- 3 hours ago
Seasoned editor Hanya Yanagihara took the helm of T, The NY Times Style Magazine, in 2017, and under her editorship, the magazineâs coverage of all things style, arts, and culture has faithfully sharpened its edge. On her off hours, she's renowned as one of the most compelling and unconventional best-selling novelists of our time. Listen in to hear how this legendary wordsmith is making her mark in the new age of media.
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00:02Welcome to Unstyled. I'm your host, Christine Barbrick, co-founder and global editor-in-chief
00:07of Refinery29. Each week, I invite a notable person to come in and talk with us as we explore
00:13the funny, inspiring, sometimes heartbreaking tales of life, work, and love, as told through
00:20the things that we wear. In the spring of 2015, Hanya Yanagihara published her second novel,
00:33A Little Life. It was a heavy book in every sense of the word, a lush and shattering tale of
00:40trauma,
00:40more than 700 pages long. No one expected it to sell more than a couple thousand copies.
00:45Instead, A Little Life exploded onto the literary scene, becoming one of the year's most celebrated
00:51books. It was everywhere, and you couldn't ride the New York subway without seeing the novel's
00:57arresting trademark cover photo. What you wouldn't see anywhere in or on the book was a photo of the
01:03author, nor could you find Hanya on Facebook or Twitter. Readers were dying to know the woman
01:09behind the astonishing story, but Hanya wasn't interested in celebrity. At the height of her
01:15book's surprise success, Hanya did something even more shocking. She went back to her day job.
01:22Hanya has been working in magazines for 16 years, writing fiction during her off hours,
01:27and after A Little Life, people expected her to do what hotshot bestselling authors do,
01:32build on her fame, turn the book into a movie, then write another bestseller, ASAP. Instead,
01:39Hanya returned to the magazine world, albeit with a pretty big promotion.
01:42In 2017, Hanya became editor-in-chief of TEA, the New York Times-style magazine.
01:49Literary elites raised eyebrows, wondering why she chose a fashion publication. Hanya scoffs at such
01:56snobbery. Art and culture are of crucial importance, she argues, especially at this point in history.
02:03In her first year, Hanya led a massive overhaul of the magazine, banning writers who turned in fluff
02:08and insisting on in-depth reporting from her staff. Whether it's a detailed retrospective on the AIDS
02:14crisis or a perfectly simple trend piece on printed scarves, Hanya summons a life force, not simply a
02:21story. She believes in the rigors of classical journalism, but she's also a friend to the digital
02:26age. Hanya lives in Manhattan, but she's a native explorer with no plans to lay down roots. Marriage and
02:34children aren't for her, and she values friendship above all relationships. She's never followed
02:39traditional paths, professional or personal. Instead, this editor and author is building a life
02:45exactly to her liking. A very big life that is truly her own.
03:04Good morning, Hanya.
03:05Good morning, Christine. Thanks for having me.
03:07Thank you so much for being a guest on UnStyled today.
03:10I'm so excited to be here.
03:11I'm so excited to have you here. I'd love to start out just talking a little bit about your
03:16background. You had a pretty unconventional childhood.
03:19I was born in LA. I'm a fourth generation American and my family's from Hawaii. And it
03:24was unconventional only insofar as we moved a lot and we kept doubling back to the same places. And
03:29part of it was because my father was in training for a long time. He was a research physician and
03:34he
03:34went where there was tenure, eventually. He was easily distracted and easily dissatisfied and he would pick up
03:40and leave whenever he got a sense of wanderlust. And so when I moved here to New York in 1995,
03:48I thought I've got to stay in one place for longer than we did when I was growing up. So
03:54by 2000,
03:55that was the longest I'd ever lived in one place consecutively, five years. And I thought, well,
03:59now I've done it. Now I've made it.
04:01Did you want to leave after that?
04:02No, but I wanted to prove to myself that I could stay put when the going got tough or boring
04:07or
04:08complicated or just lost its charm.
04:10Do you have a restless heart? Do you feel restless when you're kind of in because of that sort of
04:15all the moving around when you were little?
04:17No, but it taught me really interesting and useful skills. You know, it taught me that I can always
04:22make friends wherever I go, that I can always adapt wherever I go, you know, that nothing lasts
04:27forever. And that as bad as something is, it'll end. And also as good as something is, it will
04:32eventually end. But it did give me a sense, I think, of a certain kind of resourcefulness that
04:37has put me in good stead, especially as I didn't move cities, but I moved jobs a lot. And I
04:42know
04:43that whenever I land somewhere new, it might take me a little longer. And it might be a slightly
04:48bloodier process, but I can make it work wherever I land. And that's a very useful thing to know early
04:53on.
04:54Has the editor-in-chief role at T Magazine, which you took about in 2017, a little more than a
05:00year ago.
05:00Right, a little more than a year. So I took it in May. My first day in the office was
05:04May 9th, 2017.
05:05But moving into that position, did it make you feel a little bit more permanent?
05:09It's a funny thing to get the top job in an era when magazines are going through such
05:16convulsions and when the industry as we know it is not going to look the same in five years. I
05:22mean,
05:23the kind of curious thing for a lot of us who are career magazine editors in our 40s and 50s
05:29is
05:29that you never assume that the industry you began in will vanish or will transform so profoundly that
05:37you won't recognize it. And yet that is what's happening for many of us sort of mid and late
05:41career editors, that in five years, magazines will exist, but they won't look like they do now. And I
05:46think we can even see that, you know, in the past five years. So it didn't make it feel more
05:52permanent
05:52or more real, but it made me feel very lucky to be in magazines at the job I really wanted,
05:58at the job
05:59I'd spent, you know, 25 years clawing my way up the mast to try to get at the end of
06:03what will be
06:04recognizably this era. It's a bittersweet position to be in in many ways, because you do realize that it's going
06:12to
06:12profoundly shift and to what I don't know. But I'm glad to be here in the last gasp of its
06:18recognizable
06:18form.
06:19I actually don't think that print media will will vanish. I think that actually, it's an opportunity
06:26for magazines just like yours. I think that tea is a is a shining example of this is really taking
06:32advantage of this opportunity when people are maybe buying magazines less, but the ones that they are
06:39buying, they're really investing in. I agree with you. I don't think print is going to disappear. But
06:44I do think the way the business is run, and the amount of waste that is still pretty prevalent in
06:50the industry is going to have to end. If you look at other countries and the way their magazines are
06:55run, it's a much smaller staff, you get paid a lot less, and the sticker price of the magazine is
07:00much higher. I think the other thing that distinguishes, and I'm thinking about magazines in
07:05Europe and East Asia, mostly distinguishes those magazines is that they are more specific, you know,
07:13there isn't the sense that you have, you know, the same six celebrities on the cover month in and
07:18month out, that their strength is that they're more idiosyncratic, I think they're a little more
07:24esoteric, which tea certainly is. And they're narrower, but deeper in their interests, I think. And I do think
07:30that that is a kind of slow shift in magazines we're seeing. I mean, the problem with the American
07:36magazine publishing system is that it's still largely dependent upon newsstand. And a lot of the
07:41covers I've been able to do at tea, I would not be able to do if I had to respond
07:45to a newsstand
07:46audience. So I'm very, very lucky that way. And because we don't have to depend on newsstand, because
07:51it gets delivered, I mean, one hopes, within the New York Times, I feel if you're not taking advantage of
07:57that opportunity to do something strange, or something unexpected, or something quote, unquote,
08:02unsellable on the cover, then you're not really taking advantage of what the what this particular
08:07magazine has to offer. I agree with that completely. And I also think that there's been such a such a
08:14focus on scale, so much scale in America. Yes. And I think that that's why, unfortunately, we end up
08:21seeing the same faces on magazine covers, because there's so much pressure to actually fulfill these
08:27really exorbitant numbers. And I do think that we've lost sight of, or at least in some, in some
08:34ways, and some companies have lost sight of, you know, the real purpose that magazines have served
08:39in the beginning. And it's interesting, going back to what you're saying, I think the other thing that
08:43you see with a lot of magazines, is that you're editing for an editor. So if you're an editor in
08:47chief of a magazine, you're editing for whoever the editorial director, creative director of your
08:52company is, whenever you're editing for another editor, there's a kind of second guessing that
08:58goes into what you include, you know, what your headlines are, what your art choices are. And one
09:03of the many reasons I'm very lucky to be at T is we don't have to show our pages to
09:08anyone. So we don't
09:09have to have an approval process. You know, I mean, Dean Bacay, who's the executive editor of the Times,
09:15and a really great guy who I admire a great deal. But you know, he doesn't have time to look
09:19at
09:20at the pages of T or the New York Times magazine. He has other things to do, you know, mainly
09:25talking
09:25to the Washington Bureau. So when we're done with those pages, they go to the printer. And there
09:30isn't this that sort of second, arguably unnecessary step where you're having it approved by somebody
09:36else, and then sending it to the printer, which I think accounts for some of the sameness that we've
09:40seen creep into a lot of books, especially those published by, it's safe by the big companies. Yeah,
09:46it's safe. I think that I think that you're right. I think that when people create doubt in you,
09:51you know, that never really existed before, it's very unnerving. How often when you're sending it
09:56off to print, are you a little bit scared? Rarely. I mean, because there are certain things
10:01I'm so impressed. Well, there's I used to be scared all the time. Well, I have a very outspoken
10:06photo and video director, creative director, and managing editor who aren't shy about saying,
10:11this looks wrong. I think this isn't slightly bad taste. This is, you know, so they're they'll
10:16always say when they think something is a little bit off, either politically, or for sensitivity
10:22reasons, or just it doesn't look right. Sometimes I just let it go. And sometimes I'll change it.
10:28But I do feel that I have stopgaps that I have second and third and fourth eyes on on everything
10:33I
10:34do. And I do trust with what they say. And then there are certain safety measures that we have built
10:39into working at the Times. I mean, we don't have, it's true, a creative director for the company,
10:44but we do have an ethics and standards department. And there are certain things we can't do that
10:49probably save us from a little bit of bad taste, because we're just not able to do it. You can't
10:54swear in the book, you can't show nudity, except if it's in a if it's in an artwork, you can't
11:00use
11:00certain kinds of language. But beyond that, you can you can do quite a bit, but it saves you from
11:05the really noticeable, vulgar things, I think.
11:10You mentioned earlier that this was somewhat of a dream job. What's it? What is it like to have
11:14your dream job?
11:15Well, I mean, I guess there's two schools of thought about having the dream job. I mean,
11:18the first is that if you are getting your dream job, and it was still your dream job, then you
11:23haven't been that imaginative, because you should have really thought of something else.
11:27It's good advice.
11:28Yeah, it is good advice, right? I always wanted to be the editor in chief. I knew I could do
11:32it. I knew I
11:33wouldn't get the chance at Condé. And you know, I was at Condé for many years, as were you.
11:37At Traveler, right?
11:38At Traveler.
11:39Why didn't you think you'd ever get it?
11:41When I was there, you know, it was, I think things have changed. But when I was there,
11:45I didn't look like a Condé editor. I just didn't, I didn't think it would ever happen for me.
11:49And at the times, they don't care about that. And this was the book I wanted. You know, I went
11:53from
11:54really wanting to be the editor in chief to wanting to be the editor in chief of a book I
11:59wanted to be
11:59editor in chief of, I think, just sort of blindly thinking, well, I want this title, and I'm going
12:03to do anything to get this title, without really thinking about the context of where that title
12:08might exist. That's something you do grow out of, or you better grow out of. But really being able to,
12:14after years of experience, and many years of jobs, really identify what it is that you want out of
12:21a job and what you want out of being boss, and then going for that, because you can make the
12:26distinction between being boss and being boss of a specific thing. That's the useful,
12:31that's the useful part of it.
12:33But stepping into that role, and you were very close with Deborah Needleman, who was the former
12:36editor in chief, and also a really, really brilliant editor. What did you want your legacy
12:41to be? Like, I think that when, even though it's, it's my own company, but you know, I didn't start
12:46out with the editor in chief title, it was something that I really sort of like grew into,
12:50and had to really feel confident, especially because digital media was such a new medium.
12:54Yes. I remember thinking, like, what do I want my stamp to be through this role? Like,
13:01what do I want to say?
13:02And what did you want to say?
13:04I really felt there was an absence of, of authentic conversation happening between women.
13:10And I was already feeling really alienated by women's magazines. It's one of the reasons why
13:16I read a lot of men's magazines, Esquire and GQ and Rolling Stone. And I think because I didn't
13:23really identify with how women's magazines spoke to me. And I also didn't think that a lot of it was
13:29accurate. You know, I felt a little strange that, you know, the do's and don'ts and glamour, I was
13:34really always like into the don'ts, you know, and I think that I think a lot of people are and
13:39I think
13:39a lot of people see themselves in that. So I think to tell you that it's wrong, right, is really
13:44kind
13:44of a toxic message and behavior. But with you, I mean, I think that there's a long legacy that, you
13:50know,
13:50sort of preceded you at tea. And also just the legacy of The New York Times, I mean, is so
13:56remarkable
13:57and important, especially now given the Trump administration. But what did you want your trademark
14:03or your sort of impact to be, you know, stepping into that role?
14:06Right. Well, I mean, first, I have to say, you're right, all consumer magazines make up a set of rules.
14:12And for many, many years, it was about telling people, I mean, you know, I'm not the first to
14:18say this, obviously, but you know, women's magazines, as we knew them, let's say before
14:23the mid 2000s, were all about telling you what you were doing wrong. And so were men's magazines.
14:29And they, you know, and so are certain other magazines. But it's really about making a template
14:34for life that the editors may or may not believe themselves, and then trying to get you the reader to
14:39feel bad about not following them and inspired to follow other rules. And one of the things that
14:45sites like Refinery did, was they moved the authority from the editors, to the readers,
14:52because the readers asked for what they wanted, and the editors then fulfilled it, which was an
14:56inverse of the way a traditional women's book had worked, that the editors would tell you the reader,
15:01what you were doing wrong with your life, and then you the reader would have to try to meet
15:05this imaginary standard that was set by people in New York. And so that's been a huge shift in the
15:10way that we experience not only women's magazines, but any sort of instructive consumer magazine.
15:17With tea, you know, the brief has always been different. It's a luxury magazine, it's meant to
15:21make the Times money. I mean, that's first, that's why it was invented. And that's when Stefano Tonki began
15:27this book, about 15 years ago, I think,
15:30Who's now the editor-in-chief of W.
15:31Who's now the editor-in-chief of W about 12 years ago. I love tea. I mean, I just thought
15:35that he
15:36created in every editor since, has created such a specific world. And the things I love about,
15:42and there's not been that many editors, there's been, I'm the fourth. I think I have, we have a
15:47certain responsibility of us past editors, and I include myself in this, to make an expensive
15:53looking environment, because it is about, you know, the definition of what luxury is. It has
16:00morphed and changed and shifted and become the subject of, I'm sure, various business of fashion
16:05and TED Talk speeches. But ultimately, you want a beautiful looking book, whatever that is.
16:11When readers look at it, I want them to feel that I've been excited about discovering everything in
16:18the book, that everything in it came from a single hive mind. By which I mean, not everything I put
16:25in the book is something I personally love. But it's within the aesthetic and the philosophy
16:32and the culture of a certain kind of mind. And you might not be able to articulate it better than
16:37that, and I can't really either. But you should understand that everything in it, the people in it,
16:42the spaces in it, the food in it, the photographs in it, come from a specific aesthetic, a specific
16:48group aesthetic, I suppose I should say. When I want people to look at it, I want them to say,
16:52wow, she really did not give any fucks about what she put in this book, that it was things that
16:58it was
16:59people she admired, it was spaces she longed to see, it was ideas that she thought were important for
17:05us to hear and to read about. The greatest compliment I think I could receive about this book
17:10is if someone who's visually minded, tore something out of it and put it on their mood board. Or if
17:16a
17:17designer or an artist... You should come to my apartment, you'll see it all over the place,
17:20all over my office. I'm very flattered by that. Or a designer or an architect or an artist read
17:27something in it and inspired more of their work. I mean, that is the ultimate compliment. And I think
17:33that at its best, the magazine is a conversation between many different artists in many different
17:38mediums. And that's what I want it to feel like. And you also are very open about the fact that,
17:43and you write about it in your most recent letter from the editor, you kind of open up talking about
17:48the fact that you don't know everything. And I don't know that I've ever, ever read an editor's
17:53letter that sort of opened up admitting that there's a lot of material in this magazine that,
17:59you know, you were learning about as you were, you know, as you were building it. And I think the
18:04fact
18:04that you give so much trust and agency to your team, I think is just extraordinary.
18:10Well, thank you. And that's scary that you haven't read that before in an editor's letter,
18:13because... I mean, have you? I haven't.
18:15Well, I think there's two very broadly speaking types of editors-in-chief, and I've worked for both
18:20of them. The first group gets very threatened by or dismissive of people who know things they don't
18:26know. The second group gets really excited about it. And I hope I'm in that second group. I mean,
18:31I love it when the editors tell me something about an artist I don't know about, or about a designer
18:38or a house or so on. I depend upon them to find things that I don't know. And, you know,
18:43there's
18:44a great deal I don't know. And they all have very deep specialties. You know, one is very good at
18:48decorative arts. One is... We have really the best arts editor in town and Michael Miller. One of them
18:53is very good at plays and Broadway, and the other one's very good at dance and food. And I really,
18:59really do depend upon them. That is what an editor at a magazine should be doing. They should be good
19:03generalists, by which I mean they should be able to really kind of edit anything that comes across
19:08their desk. But they should also have a real passion about and an opinion about their specialty.
19:16And so in that way, I think one of the ways that the magazine's changed a little bit is that
19:21it does
19:21follow a much more traditional newspaper structure in that way, by which I mean there are real beats that
19:27the editors have. And when I was there in 2015 and into 16, there was that too. People sort of
19:33gravitated
19:34towards one area of or subject of interest or another.
19:37What was your beat?
19:37I came from a travel magazine, so I really tried to concentrate on travel in the various iterations of what
19:43that meant, which is not really even a beat. But anyway, but from a more consumer perspective...
19:48Yes, it is.
19:48Well, it is and it isn't. But it's much more thrilling to me when it's people who really...
19:53I mean, we have an editor, Alexa Brazilian, who has this really uncanny way of ferreting out
20:00the latest craftsmen, the movements of decorative art. We do a lot more floral coverage, you've noticed,
20:06and it's because of her. She drives that. And so the magazine as it is, is often because
20:12someone on staff really has a particular passion or eye for something and pushes it. And, you know,
20:19the rest of us just stand back and let them push. But that's what a good magazine should be. You
20:24should
20:24be able to say, you know, go talk to our decorative arts person, and isn't it great if you have
20:29one?
20:29And I'm very lucky because much like the Washington Bureau can say, I think, go talk to our NSA expert,
20:35I can say, go talk to our land art expert, and one actually exists.
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21:07strong, and always the real you in your own style.
21:21You are an award-winning author as well. You've published two novels. The fact that your first
21:26book, I think, took you more than 15 years to write, correct?
21:30Yes. Yeah, it took 18 years.
21:3118 years to write.
21:33And the second one took 18 months, and that's just...
21:36Why do you think that was?
21:37You know, with the first book, I just didn't know how to do it. And it's...
21:41So you gave yourself the space.
21:43It wasn't just that. It was mostly kind of just fumbling through the dark. And it does get easier
21:48once you know you can do it. And once you figure it out, it's like building something with your hands.
21:53There's so much construction work that goes into it that you don't know where to start. And if you
21:59weren't trained in an MFA program or a writing program, as I wasn't, you're really trying to figure
22:05things out alone. And that was one of the reasons. The second reason was I just wasn't that
22:11disciplined. I mean, this is the main reason. I wasn't that disciplined. Years went by when I
22:14didn't touch it. And I would have these visions, these fantasies that I would wake up and elves
22:21would have appeared in the middle of the night and finished it for me and magically sort of...
22:26And it would be good.
22:26And it would be good. It would be better than I could do. And they would have suctioned everything
22:29from my subconscious and somehow magically put it on the page. That never happened,
22:34obviously. And, you know, but the third reason was the character in the book, the protagonist in
22:39the book is an older man. And when I look back at early drafts now, I spent a lot of
22:43time trying
22:44to guess at what an old man sounded like. And it wasn't good. I mean, it was very florid language.
22:50And it was sort of verging on the Baroque. And it was the ideas I had about what it meant
22:55to be old.
22:56When you're 20, you just don't know. Even if you can imagine it, you can't really project it in a
23:01sense. And so it was better that I waited. And it was better that I waited as well. And I
23:06always tell
23:06young writers this. If you publish your book when you're older, and I was 38, when my first book came
23:12out, you already know who you are. This idea of defining yourself as an author, as a writer. If you
23:18can't say who else you are by that point, if you don't have some other identity, if you don't have
23:24something in life that gives you satisfaction, you're sunk. I mean, then publishing a book is
23:28not going to help you. It's not going to make you feel any better. You better know who you are
23:33by
23:33that point. And for all, I think, artists who, I also say this to make myself feel better, because I
23:38was middle age. But for all artists...
23:4138 is not middle age.
23:42It is technically middle age. But for all artists who find their first success, however you want to
23:47to find that very young, it's a mixed blessing. And it's sometimes better to have gone through the
23:54humility of waiting.
23:55I think it's interesting that you already had a successful career as a magazine editor and magazine
24:00writer, and that you felt the confidence to actually pursue these books. And these are not light books.
24:07Both books actually carry pretty heavy emotional material and themes. There's sexual abuse, there's
24:15recovery, there's pedophilia, there's disease, you know, but let's talk about A Little Life. How has
24:21that book changed your life? And tell me why you wanted to write it.
24:24I don't know why I wanted to write it. I just knew I wanted to. And that's such an unsatisfying
24:30answer. But I just knew I had these characters in me. And it's about four, it's about four male
24:35friends in New York who aged from this is my standard pitch for it, but who aged from 25 through
24:41their
24:41mid 50s. And I had probably had before the actual writing began in my head for maybe five years,
24:49and I think for many artists of all stripes, it takes really realizing that the stuff that floats
24:55around in your subconscious all the time that follows you from work to home, may actually be
25:01part of something greater. And the moment you put those pieces together, is the moment you begin the
25:07work, whether it's a painting or a composition or a novel in this case. How has it changed my life?
25:13The most significant and meaningful way for me is that it has allowed me to meet people I never would
25:20have met. And that sounds, it sounds a little pat, but it really has. I mean, there is, you know,
25:25by the time you're in your 40s, and you've been in a specific career your entire adult life,
25:31the number of people you're going to meet and the kinds of people you're going to meet are pretty
25:35much set. You've probably met them, you know, you've met your friends, you've met your friends
25:39of friends, you know, you've met your colleagues, you've met your, you know, we met really late.
25:44Yes, but because we were introduced, you know, and the reason we were introduced is because,
25:49you know, we had someone who went out of his way to do it. But those are sort of happy,
25:54kind of one offs, you don't get exposed to a completely different group of people that often,
26:00unless you move cities, or you switch careers, or you move countries, it takes a big life
26:05event. And the thing that this book has done for me is it is a bundling together of moving to
26:11a
26:11different country, and moving to a different career, it has allowed me to meet people I never
26:18would have had contact with, and I never would have been able to meet as a magazine editor in New
26:23York,
26:24who've been living here for, you know, X number of years. And that's been a great gift. And some of
26:28them have become friends. And that has really been the most surprising and unexpected part of this
26:36publication. And, you know, the book wasn't expected to, to do well. So
26:41How does that discussion come up?
26:44Well, you know, I mean,
26:45Does your agent just hit you down and say, so listen?
26:50Well,
26:50Don't get your hopes up.
26:52Well, yes. I mean, she didn't even need to say it, because my first book didn't do well.
26:55And so it wasn't even a foregone conclusion that my editor of my first book would buy this book.
27:00And so, you know, I didn't even know if it would be published. So, you know, and then when it
27:05was,
27:06when it finally made its way towards publication, it was a very small print run, a very small first
27:10edition. We asked 20 people for blurbs, they all said no.
27:14What a story.
27:15Well, you know, so it wasn't, it didn't have high hopes. And so it built very organically,
27:19and over a long period of time. And that was the other kind of, you know, midlife surprise of this
27:24book that to have something that was discovered reader by reader, and that didn't have a machine
27:31behind it, has been gratifying. And I mean, more than gratifying. I mean, it's, it's the honor and
27:37the humility of it is something that I remember daily, you know, I used to work in book publishing,
27:42it happens for so few writers, and for so few writers who deserve it so much, because there's
27:47such beautiful, wonderful writers, and you want it for them. But it just doesn't. So much of life is
27:53is luck. And, you know, and timing, but mostly luck. And if you don't believe it, then you haven't
28:00been an author or an artist of any kind. It's it's really about luck.
28:04But why do you think the story struck a chord now? Because I think that the fact that neither of
28:09your
28:09books really have strong female protagonists. And I think that a lot of the interviews with you
28:16orbited around this discussion around like writing about men, as a woman, but why do you think the
28:22relationship between these poor friends, and particularly the, you know, the difficult
28:27abuse races, you know, you said earlier that part of Good Fortune is timing, I think there are certain
28:34times when a novel, without the novelist knowing it will hit something right at the right moment in
28:40the culture. And it just it occasionally happens. And, you know, the writer thinks is very lucky,
28:45but typically, it's, it's not anything, you know, she's done, it just is luck. And when this book was
28:53published in 2015, there were the beginnings of the first conversations about, I think, what it meant
28:59to be a man, what it meant to be a woman, what, you know, the first conversation, early conversations
29:04in the mainstream about being trans were coming up, which, you know, led to greater conversations
29:09about gender, the conversations about about sexual abuse, particularly of men, were more foregrounded
29:16than they had been before. This idea of how people live these days, you know, if you didn't have a
29:22conventional family, if you didn't have a conventional marriage, if you were single, this idea of making a
29:29family made of friends, these were all things that had existed, of course, before, but you saw them more
29:34and more in the culture, just sort of bubbling up, frothing up. And I think part of the reason,
29:39of course, if I knew, then, you know, if publishers knew, then, then everything would, would do well,
29:43but they don't know, is that it just sort of hit at that particular moment, just at the cusp of
29:49the
29:49conversations we're having now. And so I think that was, that was part of it. You know, the other thing
29:54is, I think it was a very long, immersive, old fashioned Dickensian book, in an age of auto fiction,
30:02or meta fiction, in which the narrator of the book is some sort of stand in for the novelist,
30:07him or herself, like Nausgard, and, and to a certain extent, Foyer, and there are many, many
30:12others. And this was the antithesis of those books. And so it felt sort of like a sore thumb,
30:19I think, in a way. And yet, for people, I think, who wanted something more traditional and more
30:25old fashioned, you know, the book is completely unironic, it's completely self serious, it's completely
30:30sincere. And I think it offered a different sort of voice in the culture at large, I think. I mean,
30:36these are my theories, but we'll never know, really. I mean, why do you think I'd be interested?
30:41I mean, I think that it's the same kind of thing I was talking about in 2005. It's like,
30:47I think people were ready for it. I think that maybe there was a sort of hesitance about writing
30:51about such serious material, especially, you know, relating to men, because I don't think we'd ever
30:56really seen it before. It was, it was easier to write about women being abused. And I don't really
31:01know what that says about our culture. But I think that it was, maybe, refreshing is not the right
31:07word. I think that sounds trite. But I think there was something, it was challenging material that I
31:13think people were ready for and needed, you know, in order to open up discussions that weren't really
31:17happening, maybe at that time.
31:19I've heard from many men about this book, and some of whom tell me things they've not told
31:25people before. And I just think, God, we're really failing as a society if young men, you know,
31:32men in their 20s were growing up, maybe much less men in their 40s and 50s and 60s, and didn't
31:37feel
31:37that they could say to someone, I've been abused, or I've been hurt, because they felt it would make
31:42them less of a man. I mean, that means that we failed as a collective society.
31:48No, I agree. I want to ask a practical question.
31:50Tell me.
31:51I find it really challenging to write in my journal every day, let alone actually spend
31:56meaningful time working on essays or working on my own writing, which is, which is a little
32:01bit sad, you know, because we're we both have such demanding jobs. But how do you discipline
32:06yourself? What is your writing practice like? And like, what are your what are your sort of
32:10rituals? I mean, I want to know about your snacks, I want to know about your hours. I know that
32:14you
32:14have a very kind of specific way of patterns that you like to follow. But tell me about that.
32:20Well, I don't go out at night. I mean, I really don't. I go out once a week with a
32:24friend and
32:25the same friend, the same friend, and we go out every Friday.
32:28I love that. And then
32:29do you go to the same place?
32:30We go to usually this one of the three places. And if it's for work, if I have to go,
32:35then I'll go.
32:36But other than that, I don't go out at night. And everyone knows it. And when I took this job,
32:40I, you know, I said to my managing editor, I'm not going to go out at night. I'm just and
32:43I said to
32:44that to the publisher, too, I won't go out.
32:45I've never thought of actually like saying that.
32:47Yeah, I mean, you can really do it. And it's and people, people say, Okay, I mean, they're a
32:52little, you'll get a little bit of pushback. But after, you know, we accommodate ourselves to other
32:58people's schedules all the time. And this is this is a pretty understandable one. So when I was writing
33:03A Little Life, I wrote every night from 9pm to midnight, Monday through Thursday, and I wasn't
33:08Why 9pm?
33:09Well, you know, I went to the gym at night then. And so I got back.
33:13Oh, my God, you have so much energy at night.
33:14No, I don't really. But I didn't. It wasn't it wasn't a good solution. Now I go to the gym
33:18in the
33:19morning. And, you know, and then I would work on the weekend six hours a day. That's not possible
33:23anymore for various reasons, mostly because I'm older and tired. But I do really keep the nights open.
33:30And that's the only way to do it. For practical advice, you know, a publisher I know,
33:35gave excellent advice, which I think is really helpful. He said, you should either write 2000
33:41words a week or 5000 words a month. And by the end of the year, even if you even if
33:46you hit your
33:47lowest goal, so 5000 words, you'll end up with almost a full length first draft of a typical
33:52novels, 80,000 words, 90,000 words. And I thought that was really useful advice, especially for people
33:57who are trained as journalists, because we're used to hitting word counts, gives you structure.
34:01Exactly. So it's not about hours. It's not about pages. It's about words. It's and
34:04it doesn't mean that you have to write every day, although some people find that useful.
34:08It doesn't mean that you have to write for a certain number of hours, it means you have to
34:12hit that number. And you have to hit it in any sort of combination. And that I think is really
34:17and it takes sort of the anxiety and the specialness of writing out. It's a numbers game in the end.
34:23It's about finishing. And I always say this, and it sounds so trite, but you will never get published
34:28if you don't finish. And I've known wonderful writers, and they're not published because they didn't
34:33finish. You just said the only difference between a good writer and a published writer is finishing.
34:39That's really good advice. Finishing is hard.
34:42Finishing is hard. But the other good thing about writing is unlike acting, unlike dancing,
34:46you can be as old as you want. I mean, it's one of the only art form, commercial art forms,
34:52where there is no age limit, and you can do it at any time.
34:55You actually spoke in your, I'm going to read it actually from your letter from the editor,
34:59because I think it's really poignant. And it has a lot to do with the issue of race and diversity
35:03in the fashion industry right now. I find the shows moving for another reason as well. It's here that
35:09the industry announces not just to itself, but to everyone watching what it thinks an arresting
35:13woman looks like. The runway has far too long been either timid or fickle in expanding that definition
35:19and guilty of treating non-white models as either disposable or as trends. But Asian, Black, Middle
35:25Eastern and Latina women aren't gimmicks. And finally, their presence is becoming less a stunt
35:31and more a matter of fact. And you put a really, really beautiful black woman on the cover.
35:37Tell me about that choice. And tell me about like what you feel your responsibility is in this.
35:43Well, you know, when I came in, I said, I told the fashion team, and they had no problems with
35:47this,
35:47but it took a while for the casting directors to respond, I think. Whenever there was a question,
35:52I wanted a model of color. And in this issue, in the fall women's issue, the entire well is women
35:59of color. And most of the women in the front of the book stories are women of color as well.
36:03And there are many different types of women of color. And so when I saw Adesawa, who's our cover
36:08model, it was at a Prada show, I thought, my God, who is that? I mean, she's just such a
36:14beautiful
36:14woman. And she has this very long neck and this very erect posture. And I just thought that she was
36:21one of the most beautiful things I'd seen in a long time. And, you know, she's also an interesting
36:26person. You know, her parents are scientists. She's older. She's 30. She was in university when
36:31she was discovered. She just is the kind of face that I would like to look at and learn more
36:37about.
36:37And so it's something that the reason I didn't want to call out in the editor's letter that the
36:41entire well is women of color is because it's not a stunt issue. It's something that I'm committed to
36:47doing issue after issue. And it shouldn't be something that we should receive congratulations
36:51for. It should just be a different way of thinking about what a beautiful woman is. And if it feels
36:59like work, then it's not really true for you. Then you don't really believe that beauty can be found
37:05in many different forms and in many different colors. Because it should be as natural as breathing
37:10to think that.
37:11Amen, Hanya.
37:13Thanks, Christine.
37:13Hanya, it has been such a pleasure having you on Unstyled.
37:16Christine, thank you so much.
37:18Thank you so much for making the time.
37:19No, it was a privilege. Thank you so much.
37:21And I'll look forward to seeing you at Fashion Week.
37:23I'll see you soon.
37:24Okay.
37:24Okay. Bye.
37:25Bye.
37:33I hope you're inspired after hearing Hanya's story. For even more Unstyled extras, check out
37:39Refinery29 or my Instagram at Christine Barbaric. You can also join the
37:43conversation using the hashtag Unstyled across your social media. And of course, we'd be infinitely
37:49grateful if you'd please subscribe to the Unstyled podcast on Apple Podcasts and rate us while
37:54you're there. You can head to Refinery29.com to find this episode and more and make sure to sign
38:00up for our exclusive Unstyled newsletter delivered straight to your inbox every week. Our show today
38:06was executive produced by Bridget Todd, associate produced by Rebecca Easley, and edited by Priscilla
38:11Menna. Copy support was provided by Kelsey Miller. Our theme music today is by the artist
38:17Koff, and we recorded Unstyled with Paul Ruist at Argo Studios. We'll see you back here next
38:23Monday for a conversation with model and body positivity activist Tess Holliday on upending
38:29the attitudes and industry of size inclusivity. See you then.