This week, Knopf published Thomas Chatterton Williams’s Summer of Our Discontent: The Age of Certainty and the Demise of Discourse, a re-examination of the tumultuous season that followed the murder of George Floyd. I asked Williams about that moment, the war in Gaza, the new threats to free speech, and the future prospects of the Democratic Party.
ASH CARTER: Five years ago, we spoke in these pages about the Harper’s letter in defense of free speech, which you helped organize. One of the main criticisms you received then was “Why now?” Many people might be wondering the same thing about the timing of your new book, which arrives eight months into the blitzkrieg of Donald Trump’s radical and seemingly lawless second term. So I’ll start by asking you the same question: Why now?
