Phillip Lopate is director of Columbia University's nonfiction program, editor of The Art of the Personal Essay, and author of Against Joie de Vivre, Portrait of My Body, and To Show and to Tell, among other books.
Phillip Lopate
Memories of Jazz Nights
You needed stamina, but the payoff was great
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, June 23, 2017
Remembering Cynthia Macdonald
Poet, teacher, opera singer, psychoanalyst, and friend
by Phillip Lopate | Thursday, May 11, 2017
A Visit to Harvard
And a surprise encounter with Dr. Johnson
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, May 19, 2017
Baldwin the Prophet vs. Baldwin the Writer
Can a film really capture the essence of both?
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, April 28, 2017
Report from Hong Kong
30 films, two days, and the inevitable breaking out in song
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, April 07, 2017
A Quick Tour of India
Taking it all in, and taking it all back
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, March 17, 2017
On Being Popular and Well-Liked
The subject that makes me most nervous as a writer
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, February 10, 2017
Memories of Jazz Nights
You needed stamina, but the payoff was great
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, February 03, 2017
Liking La La Land and Jackie
The perversity of appreciation
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, January 20, 2017
The Complex Art of Second-Guessing
Maybe the mistakes weren’t Hillary’s, after all
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, January 06, 2017
The Agnes Martin Retrospective
What to make of all those fussy graphite lines?
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, December 16, 2016
Skyping Brazil
On the pleasure of a virtual dissertation defense
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, December 09, 2016
The Paradox of Urban Density
The good, the bad, and the ugly
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, December 02, 2016
Reflections after the Election
Counting the worry beads
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, November 18, 2016
The Roads Not Taken
I coulda been a contender—as a cantor
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, October 28, 2016
What Our Politicians Can’t Bring Themselves to Say
(And why the personal essay might help)
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, October 21, 2016
Confronting the Inevitable Subject
A few hundred words, and then I’m done
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, August 12, 2016
Remembering Abbas Kiarostami
The great filmmaker was cool, cosmopolitan, and lonely
by Phillip Lopate | Friday, August 05, 2016
Letter from Shanghai
The cityscape of the future—and the present