“Didion depicts Hawaiʻi as a place that exists solely in the white American imagination, and, because of this, her journalism is a fiction.”
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My Brain Finally Broke
“Much of what we see now is fake, and the reality we face is full of horrors. More and more of the world is slipping beyond my comprehension.”
When Fact-Checking Meant Something
“Some of us threw up in the mornings before sitting down at our desks. Some of us smoked too much. All of us worried. But our state of doubt wasn’t only fearful; it was also electrifying.”
Joan Didion’s Magic Trick
Caitlin Flanagan goes on a road trip through California — including Sacramento, Berkeley, and Malibu — visiting the homes of the late Joan Didion and exploring why her writing has had such a powerful effect on people. Slouching Towards Bethlehem and The White Album created a new vocabulary of essay writing, one whose influence is […]
The Painter of the Right
“Thomas Kinkade’s paintings show conservatives a world they have already won.”
What Happened to Cameron Crowe? He Has Answers.
“Life is the best writer, and sometimes you have to let life show you a little bit of what that is.”
Surfing the American Dream
“There’s a new fad in the sport I love. I should have hated it. Deep in a mega-mall, I surprised myself by how much it stirred in me.”
Appreciation: Joan Didion’s Indelible Study of Grief Gave Me the Tools to Save Myself
“The clinic staff had put his body in a room with a dirt floor. It was dark and cool for the tropics. Someone made it clear that I was to retrieve any personal items left in his pockets. I walked over to the slab where he was lying. When I touched him, I began to […]
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
This week we’re recommending stories by Zarlasht Halaimzai, Gloria Liu, E. Jean Carroll, Amy Margolis, and Chris Colin.

