Author

Jacqui Banaszynski

@JacquiB

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.

"During six Sundays, he never varied his routine, faithful as a migratory mallard, his route taking him through a neighborhood of apartments that all seemed to be dying of boredom."

“During six Sundays, he never varied his routine, faithful as a migratory mallard, his route taking him through a neighborhood of apartments that all seemed to be dying of boredom.”

Sometimes a sentence stops me for reasons I can’t entirely explain, or even defend. Often it includes a moment of description or metaphor that teases out a personal memory, or…
August 15, 2018
"I think of myself as a humble student trying to get better and just lucky to still be getting chances to do it.”

“I think of myself as a humble student trying to get better and just lucky to still be getting chances to do it.”

Why it’s so great: This isn’t a particularly elegant sentence. It may even come across as disingenuous – a popular, successful Hollywood actor who, at 65, still claims to be…
August 9, 2018
"What is beyond grief?"

“What is beyond grief?”

Why is this great?  Writers wade into the world to witness it in all its dimensions, then remake it in the hieroglyphics we know as words – marks we use…
August 1, 2018
Learning to read: The daily news as information and inspiration

Learning to read: The daily news as information and inspiration

Editor’s note: Our third Shop Class – part of our Story Craft posts – grew out of breaking news stories and blogs that offer rich lessons on how to do the…
July 27, 2018
"But the sea, too, took its toll."

“But the sea, too, took its toll.”

Why it’s great: Deadline reporting of natural disasters is a tightrope walk. Too little drama and events are reduced to factoids that don’t take hold in the readers’ mind or…
July 25, 2018
Learning to see: A landscape of ice, a blind boy's eyes, a grizzly bear and a wall stain

Learning to see: A landscape of ice, a blind boy’s eyes, a grizzly bear and a wall stain

Editor’s note: This is our second edition of Shop Class, a new Story Craft feature. The goal is to break down the work that goes into creating stories, and offer prompts or…
July 25, 2018

“She’s just telling what’s real out there that she sees.”

Why it’s so great: Tyler is a novelist, not a journalist. But the work of writing is the work of writing. In this New York Times profile by Charles McGrath  –…
July 11, 2018
"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances."

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

American flag, somewhere over Lake Superior off the shore of Bayfield, WisconsinWhat makes it great? Forgive the indulgence of the great-granddaughter of immigrants, and the decidedly American nature of this…
July 4, 2018
"You can't hit or write your way out of a shadow."

“You can’t hit or write your way out of a shadow.”

Maryland Capital Gazette editor Rob HiassenWhy is this so great? Before we get to that, let me say I wish I had not had reason to stumble across it. The…
June 29, 2018
Learning to see beyond first sight

Learning to see beyond first sight

Editor’s note: We are trying out a new feature. Call it writing practice (with a nod to Natalie Goldberg’s “Writing Down the Bones,” where I first encountered the term). Or…
June 28, 2018