These audience hits were the most-viewed picks on our site in 2025.
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Posted inUncategorized
10 Short Stories, The Power of Music, and Our Top 5
“I always admired how my father could play so delicately with such brutal hands. They were rough, mired with patches of psoriasis, calloused from playing the charango and the guitar, and scarred, scarred all over.” I have fond memories of playing the violin when I was a child, and over the years I’ve considered returning […]
Posted inQuotes
The Silent Farm for Developmental Disabilities
“David believes that the men who come to the farm are able to connect deeply with the animals and the natural world, in part because of the way that society has dismissed them.”
Posted inQuotes
What Death Means to Love and What Love Means to Death
“But perhaps it’s neither here nor there how we think about death. Perhaps the work that must be done is in how we think about life.”
Posted inUncategorized
Taming Water, Embracing Fire, and the Week’s Top 5
“Deep in the valley below us, in the middle distance, gaped the great black cauldron of Litli-Hrútur, its insides awash in a churning fiery stew. We stood in silence on the observation mound with our hands on our hips, faces cast in childish masks of wonder and awe. ” This week, we have two beautiful essays […]
Posted inEditor's Pick
The Intelligent Forest
“Ecosystems are similar to human societies — they’re built on relationships. The stronger those are, the more resilient the system.”
Posted inNonfiction
Longreads Best of 2020: Science and Nature
Our top picks in science and nature stories for 2020.
Posted inNonfiction
The Race That Turned to Ruin
“Fifteen teams lifted off from Switzerland in gas ballooning’s most audacious race. Three days later, two of them drifted into Belarusian airspace—but only one would survive.”
Posted inFeature
A Year in Reading: Power to the People
Incorrigible, insightful, inspiring: the incredible people of 2024.
