Writer · Teacher · Strategist · Austin, TX

Jacob Clifton

Jacob Clifton is a writer, cultural critic, and teacher based in Austin, Texas. He spent fifteen years as a flagship staff writer at Television Without Pity — one of the most widely-read TV criticism sites of its era — and has contributed to Tor.com/Reactor, the Austin Chronicle, BuzzFeed News, Vulture, and Science and Discovery Channel. He is the founder of A Rough Trade Writing School, where he teaches creative writing, craft, and editorial strategy to working writers at every stage. His novels and short fiction are available through Stag + Birch. For content strategy, editorial consulting, and 1:1 writing coaching, visit Clifton Creative.

There’s a version of this sentence that’s been true since 2000: some number of people on the internet have strong feelings about how I think about television.

That number was once a million readers a week, back when Television Without Pity was the place people went to find out what a show was actually doing — not just what happened, but why it mattered, and what it cost, and what it meant that you couldn’t look away. I was there for fourteen years.

Since then: Gawker, Tribune Media, Reactor Magazine, the Austin Chronicle. A writing school that is also a little bit a coven. A Patreon. A collection of novellas. A card deck. A husband named Jason and two dogs who have opinions.

The work is the same work it always was. The tools have just gotten better. And stranger.