Jacqui Banaszynski retired as the endowed Knight Chair in Editing at the Missouri School of Journalism in 2017, is editor at Nieman Storyboard, and a faculty fellow at the Poynter Institute. She won the 1988 Pulitzer Prize in feature writing for “AIDS in the Heartland,” a series about a gay farm couple facing AIDS, and was a finalist for the 1986 Pulitzer in international reporting for her account of the sub-Saharan famine.
By Jacqui Banaszynski Most of my holiday cards to people as 2023 ended came to a close were signed with this wish: Here’s to a hopeful 2024. Five days in, that hopefulness was been mightily challenged. A … Read more
By Jacqui Banaszynski One of my writing workshop wisdoms is bogarted from former colleague and longtime friend Katherine Lanpher. It first came to me when I was struggling to cobble together a last-minute keynote for some … Read more
By Jacqui Banaszynski In a companion piece, the bots channeled you, the Storyboard readers, to identify the top posts, by pageview, in 2023. It’s a strong list, and offers stories you can learn from again and again. Now I … Read more
By Jacqui Banaszynski My vexations with the bots are many. They read my mind when I enter the first few words — or letters — of a Google search. They track my phone to the dentist’s office and then … Read more
By Jacqui Banaszynski I am a Christmas person, without apology. I long ago left behind institutional religious practice. I no longer go big on decorations. But upbringing, culture and, mostly, the deep quite of solstice-time make it a feeling … Read more
EDITOR’S NOTE: As this Christmas weekend settles upon us, I reprise this little essay from two years ago as a Storyboard gift to all the storytellers and story readers/listeners/watchers out there. It was first posted Jan. 7, 2022, which seems … Read more
By Jacqui Banaszynski As I indulged in my morning obsession of scanning news headlines one day last week, I paused on something called “napkin stories.” The tease I got included a reference to actor Chris Pine — a favorite … Read more
By Jacqui Banaszynski A lot of journalists dream of having their byline on work that wins one of the top industry awards. Many long to see their name on the spine of a book. Some might even fantasy about … Read more
By Jacqui Banaszynski Storyboard does not indulge in easy click bait. But I would be foolish to ignore a legitimate opportunity to tap the drawing power of Taylor Swift. There’s this week’s news that she was named … Read more
By Jacqui Banaszynski The gratitude essay I wrote recentlyhas given back in multiples — which is how gratitude is supposed to work. I’ve received several lovely notes in response, including one from a non-writer who … Read more