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Ethan Gilsdorf

About

Ethan Gilsdorf is a journalist, memoirist, critic, poet, teacher and 17th level geek. He wrote the award-winning travel memoir investigation Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks: An Epic Quest for Reality Among Role Players, Online Gamers, and Other Dwellers of Imaginary Realms. Gilsdorf's articles, essays, op-eds and reviews on the arts, pop culture, film, books, gaming, geek culture and travel regularly appear in the New York Times, Boston Globe, Salon.com, BoingBoing.net, PsychologyToday.com, GeekDad, Washington Post and wired.com and dozens of other magazines, newspapers, websites and guidebooks worldwide. As an expert on geek culture, Gilsdorf frequently speaks in public, and appears on TV, radio, Internet media and in documentary films. He is a lover of ELO and a hater of littering. Sometimes he wears a tunic and chainmail, or these grampy pants. He lives in Somerville, Massachusetts.

Books by Ethan Gilsdorf
Recent Posts
What Fantasy Can Teach Us About Trauma
I waited for help to come. There was no Gandalf. There was no Dumbledore. There were no Ron and Hermione, nor Sam or Merry or even Pippin. There was just me, in a bathroom, having a panic attack.
Drawn to the Dark Side
I was never trying to make a statement about youth being a perilous time or to depress anyone. So why do I myself writing about danger, whether psychic or social?
My Pen Name, My New Personality

I would never have guessed that my pen name would develop a new identity for me—a fierier, more courageous and playful me, who writes differently under my erotic persona.

I would never have guessed that my pen name would develop a new identity for me—a fierier, more courageous and playful me, who writes differently under my erotic persona.

On Faking It: Is It Ever Okay?

It’s liberating to understand that to be successful in launching our work (or ourselves) into the world, we don’t actually have to change our personalities: We just have to fake it from time to time.

It’s liberating to understand that to be successful in launching our work (or ourselves) into the world, we don’t actually have to change our personalities: We just have to fake it from time to time.

Bring Back Food for Food's Sake

I say, let’s ramp down this notion of food as fetish, food as porn, food as adventure, food as performance, and get back to basics: Food as food, as something we eat.

I say, let’s ramp down this notion of food as fetish, food as porn, food as adventure, food as performance, and get back to basics: Food as food, as something we eat.

Of Success and Failure

Most pop-psychology looks at failure as simply the precursor to success. Failure teaches humility, relieves the anxiety of perfectionism, programs the mind to think of alternatives. But sometimes there are no alternatives.

Most pop-psychology looks at failure as simply the precursor to success. Failure teaches humility, relieves the anxiety of perfectionism, programs the mind to think of alternatives. But sometimes there are no alternatives.

Has Lego Taken Over Childhood?

Lego’s amazing innovation was always this: open-ended, creative, problem-solving play. Now, Lego encourages buying and collecting.

Lego’s amazing innovation was always this: open-ended, creative, problem-solving play. Now, Lego encourages buying and collecting.

"Earth to Echo" Echoes With Nostalgia for 80s Movies

With the exception of J.J. Abrams’ “Super 8,” which dipped its Cup of Nostalgia heavily into the same Spielbergian waters three summers ago, these sort of films don’t get made anymore.

With the exception of J.J. Abrams’ “Super 8,” which dipped its Cup of Nostalgia heavily into the same Spielbergian waters three summers ago, these sort of films don’t get made anymore.