Dementia — the inexorable erosion of memory that erases the mind and eventually robs the body of its most basic abilities — is growing to epidemic levels as America ages. It brings the same fear today that a cancer … Read more
While reporting for a story, sometimes journalists stop and wonder why they began telling the story in the first place and if it’s truly worth it. So did veteran New York Times reporter Ellen Barry, as she unraveled the … Read more
The number, when it landed, should have been no surprise. Even so, it held the power to shock. I spent a week bracing myself for news that the COVID death rate in the U.S. had hit 500,000 — leading … Read more
I love that feeling when a passage promises you that a story is worth sticking with. I had this experience recently when reading Wesley Morris’ profile of the late Cicely Tyson, who died last month at … Read more
Clichés are a bane of original writing. Unless you turn a worn and tired cliché on its ear (I sure hope you notice what I did just there) and make it new. Then all the meaning people attach to … Read more
When I walk in the forest, my eyes almost always scan the ground. That’s not because I fear to lose my footing, but because poking through the duff or loitering on a mossy log or squatting at the edge … Read more
About this time every year, the stories start rolling out, urging you to reset your New Year’s resolutions — and make them realistic. That’s because by this time, every year, the vast majority have already been abandoned. The sting … Read more
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is one of two posts today analyzing the power of the presidential inaugural poem delivered Jan. 20, 2020, by Amanda Gorman, and reflecting on its place in history. The one below, by Roy Peter Clark, is cross-posted … Read more
Worthy books are released almost every day. No doubt more than a few authors bemoaned the publication of their hard work this past year, when so much of the world’s attention was distracted by a lethal pandemic and lethal … Read more
Oh, to study those yellowed pages, with words pecked by a typewriter, then crossed out and scribbled over and typed on more pages. To marvel at those scrapbooks — more than two dozen of them — holding clips dating … Read more