personal canon

writing is an inherently dignified human activity

the case for starting your own newsletter ✦ and reflections on 2 years, 52 posts, and 31,000 subscribers

Dec 29, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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everything i read in october & november 2025

do you really need to read all the books you buy? ✦ plus reviews of 2 excellent debut novels ✦ an Italian novella about rogue AI ✦ and an attempt to…

Dec 3, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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November 2025

conversations with friends (on tech, culture, criticism, and bait)

my podcast conversation with the writer and technologist Jasmine Sun ✦

Nov 18, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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the occasional art report

the pros and cons of nostalgia, Wolfgang Tillmans, Korean ceramics, ideal translations, and the best show of Frieze London

Nov 5, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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October 2025

how to speak to a computer

against chat interfaces ✦ a brief history of artificial intelligence ✦ and the (worthwhile) problem of other minds

Oct 20, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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everything i read in september 2025

novels & nonfiction about AI poetry, lost love, corporate anthropologists, and more ✦

Oct 5, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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September 2025

everything i read in july & august 2025

15 books on love, communism, AIDS activism, and sleeping your way to the top

Sep 3, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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August 2025

how to expand the market for literature (and literary criticism)

the personal and social function of criticism ✦ and why the humanities are not dead, thank you very much

Aug 27, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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July 2025

exercises in style: bill beckley's "cake story"

short fiction and photography inspired by 1970s conceptual art ✦ and how to get started with flash fiction!

Jul 25, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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everything i read in june 2025

5 books about design, grief, spirituality and history ✦ and recent films from China, Taiwan and Vietnam

Jul 2, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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June 2025

annie ernaux fixed my disintegrating attention span

the (almost) definitive ranking of Ernaux's books ✦ everything I read in March, April, and May 2025

Jun 22, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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May 2025

no one told me about proust

on poptimism and literary snobs ✦ and why taste is cultivated through love, not education

May 31, 2025 • Celine Nguyen

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