The Yale Review | James Baldwin in Turkey
Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi on how Istanbul changed his career—and his life.
One of the ten most read pieces of 2023.
BOMB Magazine | Conversation with Idra Novey
The novelist on writing across a rural landscape and bearing witness through art.
Electric Literature | Reading ‘The Odyssey’ Far From Home
What Homer’s poem taught me about making a life on the Great Lakes
Los Angeles Review of Books | Iranian-American, Past Present Future
Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi writes about isolation, demonization, and the effects of censorship as an Iranian-American.
The Sewanee Review | Whose Time Are We Speaking In?
Oloomi's seminal craft essay on the works of Yiyun Li, James Baldwin, and Theresa Hak Kyung Cha.
Winner of the Monroe K. Spears Prize for Best Essay
The New York Times | In Lina Meruane’s New Novel, Writer’s Block is a Symptom of Migrant Trauma
Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.
Reading is a Political Encounter: On Violence, Language, and Selective Forgetting
Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi finds lessons in history, from Tehran to Orange County
The Believer | A Case of Literature Sickness
On Lynne Tillman, Henry James, and the fictional narrators that turn to literature for counsel.