When asked if there was “anything people don’t understand” about him, Gorey responded: “Yes. No. Yes. No.” A new biography by Mark Dery attempts to sort myth from reality.
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United States of Conspiracy: An Interview with Anna Merlan
“Most people in America believe in one conspiracy to some extent, but the far end of the pool … is this desire to show that you really do reject all knowable authority.”
How To Hide An Empire
Daniel Immerwahr says studying the history of the Greater United States opens our eyes to how “racism has shaped the actual country itself. The legal borders of the country, but also the borders of the heart.”
The Queer Generation Gap
How the sexual fluidity of the next generation reflects the limitations of the one that came before it.
How One Porn Mogul Made His Fortune and Ruined Everything
Michael Thevis built a lucrative pornography empire in the 1970s only to spend the rest of his life in prison.
On the Hunt for the Romanov Easter Eggs
Kind of takes the thrill out of your Cadbury Creme, your Kinder Surprise.
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
This week, we’re sharing stories from Caity Weaver, Marisa Meltzer, Jiayang Fan, Taffy Brodesser-Akner, and Jeff Maysh.
Sarah Perry on ‘Melmoth,’ Monsters, and Making Her Readers Feel Responsible for Mass Atrocity
“It was important to me that the ‘villains’ in the book were ordinary people, because readers are ordinary people, and people who do terrible things are often ordinary people.”
What Ever Happened To the Truth?
Michiko Kakutani is interested in how the distinction between fact and fiction has blurred — and how this makes us all complicit.
An Immoderate Novel for an Immoderate Season: An Interview with Olivia Laing
Olivia Laing’s new novel, “Crudo,” is a fictionalized account of the summer of 2017, written in real time by Laing — from the perspective of Kathy Acker.

