Articles

“Before the aurora borealis appears, the sensitive needles of compasses all over the world are restless for hours, agitating on their pins in airplanes and ships, trembling in desk drawers, in attics, in boxes on shelves.”

Why is it great? I admire the way Dillard turns a piece of natural science into a narrative of anticipation during which no human being makes an entrance.  The aurora…
November 15, 2017
Roy Peter Clark
How to get the attention of a senior editor at Smithsonian Magazine

How to get the attention of a senior editor at Smithsonian Magazine

Jennie Rothenberg Gritz says of story pitches she accepts: "There has to be something surprising and narratively interesting there."
November 14, 2017
Katia Savchuk
5(ish) Questions: Holly Gleason and "Woman Walk the Line: How the Women of Country Music Changed Our Lives"

5(ish) Questions: Holly Gleason and “Woman Walk the Line: How the Women of Country Music Changed Our Lives”

The editor of the new anthology talks about the joys of being subversive and using country music to talk about female empowerment
November 9, 2017
Kari Howard

“Taught from their infancy that beauty is woman’s sceptre, the mind shapes itself to the body, and roaming round its gilt cage, only seeks to adorn its prison.”

Why is it great? Take a look at the publication date: 1792. That’s more than two centuries ago, and two things are remarkable about this fact. 1) That Wollstonecraft, the…
November 8, 2017
Kari Howard
5(ish) Questions: Patsy Sims and "The Stories We Tell: Classic True Tales by America's Greatest Women Journalists"

5(ish) Questions: Patsy Sims and “The Stories We Tell: Classic True Tales by America’s Greatest Women Journalists”

The anthology, which includes Joan Didion and Lillian Ross, puts a deserved spotlight on female writers (and perhaps will give Gay Talese a few ideas when he's next asked about…
November 7, 2017
Kari Howard
For Halloween week, supernatural podcasts and the haunting of Joan Didion

For Halloween week, supernatural podcasts and the haunting of Joan Didion

A weekly roundup of some favorite things, for your reading and listening pleasure
November 3, 2017
Kari Howard
The Joan Didion documentary: a nephew's loving portrait of "a cool customer"

The Joan Didion documentary: a nephew’s loving portrait of “a cool customer”

The Netflix film is touching but not sentimental, revealing her ability to be a seemingly dispassionate observer -- as a reporter and also a grieving widow
November 2, 2017
Kari Howard
This American Afterlife: Aaron Mahnke and the spooky podcast (and TV show) "Lore"

This American Afterlife: Aaron Mahnke and the spooky podcast (and TV show) “Lore”

The creator of the hugely popular true-life scary stories talks about his love for the supernatural and getting listeners to follow him down dark tunnels
October 31, 2017
Julia Shipley

“Then away out in the woods I heard that kind of a sound that a ghost makes when it wants to tell about something that’s on its mind and can’t make itself understood, and so can’t rest easy in its grave, and has to go about that way every night grieving.”

Why is it great? For Halloween, I decided to use this wonderfully spooky line from Mark Twain (who in his writing and his speaking was a true master of the…
October 30, 2017
Kari Howard
Nikole Hannah-Jones on reporting about racial inequality: "What drives me is rage"

Nikole Hannah-Jones on reporting about racial inequality: “What drives me is rage”

At the Power of Storytelling conference, the writer talks about Charlottesville and entrenched racism that reaches back 400 years in America
October 26, 2017
Kari Howard