Articles

“It’s a little facile, maybe, and certainly hard to implement, but I’d say, as a goal in life, you could do worse than: Try to be kinder.”

—George Saunders, commencement speech at Syracuse University, 2013
June 7, 2017
Kari Howard
In Arab world, an ancient tradition of oral storytelling gets a 21st century spin

In Arab world, an ancient tradition of oral storytelling gets a 21st century spin

In the past, "hakawati" would recount legends or fables; today, Moth-like events often tackle social issues or process trauma from war
June 6, 2017
Abby Sewell
5(ish) Questions: Dana Priest and the "terrorism industrial complex" post 9/11

5(ish) Questions: Dana Priest and the “terrorism industrial complex” post 9/11

The investigative journalist and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner reflects on 30 years at The Washington Post and navigating national security concerns
June 1, 2017
Jessica Buchleitner

“He had gone into another room, to where the buffet was, after he had watched the 12 rounds when he was the heavyweight champeen of the world, back in that last indelible summer when America dared yet dream that it could run and hide from the world, when the handsomest boy loved the prettiest girl, when streetcars still clanged and fistfights were fun, and the smoke hung low when Maggie went off to Paradise.”

—Frank Deford, "The Boxer and The Blonde," Sports Illustrated, June 17, 1985
May 31, 2017
Kari Howard
5(ish) Questions: Phoebe Zerwick and "The Last Days of Darryl Hunt"

5(ish) Questions: Phoebe Zerwick and “The Last Days of Darryl Hunt”

The writer talks about how her reporting on a wrongfully convicted man changed his life -- and how she had to write the ending, however unhappy
May 30, 2017
Julie Schwietert Collazo
Notable Narrative: Ben Goldfarb and “The Deliciously Fishy Case Of The 'Codfather'"

Notable Narrative: Ben Goldfarb and “The Deliciously Fishy Case Of The ‘Codfather'”

The reporter talks about using an eye-catching narrative to tell a policy story for this Mother Jones meets Mario Puzo by way of New England article
May 25, 2017
Katia Savchuk

“Did he kill? If he did kill, I would swear that it is with this meticulous, somewhat maniacal, admirably lucid care with which he classifies his notes, drafts his papers. Did he kill? Then it is while whistling a little tune, and wearing an apron for fear of stains.”

—Colette, "Voici Landru!" Le Matin, November 8, 1921
May 24, 2017
Kari Howard
The truth must be told: a conversation with slain Mexican journalist Javier Valdez

The truth must be told: a conversation with slain Mexican journalist Javier Valdez

In this translation of a haunting interview given just months before he was gunned down, the crusading reporter talks of telling "stories of love in the midst of corpses hanging…
May 22, 2017
Ernesto Priego
Fake news and true facts, and the licenses taken in pursuit of narrative

Fake news and true facts, and the licenses taken in pursuit of narrative

All journalism is a kind of fiction, one writer argues, because of the intercession of the reporter; as our attitudes on truth and nonfiction have grown more atomized, the most…
May 18, 2017
David L. Ulin

“This will happen so fast that one night he will be in the backyard, believing it a perfect place, and by the next night he will have changed and the yard as he imagined it will be gone, and this era of his life will be behind him forever.”

—Susan Orlean, “The American Man, Age 10,” Esquire, December 1992
May 17, 2017
Kari Howard