My assignment was to answer this question: “Do you have a method for teaching or guiding what we often call the “nut graf?” The request came from Jacqui Banaszynski, editor of Nieman Storyboard. She and I are old newsroom … Read more
With the summer of 2021 drawing to an end, Mike Wilson, the deputy sports editor in charge of enterprise and investigations at The New York Times, wanted to celebrate the season (it seemed COVID might be … Read more
For many Americans, COVID news has joined the thrum of everyday life. But Charles Pierce warned readers in a recent newsletter the crisis shouldn’t be allowed to be part of the wallpaper. It should shriek like a siren — … Read more
Science journalist Ed Yong of The Atlantic has earned the reputation as one of, if not the, top chroniclers of the COVID-19 pandemic. He won the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for explanatory reporting with a series of in-depth pieces … Read more
When ProPublica health policy reporter Lizzie Presser tackles a new national story, she follows the dictum of essayist E.B. White: “Don’t write about Man; write about a man.” So when she and her editor, Alexandra Zayas, wondered if using … Read more
Stories about grief can shape themselves into as many forms as grief itself. And when grief is multiplied by several people and 20 years, it splinters and reforms again and again. After the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, people found … Read more
In “The Art of Description: World into Word,” Mark Doty writes that Proust endeavored to “dilate the sentence toward its outer limit, so that one would feel the blur of space and time that the unit of syntax … Read more
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the first of three annotated chapters that follow a grieving man’s journey into artificial intelligence to reconnect with his dead lover, and find some peace. You can read Chapter 2, “Life,” and … Read more
EDITOR’S NOTE: Read an interview with ProPublica’s editors about how to submit a successful pitch to the Local Reporting Network. When writing his style of investigative stories, Max Blau considers narrative first. His signature pieces are … Read more
EDITOR’S NOTE: The report released this week by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change does not equivocate: Global warming is real, human-caused, catastrophic — and leaves a narrowing window to address it. In light of that, Storyboard … Read more
