The celebrated tragedians of the Booth family let Shakespeare’s themes seep into their own relationships. Hubris, glory, the legacy of a dead father, brotherly rivalry, and a powerful delusion led the family—and the nation—to catastrophe.
Category: Nonfiction
It wasn’t the compendium of facts in the chapter “Water! Water! Water!” or indeed in the entire book. It was that Carey McWilliams wrote about Southern California with sensibilities my eye, ear, and nose recognized. Along with Chandler he made me feel that he’d not only walked down the same streets and into the same arroyo-he smelled the eucalyptus, heard the humming of high tension wires, saw the same bleeding Madras landscapes-and so a sense of deja vu was underlined by a sense of jamais vu: No writers had ever spoken as strongly to me about my home.
Here’s a powerful story from Rilla Askew, author of Fire in Beulah, about race and growing up in Oklahoma. Askew spoke during our night of storytelling with This Land Press in New York City. The full talk is below, and you can see all our storytellers at our YouTube page:
This year marks the 90th anniversary of the traumatic trolley accident that hospitalized artist Frida Kahlo and inspired, perhaps cruelly, her artistic path. Despite her global popularity, there’s still more to learn about this extraordinary artist. For five journalists, exploring the textiles of Frida Kahlo’s homeland gives her rich legacy a new texture.
On February 4, 1974, Patty Hearst was kidnapped from her Berkeley, CA apartment by members of an urban guerrilla group called the Symbionese Liberation Army. Two months after she was abducted Hearst— the granddaughter of the real life “Citizen Kane,” publishing magnate William Randolph Hearst—had joined the SLA, adopted the the name “Tania” as her […]
In January The Washington Post published a powerful three-part series looking at the plight of the black middle class in America. The series focuses on Maryland’s Prince George’s County—the most affluent majority-black county in America, as well as one of the counties hit hardest by the foreclosure crisis. At the heart of the series is a singular, vexing question: “Why don’t […]
Hawks aren’t social animals like dogs or horses; they understand neither coercion nor punishment. The only way to tame them is through positive reinforcement with gifts of food. You want the hawk to eat the food you hold – it’s the first step in reclaiming her that will end with you being hunting partners. But […]
In a recent piece for Vice, Jules Suzdaltsev discussed the ubiquity of white plastic chairs and what that ubiquity means for world culture amidst rapid globalization. Below is a brief excerpt about from the piece: But unlike similar global objects like lighters, televisions, paper clips, cigarettes, transistor radios, and AK-47s, these chairs are “context free.” MIT’s Director of Civic Media […]
Sex is difficult to write about because it’s just not sexy enough. The only way to write about it is not to write much. Let the reader bring his own sexuality into the text. A writer I usually admire has written about sex in the most off-putting way. There is just too much information. If you start saying “the curve of . . .” you soon sound like a gynecologist.
Following the guidance of the voices only she could hear, Joan, a peasant girl living in a world dominated by aristocrats and men, left her home to convince the dauphin—and many men along the way—that only she could save France and make him king.
The industry term for or a blockbuster movie franchise is a “tentpole”—it’s the asset that holds the whole operation up. At the height of mass culture, in the second half of the 20th century, it was enough to be on television to command an audience in the tens of millions. But as channels multiplied, the difference between […]
Journalist Kiera Feldman, who we’ve featured on Longreads many times in the past, told this story during our special night with This Land Press at Housing Works in New York City. Here’s her full story below. See more from the rest of our storytellers here on YouTube.
The author and environmental activist Edward Abbey, who passed away in 1989, would have been 88 today. Abbey—who Larry McMurtry dubbed “the Thoreau of the American West”—was known for his searing love of wilderness, particularly the deserts of the Southwest, and his progressive views. An excerpt from Desert Solitaire, his most famous non-fiction work, can be […]
In light of the recent measles outbreak in California, I want to share this interview with Eula Biss, author of On Immunity. After the birth of her first child, Biss’ research turned to vaccination, and she ruminated on a culture in which no man, woman or child is an island. Michael Schulson interviewed Biss at Salon.
Monterey Park became the first suburb that Chinese people would drive for hours to visit and eat in, for the same reasons earlier generations of immigrants had sought out the nearest urban Chinatown. And the changing population and the wealth they brought with them created new opportunities for all sorts of business people, especially aspiring restaurateurs. The typical Chinese American restaurant made saucy, ostentatiously deep-fried concessions to mainstream appetites, leading to the ever-present rumor that most establishments had “secret menus” meant for more discerning eaters. It might be more accurate to say that most chefs at Chinese restaurants are more versatile than they initially let on—either that or families like mine possess Jedi-level powers of off-the-menu persuasion. But in a place like Monterey Park, the pressure to appeal to non-Chinese appetites disappeared. The concept of “mainstream” no longer held; neck bones and chicken feet and pork bellies and various gelatinous things could pay the bills and then some.
Documents espousing marijuana’s medical benefits first appeared in 2900 B.C. in China, but medicinal cannabis in Europe is indebted to one over-achieving Irishman. Born in 1809, Dr. William Brooke O’Shaughnessy invented the modern treatment for cholera, laid the first telegraph system in Asia, contributed inventions in underwater engineering, and effectively pioneered the use of medical cannabis in Europe. Inspired by the use of cannabis in Ayurvedic and Persian medicine, O’Shaughnessy conducted the first clinical trials of marijuana, treating rheumatism, hydrophobia, cholera, tetanus, and convulsions.
Mark Leibovich, in the New York Times, gets a rare look inside the life of New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, who’s now 37 in a league where few play past the age of 40. The result is some obsessive habits about caring for his body and the food he eats: Every morning in the […]
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