We asked a few writers and editors to choose some of their favorite stories of the year in specific categories. Here, the best in essay writing.
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Posted inBooks, Nonfiction, Story
Death Made Material: The Hair Jewelry of The Brontës
What can an object tell us about a person’s life? Deborah Lutz investigates the mystery of an amethyst bracelet woven with Emily and Anne Brontë’s hair to explore the rich lives and tragic deaths of the Bronte siblings.
Posted inNonfiction, Unapologetic Women
The Rise of ‘Mama’
“Like most cultural shifts in language, the rise of white, upper-middle class women who call themselves ‘mama’ seemed to happen slowly, and then all at once.” Elissa Strauss explores how the use of “mama” helped rebrand motherhood for the modern mother.
Posted inNonfiction, Profiles & Interviews
Interview: Simon Rich on Guilt, Humor Writing, and Being the Worst Person Ever
“I’m certainly as revolting and privileged and narcissistic as any of the hipsters described in my book, if not more so. I mean, there’s nobody worse than me.”
Posted inNonfiction, Reading List
Love for the Library: A Reading List
My New Year’s resolution for 2014: forgo book-buying—just for a year. I’ve made two or three exceptions (a signed first edition! A play from my friend’s small press!), but, miraculously, haven’t binged in my local bookstore, much as I want to. I own hundreds of books. I want to read what I already own. And […]
Posted inEditor's Pick
Is Coding the New Literacy?
An argument for rethinking how we teach the basics of computer science to everyone: “Code literate.” Sounds nice, but what does it mean? And where does literacy end and fluency begin? The best way to think about that is to look to the history of literacy itself. Reading and writing have become what researchers have […]
Posted inUncategorized
Object Lessons
Photographer Nina Berman, a professor at Columbia’s Journalism School, on the evolving state of photojournalism: There are stylistic trends in art and in literature, and everyone acknowledges them. But rarely are they cited in photojournalism, perhaps because people still cling to the idea of photography as an objective or neutral medium that captures a shared […]
Posted inNonfiction, Story
Just Below the Surface
Dubious wilderness, cutthroat business, and human casualties in the war over the fabled Californian Oyster.
Posted inNonfiction, Reading List
Love for the Library: A Reading List
My New Year’s resolution for 2014: forgo book-buying—just for a year. I’ve made two or three exceptions (a signed first edition! A play from my friend’s small press!), but, miraculously, haven’t binged in my local bookstore, much as I want to. I own hundreds of books. I want to read what I already own. And […]
Posted inBooks, Nonfiction
The Missing History of Ravensbrück, The Nazi Concentration Camp for Women
The story of the Nazis’ only concentration camp for women has long been obscured—partly by chance, but also by historians’ apathy towards women’s history. Sarah Helm writes about the camp, where the “cream of Europe’s women” were interned alongside its prostitutes, and members of the French resistance perished alongside Red Army prisoners of war.
