The Hong Kong Review of Books has launched a new series of interviews with critical theorists this month. The book review site, which places a focus on ‘radical’ literature and philosophy, will run fortnightly interviews with prominent authors of new books in critical theory.

The first three interviews are live on the site now. These include Simon Critchley, talking about his new book Notes on Suicide, new MIT Press author Aaron Schuster discussing the concept of pleasure and Srecko Horvat, who has been working with Slavoj Zizek, Julian Assange and Yanis Varoufakis, analyzing love in the technological age. Next week Jodi Dean, author of Crowds and Party (featured on our ‘10 Critical Theory Books out in February‘ article) will be interviewed.

The HKRB interviewers try to ask questions which do two things. First, they aim to situate the new theoretical texts in relation to existing critical theory and discover the theoretical traditions which have most influenced new authors. Second, they aim to show the political and social relevance of critical theory today. Horvat’s interview is a good example: it includes questions about his indebtedness to Badiou, but also about Tindr, Grindr and online dating.

The interviews will sometimes be illustrated with drawings of your favorite critical theorists by talented author and artist Roy Christopher! Here are some of the illustrations already on the site, Umberto Eco, Simon Critcley and Srecko Horvat:

All the interviews can be found at the HKRB website and the best way to stay up to date with new guests is via the Facebook page.