Snark: A Polemic in Seven Fits

In seven short chapters, which he calls fits, the film critic David Denby attacks snark, a knowing, mean-spirited style of insult that he argues the internet has spread through American media and politics. Denby traces the tradition from the Roman satirist Juvenal through the British magazine Private Eye and Spy in New York to the columns of Maureen Dowd, and saves his sharpest criticism for the gossip site Gawker and its founder, Nick Denton. Throughout, he separates snark from the satire and wit he admires.

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Ryan Holiday: “Ahh, I had such high hopes for this and I think the author did too. Unfortunately, I don't think he quite understood the subject on which he was writing. Snark is a very real and very important trend in American culture but anyone that thinks Bill O'Reilly is snarky (he's not, he's an jerk.”