Sarah Mesle

Sarah Mesle (PhD, Northwestern) is faculty at USC and Senior Humanities Editor at the Los Angeles Review of Books. Prior to arriving at USC, she held postdoctoral fellowships in English at the University of Michigan and the University of California, Los Angeles. She is a 19th-century Americanist by training and is interested, generally speaking, in the long history of the American popular novel and in the many ways pop culture can excite, estrange, and surprise.

With Sarah Blackwood, she is co-editor of Avidly.org. You can follow her on Twitter.

Articles

The Heirs and Their Hair: On HBO’s “House of the Dragon”
Sarah Mesle assesses the first season of HBO’s “Game of Thrones” spinoff, “House of the Dragon.”
Sarah MesleOct 24, 2022
- Dear Television
- Television
Flick and Feather: On Diana’s Hair
Sarah Mesle reckons with what Diana's hair, in Spencer and in real life, says about feminism, power, whiteness, and princesses
Sarah MesleNov 11, 2021
- Dear Television
- Film
Academic Affects: A Conversation on Guilty Pleasures
Sarah Mesle talks with Arielle Zibrak, Ana Quiring, and Kyla Wazana Tompkins about the “bad” feelings of aesthetic experience.
Sarah MesleMay 18, 2021
- Cultural Studies
Dickinson's Hair
For Dear Television, Sarah Mesle explores the follicular politics of gender, race, and poetics on Apple TV+'s revisionist fantasy Dickinson.
Sarah MesleJan 21, 2021
- Dear Television
Her Sentimental Properties
White women have trafficked in Black women’s milk.
Sarah MesleJun 22, 2020
Dear Television vs The Psychometric Personality Quiz
We took that Psychometric Statistical "Which Character" Personality Quiz, and we're not happy. And, come to think of it, who are *we* at all?
Jane Hu, Jorge Cotte, Phillip Maciak, Sarah MesleApr 7, 2020
- Dear Television
Good Crumb: On The Great British Bake Off
For Dear Television, Sarah Mesle talks rough puffs, proving drawers, self-saucing puddings, and The Great British Bake Off in the age of Brexit.
Sarah MesleSep 13, 2019
- Dear Television
A Television of Her Own: On Emily Nussbaum
Dear Television's Sarah Mesle considers Emily Nussbaum as a feminist critic and a chronicler of the televisual cult of seriousness.
Sarah MesleAug 30, 2019
- Dear Television
Game of Thrones: Season 8, "The Iron Throne"
For Dear Television, Aaron Bady and Sarah Mesle consider the new occupant of the Iron Throne and what got them there and ask, "But why, though?"
Aaron Bady, Sarah MesleMay 20, 2019
- Dear Television
Game of Thrones: Season 8, "The Bells"
For Dear Television, Aaron Bady, Sarah Mesle, and Phil Maciak consider the relative madness of the queen(s) on Game of Thrones.
Aaron Bady, Phillip Maciak, Sarah MesleMay 13, 2019
- Dear Television
Game of Thrones: Season 8, "The Last of the Starks"
For Dear Television, Aaron Bady and Sarah Mesle check in with the last of the Starks on the day after the long night in Westeros.
Aaron Bady, Sarah MesleMay 6, 2019
- Dear Television
Game of Thrones: Season 8, "The Long Night"
Dear Television's Aaron Bady, Sarah Mesle, and Phil Maciak reluctantly celebrate all the characters who survived "The Long Night," they guess.
Aaron Bady, Phillip Maciak, Sarah MesleApr 29, 2019
- Dear Television
Game of Thrones: Season 8, "A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms"
Dear Television's Aaron Bady and Sarah Mesle talk about all the listening and learning going on in "A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms."
Aaron Bady, Sarah MesleApr 22, 2019
- Dear Television
Game of Thrones: Season 8, "Winterfell"
Dear Television's Aaron Bady and Sarah Mesle dramatically reunite to discuss "Winterfell" and why it's a dumb idea for Game of Thrones to ever really end.
Aaron Bady, Sarah MesleApr 15, 2019
- Dear Television
American Studies Takes Care: An Interview with ASA President Roderick Ferguson
Sarah Mesle interviews ASA President Roderick Ferguson about this year's upcoming ASA conference, "States of Emergence."
Sarah MesleNov 6, 2018
- Cultural Studies
Meg Murry’s Glasses
Sarah Mesle on how Madeleine L’Engle’s and Ava DuVernay’s "A Wrinkle in Time" diverge around their contrasting ethics of the visual.
Sarah MesleMar 19, 2018
- Film
- Young Adult & Children’s Literature