Mark Krotov

A Total Breakdown of All the Easter Eggs | A. S. Hamrah In December 2019, three months before the pandemic, I was standing on a subway platform in Brooklyn when I recognized a prominent older film critic also

The introduction to ALGORITHM OF THE NIGHT is up at @nybooks.com. "We’re always being told that for decades now most people’s introduction to cinema has been via a TV screen or a computer screen. This is a truism. Repeating it gets us nowhere." www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...

Algorithm of the Night, by A. S. Hamrah “A. S. Hamrah’s criticism is hilarious, irreverent, full of passionate and ingeniously defended judgments.” —Dana Spiotta

A very happy publication day to @hamrahrama.bsky.social! His ALGORITHM OF THE NIGHT is out today from @nplusonemag.com. An incredible collection of film writing that makes sense of the dystopian present without ever giving in. Essential! shop.nplusonemag.com/products/alg...

Amazing lineup of recommended books and first-rate recommenders! Plus thirty silly, fun, profound questions about literature and life. Donate any amount to generate an unbeatable reading list for the next few months! (Tho large amounts are very welcome)

I had the great honor of writing the introduction to the @enchantedlion.bsky.social edition of Gianni Rodari's Adventures of Cipollino, translated by Antony Shugaar. This expands on that introduction! Huge thanks to Max Nelson for letting me dig into kids' books, produce, and the joy of the absurd.

‘Who is Mr. Babycarrot?’ | Mark Krotov My daughter Daria and I first encountered Antony Shugaar’s translation of Gianni Rodari’s Telephone Tales several years ago, peering out at us from the

“It is impossible not to extrapolate freely from Cipollino’s dense materiality, not to transpose our own urgent concerns onto its sly inventions. That we’re mostly dealing with fruits and vegetables shouldn’t discourage…generative projection.” — @markkrotov.bsky.social

An honor to review the new NYC subway map for the mighty @nyreviewofarch.bsky.social!

markkrotov.bsky.social‬ has tunnel vision.nyra.nyc/articles/tra...es

Aid Wars | Dylan Saba As Israel’s ground operation in Gaza nears its close, the next major struggle is coming into view. The battle over the provision of essential humanitarian aid, already so brutal over the past few mont...

@shaabiranks.bsky.social, March 2024: "The aim of this strategy is to achieve by starvation what could not be achieved by military force." www.nplusonemag.com/online-only/...

Aerial view of the White House with multiple red map pointer icons above it.

I don’t think anyone is prepared for what they just did w/ ICE.

This is not a simple budget increase. It is an explosion - making ICE bigger than the FBI, US Bureau of Prisons, DEA,& others combined.

It is setting up to make what’s happening now look like child’s play. And people are disappearing.

It's hard to avoid recalling this passage from the English historian Tony Judt:

120. Upon arrival at CECOT, the detainees were greeted by a prison official who stated, “Welcome to CECOT. Whoever enters here doesn’t leave.” Plaintiff Abrego Garcia was then forced to strip, issued prison clothing, and subjected to physical abuse including being kicked in the legs with boots and struck on his head and arms to make him change clothes faster. His head was shaved with a zero razor, and he was frog-marched to cell 15, being struck with wooden batons along the way. By the following day, Plaintiff Abrego Garcia had visible bruises and lumps all over his body. 121. In Cell 15, Plaintiff Abrego Garcia and 20 other Salvadorans were forced to kneel from approximately 9:00 PM to 6:00 AM, with guards striking anyone who fell from exhaustion. During this time, Plaintiff Abrego Garcia was denied bathroom access and soiled himself. The detainees were confined to metal bunks with no mattresses in an overcrowded cell with no windows, bright lights that remained on 24 hours a day, and minimal access to sanitation.

storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.us...

The Grand Opening of an American Concentration Camp The Republicans are proudly calling it “Alligator Alcatraz.” Let’s call it what it is.

I wrote about the day the president attended the opening of an American concentration camp:

Just some lighthearted jokes on the way to the concentration camp approval bill

Juli was able to make a phone call late Friday and told her family that: She is in a warehouse, but she does not know the location She believes that the people who picked her up are bounty hunters There are many others being held where she is being held.

Yuriana Julia Pelaez Calderon, an organizer with the Los Angeles-based Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, was picked up by men in an unmarked car last Wednesday, and nobody knows where she is. She made a phone call late Friday and the information she gave is chilling:

this is the level of funding where all the possibilities for American politics that have been described as hyperbolic over the past decades - the comparisons to Nazi Germany and other nightmares of the 20th century - become logistically possible and politically likely

The difference between this and Nazi propaganda against Jews is that this is AI-generated.

Legit CQB role playing shit…no need to blow these doors and go in there that heavy…these cats watch “Sicario” on loop and now get to do it in real time

"inner-city rats"

A Knock at the Door | Colin Vanderburg I think of the people I met on canvasses. The older Polish woman in Greenpoint who took a thick stack of Zohran flyers to give out to all her friends. The hijabi Indian American mother and daughter wh...

"His campaign has advocated, he said, ’with no apology,’ on behalf of a particular New York, a city where hours and commutes are long, paychecks stretched, and housing precarious.” Beautiful @cgvanderburg.bsky.social piece about the Mamdani moment and the work it took to get us here.

Two Days Talking to People Looking for Jobs at ICE | Yanis Varoufuckice This is a disgusting country, I thought, irredeemable visually, psychically, morally, and ethically, and whatever is likable about our people’s warm patter does not in any way forgive what we have don...

Fantastic reported essay about what a public acclimated into fascism looks like on the ground.

www.nplusonemag.com/online-only/...

I wrote a sonnet about Jonathan Chait's hypothetical vote.

ICE detains Marine Corps veteran's wife who was still breastfeeding their baby U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers detained the wife of a Marine Corps veteran in Louisiana during a routine immigration appointment in New Orleans.

ICE has imprisoned the wife of a Marine veteran who was still breastfeeding a 3-month-old baby because her *mother* failed to attend a hearing in 2018 apnews.com/article/ice-...

once conspiracy theories about “FEMA camps” for mass internment flourished on the far right, and now—they’re going for it?

Wave of Domination | Dylan Saba The Trump Administration’s reliance on ICE underscores a transformation toward a domestic politics of domination that mirrors its lawlessness abroad. Just as Trump felt no obligation toward any kind o...

"Trump’s reliance on ICE underscores a transformation toward a domestic politics of domination that mirrors his administration’s lawlessness abroad." Excellent piece by @shaabiranks.bsky.social that connects the dots between the attack on Iran and ICE fascism at home.

Wave of Domination | Dylan Saba The Trump Administration’s reliance on ICE underscores a transformation toward a domestic politics of domination that mirrors its lawlessness abroad. Just as Trump felt no obligation toward any kind o...

“Increasingly, sovereignty appears to be a privilege limited by the caprices of the world hegemon.” New online: @shaabiranks.bsky.social on the Iran attack and the politics of domination abroad and at home.

It's one of those things like "the velvet underground only sold 6,000 records but everyone who bought it started their own band" but for everyone who answered "yes" to this being given a national newspaper column

Wish I could vote for him a second time

Two answers to “how could X let this happen” and they boil down to 1) greed and avarice on one hand and 2) political violence on the other.

American authoritarianism will be the dumbest iteration imaginable — memes, masks — but no less horrible.

'NOW IS THE TIME FOR PEACE!"