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Ai Weiwei and the lost backpack: A Chinese exile’s brush with bureaucracy

Reposted by Nick Hilden

Channeldraw ★ @channeldraw.bsky.social · 23d

I’m very happy to publish for the first time with @aljazeera.com on such an important story:

@aiww.bsky.social and the lost backpack — a tale of exile, memory, and bureaucracy. Introduction by @nickhilden.bsky.social

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Artist’s encounter with a railway ‘lost and found’ highlights the difficulties of those forced to leave their countries.

Ai Weiwei and the lost backpack: A Chinese exile’s brush with bureaucracy

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Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · 23d

Paperwork is serious when you're living in exile. New in @aljazeera.com - Ai Weiwei tells a story highlighting the importance of documentation for refugees, @channeldraw.bsky.social illustrates, and I provide the intro.

www.aljazeera.com/gallery/2025...

Artist’s encounter with a railway ‘lost and found’ highlights the difficulties of those forced to leave their countries.

The Philosophy of Tyranny

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Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Aug 11

In my latest for @nautil.us I discuss Plato and tyranny with classicist James Romm.
nautil.us/the-philosop...

What a formative period in Plato's life tells us about US politics today

nautil.us

Writers Talking Writers: Jess Walter on Charles Portis and Jonathan Lethem on James Salter

Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Jun 27

The latest in my Writers Talking Writers series at @publisherswkly.bsky.social!

Jess Walter on Charles Portis
Jonathan Lethem on James Salter

www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/...

The National Book Award finalist talks about Portis's appeal as the “patron saint of journalists who become novelists” and the National Book Critics Circle Award winner discusses Salter's “breathtakin...

Writers Talking Writers: Madeleine Thien on Y-Dang Troeung

Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · May 22

New in my Writers Talking Writers series at @publisherswkly.bsky.social

Madeleine Thien discusses the "stone on stone" writing of her friend Y-Dang Troeung and the act of writing as an "afterlife."
www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/...

The Giller Prize–⁠winning novelist reflects on the late memoirist and scholar's ambitious work about the history of violence in Cambodia and its resonance with current events.

In 1975, thousands of babies were daringly airlifted from the Vietnam war

Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Apr 26

To mark the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War I spoke with some of those impacted by Operation Babylift for @aljazeera.com.

www.aljazeera.com/features/202...

Some of those involved in ‘Operation Babylift’ recall the events – and what happened to the children after.

Writers Talking Writers: Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai on Thích Nhất Hạnh and Karl Marlantes on Leo Tolstoy

Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Apr 18

My latest Writers Talking Writers installment at @publisherswkly.bsky.social is a special edition for the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War:

Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai on Thích Nhất Hạnh
Karl Marlantes on Leo Tolstoy

www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/...

On the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War, two acclaimed authors who have written about the conflict and its consequences discuss the writers who shaped them.

Inside a Book Tour Turned Road Trip With Best Friends and Best-Selling Authors Tommy Orange and Kaveh Akbar

Reposted by Nick Hilden

Keziah Weir @keziahweir.bsky.social · Mar 21

A Friday treat: eavesdrop on Tommy Orange and Kaveh Akbar's Bay Area roadtrip courtesy of @nickhilden.bsky.social. “Kaveh is team poetry and I’m team novel, and we were both trying to recruit each other for each other’s teams, then realized we could play for both.” www.vanityfair.com/style/story/...

The authors of the celebrated novels ‘Wandering Stars’ and ‘Martyr!’ are each other’s valued early readers. “We both wrote when no one gave a shit that we were writing it,” Akbar tells VF. “It’s fun t...

www.vanityfair.com

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Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Mar 21

New for @vanityfair.com - On the road with Tommy Orange and Kaveh Akbar!

www.vanityfair.com/style/story/...

Inside a Book Tour Turned Road Trip With Best Friends and Best-Selling Authors Tommy Orange and Kaveh Akbar

The authors of the celebrated novels ‘Wandering Stars’ and ‘Martyr!’ are each other’s valued early readers. “We both wrote when no one gave a shit that we were writing it,” Akbar tells VF. “It’s fun t...

www.vanityfair.com

Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Mar 20

New for Writers Talking Writers @publisherswkly.bsky.social

Colum McCann on John Berger
Torrey Peters (@torreypeters.bsky.social) on Halldor Laxness

www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/...

Writers Talking Writers: Colum McCann on John Berger and Torrey Peters on Halldor Laxness

The National Book Award winner remembers drinking with John Berger and the PEN/Hemingway Award winner recounts the joys of reading Halldor Laxness.

In his new book, Michael Joseph Gross explores how the notion of strength has changed since Homer

Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Mar 13

New for @nautil.us - a chat with Michael Joseph Gross about his fascinating new book Stronger, about our changing understanding of muscle and strength.

nautil.us/the-importan...

The Importance of Muscle

nautil.us

California water wars: A century of wrangling over Los Angeles’s water

Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Mar 8

My latest for @aljazeera.com explores California's legacy of conflict over war.

www.aljazeera.com/features/202...

The battle for California’s water pitted ranchers against water barons and still echoes today.

Writers Talking Writers: Charlotte Wood on William Maxwell and Laila Lalami on Franz Kafka

Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Feb 21

New for my Writers Talking Writers series at @publisherswkly.bsky.social

Charlotte Wood (@charlottewood.bsky.social) on William Maxwell
Laila Lalami on Franz Kafka

www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/...

The Booker-shortlisted novelist praises compassion in the work of William Maxwell and the Pulitzer finalist discusses the peerless artistic commitment of Franz Kafka.

Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Feb 17

Does the GOP just shrug when they're in the minority? No, they're very effective at slowing or even stopping the process. The dems need to do the same.

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Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Feb 17

I suspect that everyone is frozen in shock at the moment. Hopefully a reaction will grow as that wears off.

Lives on the line: Low pay has US wildland firefighters quitting

Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Feb 17

Journalist with Al Jazeera here, working on this very question. Would you be interested in having a quick chat on the topic sometime this week?

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Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Feb 15

New for @aljazeera.com

“I hope that people maybe just aren’t aware of how poorly paid and poorly treated their federal firefighters are."

www.aljazeera.com/features/202...

As wildfires get worse, firefighters are struggling to combat blazes and remain in a job with poor labour conditions.

Life in an Atmospheric Zoo

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Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Feb 14

My latest for @nautil.us:

Journalist Carl Zimmer on the earliest studies of the aerobiome, historical approaches to pandemic readiness, and how learning about the creatures who live in the air around us has changed the way he moves through the world.

nautil.us/life-in-an-a...

Journalist Carl Zimmer tells the story of the science of aerobiology

nautil.us

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Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Feb 14

Cancer research was Biden's pet project. Trump is so anti-Biden that he's become pro-cancer.

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Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Feb 14

One of the biggest problems of our day is chronic lack of foresight.

OK, you fire hundreds of thousands of people and superheat the job market: what is the logical outcome of that?

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Nick Hilden @nickhilden.bsky.social · Feb 14

Watch wages plummet as highly qualified people compete over jobs