doing it, andthen it ended up going well.
There was a piece I wrote a yearor two ago called God Save the
Top.
(16:12):
And there were some paragraphsthere when it was being written
that were.
Taking an almost impishly,reductive view of what man and
woman is.
And I did it.
I did it as part of theperformance of the writer.
And the editors were concernedabout how that might be viewed
among communities and advocatesof communities that didn't agree
with that binary.
And so they asked me to, therewere some paragraph.
Meryl (16:34):
Can you tell can you give a little tiny little log line
about what the piece is about?
Oh, of course.
Shaan (16:38):
God bless the top is, it's a piece that looks at the
ethnography of gay sexualpositions, but it also takes a
personal root into why I preferthe passive sexual role rather
than the dominant one.
And the thesis of the piecesthat the true gay man is always
a bottom, that the true sexualdivide between men doesn't lie
and gay and straight, butbetween penetrators and
penetrate.
(16:59):
And so that was a piece where Ihad to actually take some
paragraphs out.
And this is how quickly timemoves.
Just two years ago, it was a lottrans issues had a certain
fraught in the progressivecircles that they don't right
now, because now they're undersiege from the outside in a way
that is united the progressivefront.
But I, at this point I'm veryworried about writing about
(17:21):
politics at this point.
Now, censorship and fear are topdown.
They're not bottom up.
They're coming from thegovernment.
When I wrote a piece a few yearsago about Ukraine and Russia,
that took the position that NATOand the US were culpable in what
was happening.
I got some death threats,weirdly.
Wow.
But it was from like randompeople who were just like, I
know where you live and we'regonna get you.
(17:42):
And I was like okay, these arelike freelance, gorillas.
That's fine.
At this point now, when youactually have federal agents
detaining people for whatthey've written at student
papers, there's a differentclimate of fear.
And so I have a piece coming outin one week exactly on Gaza, and
the Holocaust.
It's a 7,000 word piece for theLA Review of Books that is
(18:03):
partly a review of PankajMishra's new book The World
After Gaza.
And it looks at how theHolocaust has been
instrumentalized and exploitedby Israel, and it uses primarily
Jewish scholars to make thatcase.
But it's a long meditation onhow we got to this point.
And I'm very nervous.
I'm so nervous that I'mwondering to myself, do I write
this under my name as animmigrant, as a naturalized
(18:25):
citizen?
Is it safe?
To write about this
Meryl (18:27):
and primarily from the government.
Like the concern would be fromTrump, not from people.
Absolutely not People.
Shaan (18:33):
Not from I'm not worried about people, I'm not worried
about friends, I'm not worriedabout online angry people that
is so cosmetic.
And actually I feel like peoplewho are still railing against
that just don't have muchperspective because it's not
that scary at the end of theday.
Meryl (18:45):
Like what?
So what someone hates you whocan like Yeah,
Shaan (18:47):
exactly Right.
But the idea but to have your
Meryl (18:49):
immigration status and, yeah.
No, but
Ariana (18:52):
we have masked men who are disappearing people right
now.
Like it's a serious,
Shaan (18:56):
and I remember, I mean before I was a citizen flying in
as a passport holder who had alot of Arab passport stamps.
'cause I grew up in the MiddleEast.
I would get, every single time Iflew through JFK, I would get
moved to a back room andinterrogated.
It was just like this is Bush'sWar on Terror era.
And it was like so normalizedand then it disappeared.
But it reminds you that that'sthe real paradigm of fear, like
(19:17):
it's when it's turned down, noton
Meryl (19:18):
Twitter to Yeah.
Shaan (19:19):
and I think that there is, there are enough of us.
There is like a large portion ofpeople who are like, fuck this.
And I think there's almost toomany to all be rounded up.
Ariana (19:27):
Yeah.
I have to believe that's stillthe majority.
Shaan (19:29):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I will say, on the note ofGaza, it's interesting because
you couldn't talk about it from,for a long time.
Yeah.
Especially in newsrooms.
And so now, even though there issome censorship, it is still at
the forefront of the politicalimagination globally in a way
that it never has was.
Yeah.
Britain, France are about torecognize,
Ariana (19:45):
yeah.
Shaan (19:46):
Palestine as a state, there's a lot of progress being
made, even in, but of course theprice has been the elimination
of Gaza.
But at the same time, on theother side, we were talking
about how quickly the politicalclimate changes and the social
climate changes.
2020 to 2023 was a bigdifference.
2023 to now is a big difference.
If, God willing, AOC becomespresident or something like that
(20:07):
happens in the next term.
A lot of this will be pedaldback.
And so while this is reallyhorrifying and very scary.
We have to remember that thereare cycles and that if we record
this in three years, we could behaving a totally different
conversation.
And I think it's important toparse the difference between a
timely scare and a larger humancondition.
Yeah.
Or political condition or, yeah.
Ariana (20:25):
whenever I'm feeling quite down and helpless and
powerless, it's what's the wordthat everyone says?
This shall pass.
Like nothing is permanent.
Change is the only constant.
And it's just change ishappening so much quicker now, I
think because of, technology andthe internet and all that jazz
but also for the good, I don'tknow, what you said made me
(20:47):
think of that.
Okay, things have gotten reallyquickly, I consider bad, but it
could also quickly becomebetter.
Shaan (20:55):
I will just say that, when Reagan was president, they
were a series of astonishingfinancial deregulation enacted
that didn't have thesensationalism that Trump's do.
I think partly because we justdidn't exist in a climate where
everyone was watching andcommenting at the same time.
And I guess that leads me toask, are, are things happening
at a fast pace or are we just isthat just the perception we have
(21:16):
because of the way we engagewith the world?
Yeah.
If like we were not online andnever went online and we just
went about our lives in New YorkCity, would we see much of a
difference?
We'd see little things that weredifferent.
Look, my sister lives on a farmin Virginia.
It's an intentional community of40 families.
And it's not culty at all.
It's hippie, but there's a lotof like older progressives who
are, who never leave this farm.
(21:36):
And yet when I go over to theirhouses for dinner, are in the
state of hand ringing anguishbecause of what they saw on a
screen and all around them isnothing but beautiful forest us.
And they're like, the world isending, right?
There's no more land left.
Trump is ruining the world.
And I'm like, it's important.
It's certainly important.
I say this as a writer and as acritic and as a, a political
writer.
It's certainly important to knowwhat's happening, but I don't
(21:56):
think it's important to totallyuntether yourself from the what
actually human experience.
Experience.
Yeah.
Meryl (22:07):
Can you tell us about the book you're working on?
Ariana (22:09):
Yes.
Shaan (22:11):
Yes, I will.
And I had a conversation withmyself on the way here about how
much I should talk about andyou'll figure out why in a sec.
But I've worked in, I've workedin corporate news for a long
time.
I've worked at CNN Fox, CBS andI spent so much time in
mainstream newsrooms just tomake a living.
I was there just not reallyinvested in what was happening
(22:32):
because I knew I wanted to be awriter.
And at the time, for a lot ofit, I wanted to write
philosophy.
So it was a total disconnect.
But sitting in the newsroom, Ilearned that so much of what
from the outside ischaracterized as sinister or
conspiratorial is actuallyconducted by people who are
completely unaware of whatthey're doing.
They're completely unaware thatthey're that they're doing
(22:53):
anything that's not good.
They think they're doing God'swork.
And from the very top down, I'mtalking about the very highest
levels of these organizationsthat I've sit in on meetings
with.
There is simply no cognizance ofthe idea that what they're doing
is perpetuating a reallyproblematic world and national
order.
And so the book I wanted towrite is a way to make use of
all these years I've spent innewsrooms by putting out the
(23:16):
thesis that what pervadescorporate media and mainstream
media is unconscious bias, notconscious bias, that the people
who work there don't knowthey're biased and that they
internalize bias primarily bythe language they use to talk
about the world.
When they use words liketerrorist or gorilla or official
source or formal source orinformal source without really
(23:38):
thinking about what those mean,they perpetuate a national world
order.
That's the book I've beenmeaning to write.
However about a month before myfirst residency.
Which was in Wyoming in April Iwas
Meryl (23:50):
You've been on how many residencies since April?
Just two.
Just two.
Just two.
You have another one coming up,right?
Shaan (23:55):
I have another, I have three more coming up.
Ariana (23:56):
Three more.
That's amazing.
So you're living in a spacewhere you're dedicated to
writing this book, bouncing fromresidencies, I shouldn't say
bouncing, experiencing differentresidencies.
Shaan (24:05):
I like bouncing it sounds like fun.
Beyonce's song, river dancesong, shit.
Dance.
Yeah.
No, very much it's my year of,it's like my year of the
opposite of rest and relaxation,but there is some of that in
there too.
It's really magical
Meryl (24:16):
thinking and magic.
Shaan (24:18):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, it's yeah, the year of thefrenetic Penman it's I'm moving
between residencies and inbetween stopping in New York and
Virginia where my sister lives,so I'm just constantly moving.
But, so a year a month before Ileft for Wyoming, I had I was
thinking through a feud I washaving with a very close friend
of mine, and it suddenlyoccurred to me that I had to
write about it to understand it.
(24:39):
And suddenly out of nowhere Iwas hit with this idea to write
a novel that was not just aboutthis friend, but about a series
of, it was a series of portraitsof writers in New York.
And I've never written fiction,I've ever written, never written
a novel.
And I just realized I had nochoice because it would not
leave me.
And so that is and I'm not evensure if I'm supposed to be
(25:02):
saying this.
Meryl (25:03):
I love this plot twist.
I did not expect this.
I know this is fun.
But also just judging by, what'sit called?
Steam room ology.
Like you can write fiction likethat reads like fiction.
Shaan (25:15):
You think so?
Meryl (25:16):
Yes.
Like your nonfiction feels solived in and feels like it could
easily be translatable.
Ariana (25:24):
Yeah.
You have the artistry oflanguage like you expressed your
that you pay attention to that.
And I feel like that's fiction.
Shaan (25:31):
That's really interesting.
I think as a nonfiction writerwriting fiction, I've learned
that the line is a little biteerily nebulous because I'm
writing it as nonfiction.
I'm writing it as a collectionof creative nonfiction, essays,
learning that you can get awaywith doing that.
Yeah.
It's if I could just write aportrait of you and change your
name.
And it works, but it's beingwritten in a kind of
intellectual way that i'mwondering how it will come
(25:53):
across when it's done, butthat's what I'm doing.
However, my next residency, I'mofficially the nonfiction writer
in residence, and I have to givea number of public
presentations, and so I'm goingto pivot to my nonfiction book
Meryl (26:04):
so that you'll shelve the fiction for until after that
residency.
Ariana (26:08):
Or you'll write late at night.
Exactly.
Meryl (26:11):
That's what you're used to.
That's your
Ariana (26:12):
your muse or your like your side piece.
Yeah.
Meryl (26:16):
You've been doing it with your news writing and your
nonfiction, so for a
Shaan (26:20):
while, right?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think it's hard to give upsomething you've started.
So I think I'll write it becausethe nonfiction will be a lot of
research, not writing.
It's gonna be like a year ofresearch.
So I'll be able to continue thenovel.
Ariana (26:36):
You've worked in these corporate news spaces, but then
you've also written a lot thatyou've pitched to different
publications.
We were curious about yourprocess of pitching ideas to, I
don't wanna call themnon-traditional, but the
non-corporate publications.
Shaan (26:52):
Yeah, there's actually I almost feel like I get excited
when helping friends pitch toplaces because in a way it's
it's almost the straightequivalent of collecting sports
cards or something.
Like I love this idea of oh,let's look at a deck and see
what'll work.
There in an age where we aresadly being fragmented into kind
of individual, platforms wewrite just for ourselves,
(27:14):
obviously I'm thinking aboutsubstack.
I do still feel like there'sthis magic to publications and
even if they have a smallcirculation and even if they
have an a volunteer staff, whichis very sad, and even if they
can barely pay their writersanything, something about the
cultural nexus and thecollective intention to run a
publication that publishesliterary pieces is just, I just
(27:35):
think it's this magical thing.
So I do believe that it's worthtrying to publish with journals
and reviews and magazines, and
Meryl (27:44):
I a hundred percent agree.
Yeah.
There's something to beingaccepted, to having the stamp of
approval to go beyond your ownaudience.
Shaan (27:52):
Exactly.
And to work with people who arededicated, even though editors
can be tedious sometimes to workwith people who are dedicated
ultimately to this project.
And to, to giving your work toothers.
And also look, if we all haveour own substack in 10 years,
we'll have to just recreate thislandscape once again by
consolidating, because no one isgonna subscribe to 10,000
(28:13):
different writers.
It's never gonna work.
Ariana (28:15):
It's like streaming services now.
Meryl (28:16):
Like it's a fucking nightmare.
My whole email, it's I'm like, Idon't even know who these people
are.
Somehow I'm on their list.
Yeah.
Should I read it or should Ijust delete all of them?
Shaan (28:25):
Totally.
Yeah.
And it, and I think it alsodissolves the line between
formal and informal writing.
There's no longer this, at leastquasi process of, let's think
about this, let's look at ittogether.
Let me show it to somebody else.
Let's invest in putting it outin, in our pages.
So I say all that becausewhenever I'm pitching or I'm
helping a friend pitch, I thinkit's lovely to look at the
places that remain and ask,okay, who would this be good
(28:47):
for?
And there are a lot of lovelysmall reviews that are run out
of they're run out of universitysometimes, like the New England
Review is run out of middlebury,for example or the Hedgehog
Review is run outta theUniversity of Virginia.
They're not for
Meryl (28:59):
Southampton Review from Stony Brook.
Shaan (29:01):
There you go.
Right?
Yeah.
And they're not for students.
They're actually for establishedand sometimes esteemed writers
they're just part of theuniversity apparatus, and so
they have the funding for it.
And so, I do tend to start withthe big places just because
there is like an inkling ofcareerism still that I have to
cater to just for my owntenability as a writer.
So I'll start with the five bigplaces as in my mind.
(29:24):
And if it's not good enough topitch to the Atlantic or Harpers
or, I'll just be like, okay,let's start at a magazine that
has a smaller circulation.
But you also have to know that,for example, the New York Times
will never publish somethingsuper literary or super long
form or super voicey.
Steamroom-ography.
I pitched to a ton of places.
I actually started writing itwith the approval of an editor
(29:45):
at Guernica and then Guernicashut down.
Meryl (29:47):
Are they still shut?
They're just gone forever.
Shaan (29:49):
They're gone.
Oh,
Meryl (29:50):
wow.
I remember that there was anissue and yeah, everyone quit
and then I guess they,
Shaan (29:55):
I thought it was very silly.
God, I just think quitting.
That was ridiculous.
Meryl (29:58):
That was absurd.
Shaan (29:59):
I agree.
And it, the piece, I thought thewhole thing was an example of
leftist hysteria in a way that'sself-defeating.
Like why dissolve an institutionor, a magazine that does such
good work.
Because one person wrote a piecethat was ultimately sympathetic
to Palestine.
I'm writing, I'm, saying this assomeone who's like a hardcore
supporter of Gaza.
It was just, it was very silly,but, so I, the piece ended up
(30:19):
being killed and I wrote thewhole thing.
Wow.
And it was very depressing.
So it's very difficult to pitcha whole piece.
It's always better to start witha kernel.
And I wrote it unconventionallyknowing that it fit Guernica.
And so I pitched it everywhere.
Everybody said no.
And then finding this lovely newmagazine started by a cohort out
of Princeton called StrangeMatters.
(30:39):
And they're like a Socialistmagazine.
They loved it.
And so they took it on board.
But it was like, that was aninstance of me not having
planned a place.
Often I'll first pitch and thenwrite from there.
So for example, I just pitched apiece that is seems to be in the
work for New York Magazine ontraveling while Brown and
Bearded in the age of Mamdaniand in the age of Kash Patel.
(31:03):
So you have the head of the FBI,who's brown and bearded, the
likely mayoral, victor of NewYork City, brown and bearded,
and I, yet, I still get pulledover to airports.
And so my question is are westill using the right metrics?
25 years on?
Surely there's another indicatorof someone who's sinister that
just being brown and bearded,but they're
Meryl (31:18):
gonna love it.
Bald and white.
White.
Shaan (31:22):
The most likely person to have a firearm at security at an
airport is a white southern man.
Meryl (31:28):
Right.
Shaan (31:28):
So it's then that's like an official, statistic.
So it's really funny.
But, so for example, that's apiece that I'm not gonna write
in a literary way because it'sfor New York Magazine.
I'll write, it'll be funny andvoicey and punchy, but you have
to I think it, it helps to knowwho you're writing for so you
can write accordingly.
Yeah.
Ariana (31:43):
Mm-hmm.
So as you are working on yourown books right now, Do you have
an audience in mind for, let'ssay, your novel, for example?
Or are you just using your ownvoice?
Shaan (31:55):
I think with the nonfiction book, I have an
audience in mind because I'vethought about it for so many
years.
Yeah.
This novel is like this weirdthing that came out of nowhere
that I'm just writing because Ireally wanna write it.
And I think that my aspirationalaudience is a type of person
who'd read like a book by RachelCusk or by Garth Greenwell which
(32:18):
is like a higher brow literaryaudience.
And I'm saying that with someirony in the sense that I have
no idea if I can pull that off.
And I'm also I told myself,look, just write this as simply
as you can.
And I started writing it and Iwas like, I'm so fucking florid
in the way I write.
Like I'm just so baroque and soold fashioned in such a
ridiculous way.
And that has come out and mymentor looked at a little bit of
(32:42):
it and was like, look, even ifyou tried to write in the most
gmail-ish way, you're stillgonna be so old fashioned calm
down, so I'm trying to do thatand I think it's working.
So with the novel, it's hard tosay with the nonfiction book,
this is an era where nonfictionwriters actually have an easier
time than novelists do.
I think of a book by AnandGiridharadas called Winners Take
(33:05):
All that was published a fewyears ago about how
philanthropists are perpetuatingthe financial world order by
just putting band-aids over it.
And that was written with thisreally lovely mix of personal,
political and political analysisand then I think of others like
Naomi Klein and Maggie Nelson,and I'm, and I think of merging
those voices a little bit.
(33:26):
'cause you ultimately, you wannabe inspired, but you still want
to write in a way that is trueto yourself, enhances or
vilifies your individual quirks,
Ariana (33:35):
and I feel like it is really nice right now.
I think a lot of contemporarynonfiction books are really
pushing the bounds of what theform can take, which is really
cool.
Shaan (33:45):
Absolutely.
Breaking formula can be soliberating and refreshing.
It's nice to pick up anonfiction book and be like, oh,
this isn't just laborious text.
There's something differentgoing on here and something
literary.
And Maggie Nelson does that sowell.
Yeah, she does.
Yeah.
Ariana (34:03):
And where are you going next?
If you next?
Shaan (34:06):
So I was in Wyoming, then I was in Washington State.
Next is Texas.
I've never been to the state.
Okay.
That's a small, very artsy towncalled Corsicana.
And I'll be there for twomonths.
Wow.
Which will be really nice.
And then after that, I'm inSpain.
I'm in the house that TrumanCapote wrote In Cold Blood, and
it's right on the Mediterranean,on the cliff.
And that'll be reallyinteresting, I think there for a
(34:26):
month
Ariana (34:27):
Your little luxurious treat at the end of your your
tour.
Shaan (34:31):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Then after that a friend of minehas a house in Hungary and he's
just basically opened it up tome for a month.
So I'll be there.
Wow.
And then back to Wyoming, andthen I finish.
Yeah.
Meryl (34:39):
Whoa.
Can you tell us how yourexperience has been in general
through these through theseresidencies?
Like what it's done for you?
Shaan (34:48):
Yeah.
Actually I feel like this couldbe a good starting point for
that could be the genesis of ourfriendship, Meryl, which is
perfect in a way, the oldest,urban and largest urban writer's
colony in the country.
The writer's room.
Shout out to the writer's room.
Shout out to Donna Brodie, thedirector.
okay, so the writer's room is,it's in Greenwich Village and
it's a 24 hour space forwriters, and it's quiet and it's
(35:09):
amazing.
And I joined in 2014 in January,2014.
So I've been a member for over adecade, and it's because I just
couldn't, for the life of mewrite in my room I couldn't
write in a space that that wasso close to my bed and where I
could masturbate as much as Iwanted.
No, could hold me accountablefor same problem.
And I, so I just found like somedistance traveling somewhere
(35:31):
committed me to that space.
And that model has always workedvery well for me.
Residencies are like a reallyintensified version of a writing
space because you are put in themiddle, often of a rural
environment.
You're given your own space andyou have nothing to do but write
and you don't have any of thedistractions of everyday life.
So there's no gym, there's nogrocery shopping.
(35:52):
They give you everything.
The one I just did had a chefwho deliver lunches to my room
every day at noon.
And then there's dinners madeevery night.
Breakfast is made for you aswell.
And so what you get done in fourweeks can be the equivalent of,
three or four months in thecity.
It's such intensive work.
That being said, it's alsodangerous.
Like you can burn out, you canexhaust yourself.
That can almost be thisintellectual adrenal fatigue
(36:14):
where every pore of you has beendrained.
There can be drama with theother residents.
It's like a reality TV showwhere there's there can be some
weird people you're stuck with.
But I just feel like if you havean idea and you're ready to
really hunker down, it isincredibly liberating to just
have nothing but that to do.
And I was writing at my best, Iwas writing like 2000 words a
day, every day.
(36:34):
It was really nice.
Ariana (36:40):
So you have your own podcast, Diva Discourse in which
you focus on one song for eachepisode.
Right.
So how did that come to be?
Tell us about your love forBeyonce, because I also love
Beyonce and we can also talkabout Cowboy Carter
Shaan (36:55):
No, it's, that's so great.
The title of the podcast, DivaDiscourse, kind of gestures
towards my obsession and mypodcast co-hosts obsession.
His name is Enzo Escobar, verygood friend of mine.
There's this tradition of gaymen having divas that they
worship, and it started out withopera singers and then it moved
(37:16):
to Broadway stars and actresses,and now it exists primarily in
the form of the female pop star.
And the way you look upon themis not as a peer or even an
aspiration, but a Goddess,someone who's untouchable.
And just in a way the femaleform in femininity is this, it's
the, this kind of exalteduntouchable, glamorous way of
living that the gay man can onlyaspire towards or imitate in
(37:38):
drag, in, in the drag sense.
And so divas become this, likethis paragon.
And when you look at femalesingers and pop stars, just
nobody, if you're a gay man andyou don't watch a Beyonce,
that's fine.
It just shows to me that youdon't really understand music
very well
Ariana (37:54):
or just, goddess hood.
Exactly.
Right, right.
Shaan (37:57):
Like,
Ariana (37:57):
where are you?
Who are you?
It's
Shaan (37:59):
Yeah, you just, you have some lesser religion, but she
can do everything in a way thatis so superhuman and so
glamorous and so glamorized thatI found her irresistible.
it was really when she startedtouring post the Beyonce
experience of the I Am WorldTour onwards, where I feel like
she became such a master of hercraft singing so flawlessly that
(38:19):
her live albums are just as goodas a recorded albums with all
the flourishes of what she doeslive, which is often not just
off the cuff, but really thoughtout mixes of her songs, which as
we saw during Cowboy Carter,reach this incredible zenith of
a 30 year discography I go onand on.
But my friend Enzo and I I wrotea piece in Slate about Beyonce
(38:41):
for her 40th birthday that heread before we became friends.
And so he was like, we becamefriends at this at the Beyonce
connection.
'cause he was like, I love hertoo.
Can we talk about her?
And we became really closefriends and people who would
listen to us speak about herwere like, you guys should just
put mics in front of you.
Mm-hmm.
And so we just, were like, okay,let's just do that.
Let's just talk about one songand do that.
And we found that it was reallyfun but also we put clips of
(39:03):
what we're talking about,whether it's her live
performances or her songs orother people's songs.
And I feel like there, so thereare these nicely textured 20 to
30 minute episodes.
But with Beyonce herself, I justcan't, I thought during her
Renaissance world tour that Iwas seeing kind of the end of
this glorious chapter of herlive performances because she
had stopped dancing and sherevealed during the Renaissance
(39:24):
World tour film that it'sbecause in 2009, during a
rehearsal, she was flown intometal stairs in a way that
injured her knee so badly thatshe just couldn't dance in the
same way But looking at CowboyCarter, not only is she dancing
once again, even though her kneeis still injured, but she's
shown us that she can actuallyhave this glory on stage that's
post dance.
(39:45):
The album was so conducive tosomething that was not just her
dancing, even though she hadamazing choreography when she
did.
I think it's her best tour.
I, oh my God.
I saw it.
I paid like my rent to see itand I cried so hard.
Did you see it?
I cried.
Ariana (40:00):
Oh my God.
So the opening number, I justgot this huge rush and it was
like tears.
'cause I've seen people cry atconcerts.
I'm like, I've never been thatperson.
But I was just like, like what?
They, when they started withRequiem I was American Requiem.
I was just like, I was flooded.
And then all those little bitsin between with that are just
homages to all the people who'vecome before and who have created
(40:23):
American music and all theseBlack people and the struggle
and all this stuff.
And it was just like, it was solayered.
I also thought it wasperformance art.
This wasn't a concert, this wastheater.
It really was
Shaan (40:35):
totally performance art and like concept art and high
art film.
And the way that she paid homageto those that came before her
was so not like laborious orgestural.
It felt like part of acelebration where you weren't
like, oh, I'm being lectured to,you were electrified by the
footage of her performingalongside video of James Brown
and others.
It was amazing and then sheflies around the stadium in a
car, which was eventuallyswapped out for a golden horse
(40:58):
after a scare in Houston wherethe car almost toppled her over.
But she like flies around thestadium.
She came so close to us seeingknow 16 carriages.
I was sobbing so hard that I waslike with Enzo, we were holding
each other's like sobbing and mycousin next to me was like, do I
need to call the EMS?
I was like shaking andconvulsing.
Yeah.
I
Ariana (41:15):
was with my mom, my brother and his and his wife
who's pregnant.
And all of us were just like, wejust felt blessed, like when she
came around in that car and wecould like nearly touch her.
Shaan (41:27):
She's so good that all she has to do is get up there
and suddenly, you your urge tobe contrarian just dissipates in
the face of her glory.
Ariana (41:35):
Yeah.
Yep.
I'm part of the religion.
Meryl's, like
Shaan (41:39):
one of those daughters who's been like dragging along
to church being like, oh, fine.
There was one more thing Iwanted to say that, One thing
that I think causes me perennialexistential crisis as a writer
is how thin the line is betweenwriter and non-writer.
(42:01):
Everybody writes, not everybodypaints or sings or makes films,
and so I feel like other genresof art are more comfortably
sequestered in this kind ofspecialization of just a sheer
medium.
Every time a doctor or anassistant or anyone, even a
family member emails mesomething that's well written.
I'm just like why am I a writer?
(42:22):
You can write a well-writtenemail and you're a doctor or a
lawyer or whatever you are.
Like, I have nothing but justthis writing.
And in a way just feels likewhat all I am is a speaker or a
thinker or an expressor.
Writing and speaking is the airthat we all breathe in.
And so how do you, what givesyou the right to call yourself a
writer?
It's like saying I'm an exister,right.
Or I'm a just, yeah.
(42:42):
I'm a be-er.
And so that is something that Ifeel like besieges me now and
then because I feel likethere's, just in the promiscuity
of the medium, there comes ahigher threshold of of
validation of having to proveyourself as being able to call
yourself a writer.
And I think there's an answer toit.
Meryl (43:01):
I have good news though.
I hear basically in everyconversation I'm in now, people
are using AI to write.
They do not feel comfortableeven writing an email.
And so I think that if wecontinue to not use AI and
continue to write from ourheads, we are going to become
really special soon.
Shaan (43:18):
I love that.
I really love that.
In fact, I love theproliferation of AI because I
feel like we will be the specialones in a generation if we still
Meryl (43:28):
trust ourselves to write and and not use it.
I think we're gonna be really,the top of the world.
Shaan (43:34):
I love that, and thank you for bringing me into the
contemporary because I wasspeaking with LADA and thinking
about that, and you're totallyright.
And all I would add to that isthat one other thing that
distinguishes the writer orgives the writer the right to
distinction is the sheerpersistence and will to continue
writing.
It's one thing to write anemail, it's one thing to write
(43:55):
incidentally, it's another tosit down and write.
And I think in sitting down andintentionally writing, you also
do something with your mind andwith the coherence of expression
that is unique to the craft,that is a little bit different
from anything else.
When you speak for an hour, it'svery different than speaking off
the cuff for a few sentences.
Right.
Your ideas reach a kind ofcrescendo.
(44:16):
And so what I would say to endthat is it's all right to call
yourself a writer.
Ariana (44:27):
Follow us, like us.
Leave a review on wherever youget your podcast.
It's all right.
You can follow us on Instagram@itsallwritepod.
Write spelled W-R-I-T-E'causeit's a pun.
You can also email us at It'sAll right pod@gmail.com.
We'd love to hear from you andyeah,
Meryl (44:45):
thanks for listening.
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