menu_open Columnists
We use cookies to provide some features and experiences in QOSHE

More information  .  Close

While Others Downsize Literary Coverage into Oblivion, We’re Launching a Books Section

30 0
19.06.2026

Fact-based journalism that sparks the Canadian conversation

Articles Business Environment Health Politics Arts & Culture Society

Special Series Hope You’re Well For the Love of the Game Living Rooms In Other Worlds: A Space Exploration Terra Cognita More special series >

For the Love of the Game

In Other Worlds: A Space Exploration

More special series >

Events The Walrus Talks The Walrus Video Room The Walrus Leadership Roundtables The Walrus Leadership Forums Article Club

The Walrus Video Room

The Walrus Leadership Roundtables

The Walrus Leadership Forums

Subscribe Renew your subscription Change your address Magazine Issues Newsletters Podcasts

Renew your subscription

The Walrus Lab Hire The Walrus Lab Amazon First Novel Award

Amazon First Novel Award

While Others Downsize Literary Coverage into Oblivion, We’re Launching a Books Section

More reassessments, more polemics, more manifestos, more feuding!

IF YOU’VE BEEN following us online, you’ve likely noticed our aggressive pivot toward politics and breaking news coverage. Partly, it was an overdue overhaul for a media landscape that, from search engine optimization to aggregators, has reshaped itself around hard news. Partly, it was about meeting the national mood. Blame Trump. Alarm over Canadian sovereignty has produced a surge of interest in how the country works—or doesn’t. Readers are nerding out on industrial policy debates they would have skipped just a few years ago. Somewhat improbably, the civic nuts and bolts of institutional life have become a kind of clickbait.

But even as our audience has embraced this shift in commissioning—engagement has never been higher—we’re faced with the question of what a current affairs magazine should even look like in this moment. For a long time, The Walrus allowed itself to drift into something closer to a literary journal: reflective, essayistic, stylish, largely insulated from the forces actually shaping everyday life. There........

© The Walrus