Laura Kipnis and the Modern Man

Cultural commentator Laura Kipnis is one of our sharpest surveyors of sexual politics and gender relations. She's written bracingly about porn, femininity and feminism, self-deception and scandal, love and marriage… So why'd it take her so long to get around to the subject of men and masculinity? Actually, Laura's been writing about and puzzling over guys—and her relationship to them—for years, and now she's collected some of her best essays on the topic in her book "Men: Notes from an Ongoing Investigation." We talked about male anxiety, male power, male excess, her own envy of men and her sometimes confused expectations of them. Also the challenges of self-exploration and self-revelation in writing, and what to wear when you meet Larry Flynt.