A response to Ta-Nehisi Coates’s “My President Was Black” from sociologist Tressie McMillan Cottom: “My first black president seems to think he can have black cool without black burden. For all his intimacies with his white mother and white grandparents, my first black president doesn’t appear to know his whites.”
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Donald Trump’s War With the Past
The president willfully ignores, rewrites, or rejects history just as we have begun to truly interrogate the trauma of the Civil War.
‘I Still Live in a Small Town That I Hate’: Roxane Gay’s Perspective on Her Success
This week, a number of people heard of Roxane Gay for the first time when Simon & Schuster canceled its plans to publish controversial alt-right author Milo Yiannopoulos’s book — but her success has been building for a long time.
In the Library with Ta-Nehisi Coates
Black Cardigan is a great newsletter by writer-editor Carrie Frye, who shares dispatches from her reading life. We’re thrilled to share some of them on Longreads. Go here to sign up for her latest updates. * * * When I was in college I was pretty good at gadding around (sorry to boast!), and spring was my very best […]
Longreads Best of 2017: All of Our No. 1 Story Picks
Here’s every story that was chosen as No. 1 in our weekly Top 5 email.
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
Our top stories of the week, as chosen by the editors at Longreads.
A Reading List from the NBA’s Smartest Coach
Every off-season, Popovich puts together a substantial list of books he intends to read during his downtime.
What Comes Next: Confronting a Post-Election America
This week’s reading list is dedicated to marginalized voices. Some of these stories were written in the wake of this year’s election; others came before.
Longreads Best of 2016: Political Analysis
We asked a few writers and editors to choose some of their favorite stories of the year in various categories. Here, the best in political analysis.
What Comes Next: Confronting a Post-Election America
This week’s reading list is dedicated to marginalized voices. Some of these stories were written in the wake of this year’s election; others came before.

