What do you think?
Rate this book
n+1 Issue 35: Savior Complex
Abolish private property. I was a teenage telemarketer. Lorelei Lee on sex work and consent. Not-boyfriends, no girlfriends. Pre-mourning diary. Mark Greif reads the Mueller Report. Thinking about design thinking.
216 pages, Paperback
Published October 1, 2019
1 person is currently reading
129 people want to read
About the author
n+1
64 books137 followersn+1 is a print journal of politics, literature, and culture, published originally twice a year and now three times a year.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
Read
February 20, 2020This issue of n+1 includes a short story called "The Feminist" by Tony Tulathimutte that is absolute fire. Be careful with this one! Powerful, uncanny, and insightful writing that breaks through illusions and brings us closer to the truth of how human beings connect with each other (or not haha) in this age of alienation. (It reminds me in many ways of Cat Person which went viral last year.) You can read the whole story here -
https://nplusonemag.com/issue-35/fict...
https://nplusonemag.com/issue-35/fict...
December 4, 2025
Read the short story "The Feminist" by Tony Tulathimutte. Chilling and genius. Loved the word flow.
October 24, 2019
Stunning. Lorelei Lee's piece on sex work is a masterpiece & I will be thinking about that opening section for a long, long time.
December 9, 2019
Read "The Feminist" and wow. Wow.
December 2, 2025
The Feminist is an excellent character study of a modern man who follows the guidelines of feminism without internalizing it.
Structurally, I don't think this story is all that different from a type of story we've seen a lot of, which is a man working at an office, doing his job right, not getting the promotion he thinks he deserves by following the rules, and then lashing out. In The Feminist, the difference is that the rules are social rules, and the thing he thinks he deserves is a human woman.
This creates an unsolvable paradox within the person. He thinks that by living life as if women aren't trophies, he will earn a woman as a trophy. He can't see through his own internal contradiction, so when it doesn't work, he blames the very system he felt he was adhering to.
This story works as a snapshot of an issue, a situation, a type of person, without necessarily providing any answers. That's okay for me. The humor is at times sad, at times scary, but it's also somewhat sympathetic. It's a portrait of a bad person that isn't fully hopeless, in the way that an examination of an abusive drunkard can show that drunkard as both wrong and a victim of their addiction. It's complex, and I like it.
Still, the school ingrained in him, if not feminist values per se, the value of feminist values.
Structurally, I don't think this story is all that different from a type of story we've seen a lot of, which is a man working at an office, doing his job right, not getting the promotion he thinks he deserves by following the rules, and then lashing out. In The Feminist, the difference is that the rules are social rules, and the thing he thinks he deserves is a human woman.
This creates an unsolvable paradox within the person. He thinks that by living life as if women aren't trophies, he will earn a woman as a trophy. He can't see through his own internal contradiction, so when it doesn't work, he blames the very system he felt he was adhering to.
This story works as a snapshot of an issue, a situation, a type of person, without necessarily providing any answers. That's okay for me. The humor is at times sad, at times scary, but it's also somewhat sympathetic. It's a portrait of a bad person that isn't fully hopeless, in the way that an examination of an abusive drunkard can show that drunkard as both wrong and a victim of their addiction. It's complex, and I like it.
July 26, 2021
I've only read Tulathimutte's "The Feminist" and that was a LONG time ago. But still, wow is that short story brilliant.
I must assume (as my memory isn't too good) that it was a denouncement of the most liberal and performative femenism that prevails in so many left-circles, though I don't necessarily read it as a complete denouncement either (the main character is unreliable after all). Regardless of what your conclusions on the story were, the characterization and the writing are superb, and the pacing is spectacular.
The progressive movement needs to do something about masculinity because it's losing the battle to the likes of Jordan Peterson. On the one hand, the men's liberation movement has the heart in the right place (and it is true that we need to get rid of gender expectations and so on), but it's clearly not doing enough. On the other hand, the left needs "masculine" role models that talk about issues of masculinity from a leftist and femenist point of view. I'm hopeful though, we'll get there, eventually.
I must assume (as my memory isn't too good) that it was a denouncement of the most liberal and performative femenism that prevails in so many left-circles, though I don't necessarily read it as a complete denouncement either (the main character is unreliable after all). Regardless of what your conclusions on the story were, the characterization and the writing are superb, and the pacing is spectacular.
The progressive movement needs to do something about masculinity because it's losing the battle to the likes of Jordan Peterson. On the one hand, the men's liberation movement has the heart in the right place (and it is true that we need to get rid of gender expectations and so on), but it's clearly not doing enough. On the other hand, the left needs "masculine" role models that talk about issues of masculinity from a leftist and femenist point of view. I'm hopeful though, we'll get there, eventually.
June 20, 2021
“The Feminist” was excellent. Should keep Tony Tulathimutte on my radar for young writers of contemporary lit.
June 23, 2021
read Lorelei Lee’s Cash/Consent
February 13, 2022
The Feminist was physically uncomfortable to read. Alright, then.
October 23, 2024
Read The Feminist and strongly recommend. It’s an interesting and challenging read. Truly stunning.
Read
February 19, 2020Great issue. The piece on sex work is especially incredible.
January 29, 2020
In the two years worth of issues I've now read, this is the first where my favorite piece has been fiction. Tony Tulathimutte's The Feminist is incredible, manipulative and desperate just like it's protagonist. Agonizing and heartbreaking and horrifying.
Also incredibly strong was Lorelei Lee's essay on the complexities of sex work - how people get into it, how they stay, how they fight for it, why they love it, who supports it and who tries to dismantle it's systems of safety in the name of some kind of "purity" motivated eradication.
I was glad to see Mark Grief's name again but less interested in his take on the Mueller report than his past work.
Also incredibly strong was Lorelei Lee's essay on the complexities of sex work - how people get into it, how they stay, how they fight for it, why they love it, who supports it and who tries to dismantle it's systems of safety in the name of some kind of "purity" motivated eradication.
I was glad to see Mark Grief's name again but less interested in his take on the Mueller report than his past work.
October 21, 2019
Really enjoyed the nonfiction and editorial content at the beginning. Especially the evangelical mind and, surprisingly, the Muller report.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews