A novelist who saw our screen-soaked culture coming — and asks how to enjoy life anyway
This preview is based on the episode’s published notes, not the audio itself. Ezra Klein talks with Gary Shteyngart about why his 2010 novel feels eerily current in a metrics-driven, image-obsessed culture — and how his new essay collection turns toward pleasure, delight and living well amid the gloom.
This episode preview, based only on the published show notes, points to a conversation that pairs cultural diagnosis with a more personal question: how to live well when the broader social atmosphere feels distorted. The setup is Gary Shteyngart’s 2010 novel *Super Sad True Love Story*, which the notes describe as imagining a hypervisual, wellness-fixated, postliterate society where people are glued to screens and constantly judged by metrics. Ezra Klein suggests that world now feels uncomfortably familiar, especially in the age of “looksmaxxing,” longevity culture and a general sense that people are anxious but reaching for the wrong solutions. What makes the episode especially interesting is that it doesn’t seem content to stop at “he predicted it.” The notes frame Shteyngart not just as a sharp observer of cultural decline, but as someone trying to answer a harder follow-up: how to find pleasure and meaning anyway. That thread connects to his forthcoming essay collection, *The Sensualist: Adventures in Pure Pleasure*, which appears to explore delight as a serious response to dark times rather than a form of denial. If you’re drawn to episodes that connect literature to contemporary life, this looks like a strong pick. It should especially appeal to listeners interested in internet culture, status metrics, wellness ideology and the tension between social collapse narratives and everyday joy. One practical note from the show notes: the episode contains strong language.
About this episode
<p>A hypervisual, looks-obsessed, wellness-crazed, postliterate society where we’re constantly staring at screens and evaluating one another based on metrics, as the country around us feels like it’s falling apart: That sounds like the world we live in. It’s also the world Gary Shteyngart created in his 2010 novel, “Super Sad True Love Story.”</p> <p>I’ve been thinking about the book a lot recently, especially with the rise of the “looksmaxxing” influencer Clavicular and the longevity guru Bryan Johnson, and this feeling that people are upset and agitated but grabbing at the wrong things to fix it. It feels uncannily like the experience of living inside Shteyngart’s novel.</p> <p>But Shteyngart isn’t just a dystopian prophet, he’s also an expert at living well amid the world’s darkness. His forthcoming book, “The Sensualist: Adventures in Pure Pleasure,” is an essay collection about his efforts to do exactly that. So I wanted to have Shteyngart on the show to understand how he predicted so many of the grimmer aspects of our present, but also how we might delight in the world’s “endless buffet of pleasure” in spite of them.</p> <p><i><strong>This episode contains strong language.</strong></i></p> <p><strong>Note: We’re recording an "Ask Me Anything" episode soon. If you have a question, please email ezrakleinshow@nytimes.com using the subject like "AMA." We'd love to hear from you.</strong></p> <p>Mentioned:</p> <p><strong>“</strong><a href="https://www.garbageday.email/p/the-end-point-of-viral-content" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>The End Point Of Viral Content</strong></a><strong>” by Ryan Broderick</strong></p> <p><strong>“</strong><a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/01/23/how-jokes-won-the-election" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>How Jokes Won the Election</strong></a><strong>” by Emily Nussbaum</strong></p> <p><strong>“</strong><a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/visit-seoul-writer-future-robots-180963238/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>A Visit to Seoul Brings Our Writer Face-to-Face With the Future of Robots</strong></a><strong>” by Gary Shteyngart</strong></p> <p><a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/671594/the-intimate-city-by-michael-kimmelman/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>The Intimate City</strong></a><strong> by Michael Kimmelman</strong></p> <p><strong>“</strong><a href="https://www.wesleyan.edu/about/news/2026/05/chris-murphy-dont-just-take-the-slow-road-build-it.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>Don’t Just Take the Slow Road; Design It</strong></a><strong>,” Commencement address at Wesleyan’s 194th Commencement Ceremony, Chris Murphy</strong></p> <p>Book Recommendations:</p> <p><a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/men-like-ours-9781639735228/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>Men Like Ours</strong></a><strong> by Bindu Bansinath</strong></p> <p><a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/797017/a-tender-age-by-chang-rae-lee/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>A Tender Age</strong></a><strong> by Chang-rae Lee</strong></p> <p><a href="https://www.harpercollins.com/products/motherland-julia-ioffe?variant=42684866396194" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>Motherland</strong></a><strong> by Julia Ioffe</strong></p> <p>Thoughts? Guest suggestions? Email us at ezrakleinshow@nytimes.com.</p> <p>You can find transcripts (posted midday) and more episodes of “The Ezra Klein Show” at <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/column/ezra-klein-podcast" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>nytimes.com/ezra-klein-podcast</strong></a>, and you can find Ezra on Twitter @ezraklein. Book recommendations from all our guests are listed at <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><strong>https://www.nytimes.com/article/ezra-klein-show-book-recs</strong></a>.</p> <p>This episode of “The Ezra Klein Show” was produced by Annie Galvin. Fact-checking by Michelle Harris with Mary-Marge Locker. Our senior engineer is Jeff Geld, with additional mixing by Johnny Simon. Our recording engineer is Johnny Simon. Our executive producer is Claire Gordon. The show’s production team also includes Marie Cascione, Rollin Hu, Kristin Lin, Emma Kehlbeck, Jack McCordick, Marina King and Jan Kobal. Original music by Pat McCusker. Audience strategy by Shannon Busta. The director of New York Times Opinion Shows is Annie-Rose Strasser.</p> <p><p>Subscribe today at <a href="http://nytimes.com/podcasts">nytimes.com/podcasts</a> or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher">https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher</a>. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app.</p></p><br/> <p>Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See <a href="https://pcm.adswizz.com">pcm.adswizz.com</a> for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.</p>