PEN Out Loud: Lindy West and Hari Kondabolu

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Salman Rushdie and Marlon James »
Rion Amilcar Scott and Vinson Cunningham »
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Lindy West, the groundbreaking author of Shrill, is joined by comedian Hari Kondabolu (Netflix’s Warn Your Relatives) to discuss her highly anticipated new essay collection. The Witches Are Coming investigates what it means to be a woman in the #MeToo era and how we arrived at this moment of cultural reckoning.

Produced in cooperation with Symphony Space and Strand Book Store.

Lindy West is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times. She is the author of Shrill, a memoir, which has been adapted into a Hulu series starring Aidy Bryant. Her essays on feminism, social justice, body image and popular culture have been featured in Jezebel, Cosmopolitan, GQ, and on This American Life. From 2014 to 2017 she wrote a weekly political column for The Guardian. She is also the founder of I Believe You/It’s Not Your Fault, an advice blog for teenagers, as well as the reproductive rights destigmatization campaign #ShoutYourAbortion. She lives in Seattle.

Hari Kondabolu is a comedian, writer & podcaster based in Brooklyn, NY. He has been described by The New York Times as “one of the most exciting political comics in stand-up today.” In 2018, his Netflix special “Warn Your Relatives” was released and he was named one of Variety’s Top 10 Comics To Watch. Hari has released two comedy albums two albums, “Waiting for 2042” & “Mainstream American Comic” with the legendary indie rock label Kill Rock Stars. He has performed on The Late Show with David Letterman, Conan, Jimmy Kimmel Live, John Oliver’s NY Stand-Up Show, @Midnight & has his own half-hour special on Comedy Central. A former writer & correspondent on the Chris Rock produced FX TV show “Totally Biased with W. Kamau Bell.” In 2017, he released his critically acclaimed documentary “The Problem with Apu” on truTV. He co-hosted the popular “Politically Reactive” podcast with W. Kamau Bell and currently co-hosts “The Kondabolu Brothers Podcast” with his brother Ashok on Earwolf. Hari attended both Bowdoin College and Wesleyan University, graduating from the former institution with a B.A. in Comparative Politics in 2004. A former immigrant rights organizer in Seattle, Hari also earned a Masters in Human Rights from the London School of Economics in 2008. He was the NYU’s APA Institute’s “Artist in Residence” for the 2014-2015 Academic Year.