When I first discovered that Earl Shaffer — the first man acknowledged to have hiked the entire 2,200-mile Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine — lived nearby, I went through his brother John Shaffer with an interview request. It … Read more
Aldo Leopold’s “A Sand County Almanac” turns 70 this year. At a time when writing about ecological emergency is emotionally and politically fraught, the “Almanac” is a balm of wisdom and reverence for nature. And few essays have … Read more
There are known news conventions: something happens and someone writes about it and somebody publishes it and then maybe people talk about it. There are known narrative conventions: a relatable protagonist confronts a complication and, through time and … Read more
Before anyone could even unfold the tree pulp, The New York Times Magazine wanted readers to know the magnitude of the story it had taken on. Editor Jake Silverstein announced on Twitter that the Aug. 5, 2018, print issue … Read more
Editor’s note: We have written about Tom Junod’s 1998 Esquire profile of Mister Rogers before. The release of the documentary film, and the climate of the times, prompted us to revisit a piece that has now become a classic. Read more
The lede came to David Grann a year before he would complete his epic story and a year after the events it describes: “The man felt like a speck in the frozen nothingness. Every direction he turned he could see … Read more
When Jack Hitt got an assignment to write about Jerry Foster, a daredevil helicopter pilot who worked for a TV station in Phoenix in the ’70s and ’80s, he thought he had a plum adventure story. It turned out to … Read more
As far as Terry DeMio knows, she’s the only journalist in the country with the title “heroin reporter.” She’s been covering the opioid epidemic for The Cincinnati Enquirer for five years, including two on the beat full time. Yet DeMio … Read more
In the opening of Maurice Chammah’s story “The Accusation,” jointly published by Esquire and The Marshall Project, we meet Katie Spencer Tetz, a 25-year-old woman who learns that her father is getting out prison. He’s been locked up for … Read more
The story of the woman called Lola begins and ends with ashes. Ashes that “filled a plastic box about the size of a toaster.” Ashes sheltered in a canvas tote bag from a suburb north of tech-hip Seattle to a … Read more
