What Has JBS Been Reading?

Jason Nojas

Culture Quasher

What has JBS been reading? 

Recently, the Tripod was fortunate enough to sit down with President Joanne Berger-Sweeney and ask the elusive question that no one else has asked in her 11 year presidency: What book are you reading? The question is one that JBS posed at several different speaking engagements in an effort to engage with students and spark deep and meaningful intellectual conversation. What a mystery why no Trinity student has asked before! 

In order to meet with the elusive Berger-Sweeney to ask this pressing question, we met at her office. Staff were given directions with a disappearing ink map and guided by candlelight by cloaked figures. 

President Berger-Sweeney greeted the Tripod team with a grimace, saying “Oh… you’re here I guess.” As we began the interview, we got to ask the central pressing question: What are you reading? Before giving us her answer, she had her interviewers guess. “Meditations by Marcus Areulus?” I asked. “Close!” said President Berger Sweeney before revealing a copy of Fifty Shades of Grey. “I read it for the impressive narrative and political philosophy” she tells the Tripod. 

As it turns out, Berger-Sweeney is no stranger to the genre. Instead of office hours, she dedicates her afternoons to Wattpad fanfiction. With over 30,000 monthly readers, she is a top writer on both AO3 and Wattpad, specializing in fanfictions about The Hunger Games, Wicked (the 2024 film specifically), and Supernatural. 

“I used to read stuff like The Culture of Narcissism and Man’s Search for Meaning. Then I realized, who am I trying to impress? Certainly not you losers.” Inspired by BookTok and Colleen Hoover, President Joanne Berger-Sweeney’s shift from highbrow literature to trashy romance began over quarantine in 2020. Her collection of Madeline Albright biographies and social theory books now sits in a dusty box under her desk to be brought out for display when the Board of Trustees visits biannually. “It feels so good to be free from these literary expectations,” the president confessed. “Now, I get to read enemies to lovers slowburns instead of all that cultural BS.”

“Really?” I questioned. Here, the interview almost turned sour. “When’s the last time you read a book, huh? God forbid a woman has taste.” JBS sniped in our exclusive Tripod interview. 

After retiring from Trinity, Berger-Sweeney hopes to move forward with this path. She is currently in talks to co-author a book with Nicholas Sparks through Grand Central Publishing. Blake Lively will star in the movie adaptation in 2029.