The Importance of Male Heirs

Ottessa Moshfegh (Eileen, My Year of Rest and Relaxation) discusses her latest novel, Lapvona. Born out of the seclusion of the pandemic, Lapvona is a work whose perspective-shifting, fable-like narration and medieval setting differ from much of the author’s previous work. During the conversation, Moshfegh deconstructs her characters and goes beyond the text at hand to address her writing more broadly, exploring the importance of tone in building genre and systems of information, and her relationship with the grotesque.

Read an adapted excerpt of Lapvona: https://harpers.org/archive/2022/06/ina-ottessa-moshfegh-lapvona/

This episode was produced by Violet Lucca and Maddie Crum, with production assistance by Ian Mantgani.

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