Table of Contents
Introduction 1
Part I The Private Sector
Women of Letters Talk for Ubud Readers and Writers Festival, Indonesia, 2013 7
"Putting Away Childish Things," Sermon in Manchester, England, 2013 11
"Terminal Friendship," The Guardian, 2010 21
"My Teenage Diary," The Guardian, 2015 27
"The Big Story," Financial Times, 2013 31
Greg Shriver's Memorial Tribute, Durham, North Carolina, 2009 37
Part II "What Did You Do in the War, Mommy?"
"Fiction and Identity Politics," Brisbane Writers Festival Opening Address, 2016 45
"Liberals Now Defy the Etymology of the Word," The New York Times, 2016 58
"Writers Blocked," Prospect, 2018 64
"Cruel and Unusual Punishment," Harper's Magazine, 2019 75
"Lefty Lingo," Harper's Magazine, 2019 84
Part III Confessions of an Expat
"Bye-Bye Belfast," 1997 95
"No Exit," Harper's Magazine, 2019 120
"Patrios," Harper's Magazine, 2019 130
Part IV Getting the Blood Running
"Ode to the Hacker," Prospect, 2011 141
"London's Unofficial Olympic Sport," The Atlantic, 2012 146
"Your Gym Routine Is Worthless," Unherd.com Review-Essay on Alison Bechdel's The Secret to Superhuman Strength, 2021 151
Part V Against The Grain
"I Am Not a Kook," The New York Times, 2016 159
"Ikea's Real Genius," The Spectator, 2018 164
"Our Institutions No Longer Understand What They Are For," The Spectator, 2018 168
"Dear WriteNow," The Spectator, 2018 172
"He, She, and It," Prospect, 2016 177
"A Monumental Matter," The Spectator, 2017 185
"Would You Want London to Be Overrun by Americans like Me?" The Spectator, 2021 189
"The Criminalization of Making Money," New Criterion, 2010 193
"Quote-Unquote," The Wall Street Journal, 2008 204
"Lionel Shriver Is Grateful for Pandemic Quarantine (No She Isn't)," Los Angeles Times, 2020 213
Part VI End Papers
"In Defense of Death," Population and Development Review, 2010 221
"I Was Poor, but I Was Happy," The Guardian, 2014 233
"Friendship Agonistes," Prospect, 2011 237
"'I'll Never Put Up with Life in a Care Home,' and Other Lies We Tell Ourselves," The Observer, 2021 245
"Just Because We've Been OK Doesn't Mean We'll Stay That Way," Ramsay Centre Virtual Address, 2020 254
"Catastrophizing Is My Idea of a Good Time," The Spectator, 2038 268
"The Nobody at Cannes," Standpoint, 2011 272
"Semantic Drift," Harper's Magazine, 2019 275
Acknowledgments 285