By Kim Cross Interviewing for narrative is like hunting for something in a pitch-black warehouse with nothing more than a flashlight. It’s a good flashlight — with a head you can twist to change the shape and range of … Read more
By Chip Scanlan Legend has it that Tom Wolfe, the New Journalism pioneer whose stories regularly presented his characters’ points of view, was once challenged by a critic who demanded to know how he could possibly know what those … Read more
EDITOR’S NOTE: This is our final dispatch from the 2024 Power of Narrative conference. For earlier posts, see deadline narratives by a Wall Street Journal podcast team, the braided structure used by The Atavist … Read more
By Jacqui Banaszynski Last week brought the sad news of the deaths of more fine journalists I’ve been graced to know. One was Jim Caple, who was one of those sports reporters who saw sports through … Read more
By Trevor Pyle A reader’s comment, a trove of first-hand documentation and a patient, collaborative approach. Those were three elements among many that helped Washington Post reporter Peter Jamison report and write a powerful profile of a family that … Read more
By Talia Richman Before our first meeting about how to tackle a tick-tock of the mass shooting at an outlet mall in Allen, Texas, this spring, Kelley Benham French sent over an annotated copy of David … Read more
By Chip Scanlan Journalism, by its very nature, focuses on the now — the events and people making the news today. But powerful stories can be found by mining the past to add fresh material and context to what … Read more
By Chip Scanlan When one journalist falls, others rise to take up their cause. That’s the animating principle behind a long history of journalists completing untold stories left behind by murdered or jailed reporters. Such memorial work gained attention … Read more
By Trevor Pyle In opening paragraphs of her Chicago Reader piece about six deaths in Chicago last year, Katie Prout makes a rare and daring admission: She reveals that she keeps an altar and remakes it … Read more
By Madeline Bodin After reading a remarkable work of nonfiction, have you ever wished you could learn exactly how the writer created what you just read? I don’t think I’m alone in being intrigued by how the stories that … Read more
