The Top 5 Longreads of the Week

This week, we’re sharing stories from David Dobbs, Rachel Aviv, Max Read, Holly George-Warren, and Bianca Bosker.

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1. The Touch of Madness

David Dobbs | Pacific Standard | October 3, 2017 | 44 minutes (11,231 words)

David Dobbs writes about Nev Jones, a psychologist who experienced psychosis as a Ph.D student, and psychosis more broadly in historic and global context.

2. How the Elderly Lose Their Rights

Rachel Aviv | The New Yorker | October 4, 2017 | 32 minutes (8,200 words)

Julie Belshe had thought her parents had been kidnapped: their house in Clark County Nevada was locked and dark, and they didn’t answer their phone for days. She discovered they had been removed from their home and taken to an assisted living facility, their possessions were sold and their money confiscated. It wasn’t a mistake. It was the law.

3. Does Even Mark Zuckerberg Know What Facebook Is?

Max Read | New York Magazine | October 1, 2017 | 19 minutes (4,980 words)

In a little more than a decade, Facebook has become one of the most important technology companies in the world. But as it’s grown, the company has had to try to figure out how to govern its two billion users, something it hasn’t quite managed. In light of that, Max Read grapples with an increasingly important problem: what exactly is Mark Zuckerberg’s world-spanning empire?