Christine Hyung-Oak Lee reflects on seeing and “being seen” — the silent gift of bearing witness to one another and individual suffering as a way of offering comfort and hope.
Nonfiction
‘Wir Schaffen Das’: Angela Merkel, the Refugee Crisis, and the Complexity Behind a Simple Statement Like ‘We Will Do It’
In Lapham’s Quarterly, Renata Adler returns to her familial homeland to explore Germany’s present-day reaction to the millions of people now trying to get in rather than out.
Northwestern Is Poised to Compete in March Madness for the First Time in History
Northwestern has never competed in the NCAA basketball tournament. This could be their first year.
A History of American Protest Music: How The Hutchinson Family Singers Achieved Pop Stardom with an Anti-Slavery Anthem
“Get Off the Track!” borrowed the melody of a racist hit song and helped give a public voice to the abolitionist movement.
The Name’s Grass. Mr. Grass.
At watching-grass-grow.com, you can watch Alex Komarnitsky’s lawn. In Southwest magazine, Bradford Pearson profiles Komarnitsky and explores his own fascination with a stranger’s front lawn.
‘This Land’ Was Our Land: A Eulogy for a Groundbreaking Magazine
“This Land”closes its print edition this month, capping seven years of extraordinary local journalism.
Leaving Aleppo: ‘A distant star / Exhausts its light on the sleep of the dead.’
Pauls Toutonghi lovingly recalls his grandfather, Philippe Elias Tütünji, a writer, poet, and translator from Aleppo, Syria. Tütünji immigrated to America during World War II and never gave up his dream to achieve success as a poet in his adopted homeland.
‘Why Pay for Therapy When the Advice of Strangers Has Proven to Be Helpful and Free?’
Ben Popper takes a look at Koko, a startup with an app that helps people connect and provide emotional support to peers and, in the process, allows them to recognize and “rethink” their own problems.
The Men Vying for the Emerald That’s Worth Millions… or Nothing
For her story in Wired, Elizabeth Weil fell down a rabbit hole of conspiracy, arson, faked kidnapping, bankruptcy, and lawsuits that swirls around the 752-pound Bahia Emerald.
Money: It Can’t Buy Love, But Can It Rent You a Best Friend?
In Bloomberg, Patrick Clark introduces us to Dusty Wunderlich (real name), the man who’s trying to monetize man’s best friend by leasing out purebred dogs.
