Thresholds

Jordan talks with Vinson Cunningham (Great Expectations) about finding himself in the midst of history, discovering ways to hang onto moments, and why he turned to his real life for his debut novel.

MENTIONED:

• The Vanity Fair Diaries by Tina Brown
• Answered Prayers by Truman Capote
• "How Auto is Auto-fiction" by Christian Lorentzen
• "American Boy" by Estelle
• The Idiot by Elif Batuman
• Shadow and Act by Ralph Ellison

Vinson Cu...

Jordan chats with Meghan O'Rourke (The Invisible Kingdom) about hiding from herself, the death of her father, and the challenges of writing a book without knowing where it will go.

MENTIONED:

• The Riddles of the Sphinx by Anna Shechtman
• Walking and Talking (1996, written & directed by Nicole Holofcener)
• "The Teens Have Made Nirvana Preppy" by Sarah Stankorb

Meghan O’Rourke is the author of the New York Times be...

Jordan talks with Rumaan Alam (Leave the World Behind) about money, freedom, his recent period of creative fecundity, and the enduring power of art.

MENTIONED:

• The Golden Bowl by Henry James
• Appropriate by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins
• Family Meal by Bryan Washington
• Zero K by Don DeLillo
• Agnes Martin

Rumaan Alam is the author of three novels: Rich and Pretty, That Kind of Mother, and Leave the World Behind. Other writing has ap...

Jordan talks with artist and writer Maira Kalman about the death of her husband Tibor Kalman, the process of grief, and her irrepressible creative spirit.

MENTIONED:

• Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lindgren
• Sarah Berman's Closet
• The Diaries of Franz Kakfa by Franz Kafka, tr. by Ross Benjamin
• "Cheek to Cheek" by Irving Berlin, sung by Fred Astaire

Maira Kalman was born in Tel Aviv and moved to New York City with her fam...

Thresholds is back! To open a new season, Jordan sits down with McKenzie Wark live at PioneerWorks in Red Hook, Brooklyn, for a conversation about raving, gender transition, and the radical work of "playing" with form.

MENTIONED:

• Leonora Carrington
• Kenneth Goldsmith
• Audre Lorde’s Zami
• Zoo, Or Letters Not About Love

McKenzie Wark is the author of Love & Money, Sex & Death; Raving; Capital Is Dead; Reverse Cowgirl,...

For her last guest as guest-host, Mira chats with former mentee Gina Chung about her debut novel Sea Change, writing about the honest messy stuff, and about learning to take better care of yourself (mind, body, and spirit) for the long-haul creative practice.

MENTIONED:

• The bats under Congress Bridge in Austin, TX
• “The Love Song of the Mexican Free-Tailed Bat” by Gina Chung (at F(r)iction)
• The Daniels accepting the Oscar for Best P...

J Wortham joins Mira to talk about the power of changes -- changing location, changing names, changing pronouns -- and the space that can open up as a result of them. Plus, some love for benevolent conspiracies!

MENTIONED:

• Alejandro's Run in LA
• Still Processing
• Kristy from The Babysitter's Club

J Wortham (they/them) is a sound healer,, reiki practitioner, herbalist, and community care worker oriented towards healing justic...

Legendary cartoonist Barbara Brandon-Croft (Where I’m Coming From) joins Mira to talk about building a life out of odd jobs, the double-edged sword of being ‘the first,’ and how being a cartoonist was never on her mind until it happened.

MENTIONED:

• Brumsic Brandon, Jr. (Barbara’s father, creator of the comic Luther) 
• Marie Brown
• Jules Feiffer’s Village Voice strip
• Women’s Wear Daily

Barbara Brandon-Croft was born in Broo...

Writer and organizer Sarah Thankam Mathews (All This Could Be Different) joins Mira to discuss a brush with mortality in a rip-tide off the California coast, discovering “the sourdough starter of ego death,” and the problems of being an artist under capitalism.

MENTIONED:

• Big Sur, California
• "How to Escape a Rip Current"
• What It Is by Lynda Barry
• I May Destroy You
• Michaela Coel's Emmy acceptance speech (video, transcript)

Sar...

Poet Layli Long Soldier joins Mira to talk about her transformation during pregnancy, learning to open up to the possibilities of the world, and how she makes a space for ease in order to make a space for creativity.

MENTIONED:

• The Indigenous Language Institute
• The Real Housewives
• S.J. Res 14 (111th Congress)

Layli Long Soldier earned a BFA from the Institute of American Indian Arts and an MFA with honors from Bard College....

Comedian Hari Kondabolu joins Mira to talk about seeing space for himself on the screen, discovering an answer to the question of how to be in the world, the first joke he was really proud of, and the power that comes from alienating an audience on purpose. There's a lot of laughter in this one, y'all -- as you might expect.

MENTIONED:

• People Magazine's Sexiest Man Alive in 1992: Nick Nolte
• Apu
• Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal
• Hari's '...

Mira chats with novelist Angie Cruz (How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water) about figuring out who you want to be, Angie's semi-secret history in fashion design and painting, the arrival of her character Cara Romero in her life, and questioning the truths of America in these most trying of times.

MENTIONED:

• FIT (Fashion Institute of Technology)
• Go Tell It On the Mountain by James Baldwin
• Just Above My Head by James Baldwin
• Jazz by To...

Guest-host Mira Jacob talks with astrologer and author Chani Nicholas about being the child at the party, how Chani found her voice, and the question of who heals the healers?

MENTIONED:

• Morning Pages (from Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way)
• FreeFrom
• therapy

CHANI NICHOLAS is a Los Angeles–based New York Times bestselling author of You Were Born For This and astrologer with a community of over one million monthly readers...

Big News: novelist/memoirist/wonderful human Mira Jacob will be stepping into the host chair this spring! This week, she and Jordan sit down for a pass-the-baton chat -- kicking off with a flashback to the very first Thresholds episode (and interview) from February 2020.

MENTIONED:

• Mira's Thresholds interview
• "What You Might Not Know About 'Getting Roofied'" by Jordan Kisner
• Mira in conversation with Saeed Jones and Kiese Laymon fo...

Hafizah Geter (The Black Period) joins Jordan to discuss her family's influence on her work, the power of memory, being in conversation with the writers you love, and how all of us live in a mix of genres.

MENTIONED:

• Goya's Black Paintings
• "Fighting Erasure" by Parul Sehgal
• Toni Morrison's concept of rememory
• Fela Kuti, Yussef Lateef, Otis Redding

Hafizah Augustus Geter is a Nigerian American writer, poet, and literary agent...

Sam Lipsyte (No One Left to Come Looking For You) joins Jordan to talk about giving up on punk rock, rediscovering a passion for writing, and the revelation that if you realize nobody cares, then you can do the thing that makes you happy.

MENTIONED:

• Dungbeetle
• Riverbank State Park
• John Cheever
• Galaxie 500

Sam Lipsyte's latest novel is No One Left to Come Looking For You. He is the author of the story collections Venus Drive ...

Heather Radke joins Jordan to talk about Butts: A Backstory, the playful invitation of the book's title, the general unruliness of bodies, and the joys of a JSTOR deep-dive.

MENTIONED:

• Jodie Foster's Coppertone ad
• "Baby Got Back," Sir Mix-a-lot
• Elizabeth Alexander's "The Venus Hottentot"
• The Normman & Norma Statues

Heather Radke is an essayist, journalist, and contributing editor and reporter at Radiolab, the Peabody...

Thresholds reaches its centenary episode with equal parts celebration and consideration. We reached out to old friends to leave us some voicemails, Jordan wrote a musing on this particular milestone, and we're doing a little giveaway to celebrate all of you who've helped bring us this far along the path.

Mentioned:

• "Notebook, 1981," by Eileen Myles
• The Isolation Journals by Suleika Jaouad

Thanks to all of our guest...

It's the end of our last full capsule for 2022 -- and what a joyful, life-affirming batch of conversations it was! First up, we've got Saeed Jones offering some writing advice (and an exercise, of sorts) -- then some alumni news and a call to pre-order several 2023 releases -- and finally, Chloé Cooper Jones and Jordan get into talking about revision and the life-affirming process of writing.

MENTIONED:

• The Best American Essays 2...