There are two stories from the immediate aftermath of Sept. 11, 2001, that to me remain better than all the others. R.W. Apple wrote a news analysis that ran on the front of the New York Times on Sept. Read more
For one thing, it’s 42,535 words long. This lets you know that you’re into Serious Business right there, before you even get started. Then comes the opening, torn straight from a 19th-century adventure novel and refracted through a cyberpunk prism: … Read more
Magic and writing tricks differ in at least one happy way: A writing trick’s delights only increase once you see through the sleight of hand. In “Inhaling the Spore,” writing about a visit to a very peculiar museum, Lawrence … Read more
It’s hard to think of a single magazine piece that exerts as world-historical an influence upon its genre as Gay Talese’s “Frank Sinatra Has a Cold,” the 1966 Esquire profile that redefined the way that long-form journalists write … Read more
A few years ago, a bunch of us were sitting around the front porch of this crumpled old resort in the Catskills, knocking back drinks and talking shop. I can’t remember how it began, but when the sun went down … Read more
The Pulitzer Prize for breaking news tends to go to a massive team effort, often one in which a dozen or more reporters feed material to one, two or even three writers, who pull together the main story. Papers like … Read more
For seven days and seven nights in mid-March of 1995, David Foster Wallace took a cruise. He did not have a very good time. The results of the voyage are recorded in “Shipping Out,” an extended essay, framed … Read more
Last October, with the Greek bond crisis emerging as a danger to the European economy, Michael Lewis wrote a piece for Vanity Fair about an order of monks accused of manipulating the crisis to bilk the Greek government … Read more
Freed from the captivity of home cookery and the rarefied practice of restaurant criticism, food is now a legitimate lens for thoughtful cultural journalism. It’s also a massive revenue generator in mainstream media, as many commentators pointed out … Read more
The Great Zucchini has a secret. And in “The Peekaboo Paradox,” Gene Weingarten exhumes the history that haunts the most popular children’s entertainer in Washington, D.C. The story, which ran in January 2006, is the best thing ever … Read more