On the secrets we keep from and for others, and how it warps our identities: I was so lonely it hurt. I hadn’t told friends the secret of our marriage. The keeper worries about being found out. The keeper also tries to create an internal story that keeps self-judgment at bay. So we rationalize, and […]
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Posted inNonfiction
The Gothic Life and Times of Horace Walpole
Two-hundred and fifty years ago, Horace Walpole published ‘The Castle of Otranto,’ a strange, campy book that’s widely considered to be the first Gothic novel. In real life, Walpole’s family was beset by tragedy and his life’s obsession was a Gothic castle called Strawberry Hill.
Posted inMember Pick, Nonfiction
Swiping Right in the 1700s: The Evolution of Personal Ads
Noga Arikha | Lapham’s Quarterly | 2009 | 13 minutes (3,200 words) Download .mobi (Kindle) Download .epub (iBooks) I. In 1727, a lady named Helen Morrison placed a personal advertisement in the Manchester Weekly Journal. It was possibly the first time a newspaper was ever used for such a purpose. As it happens, Morrison was […]
Posted inNonfiction, Story
Long Live Grim Fandango
The greatest adventure game ever made returns from the dead.
Posted inMember Pick, Nonfiction, Story
Untangling the Knot: My Search for Democracy in the Modern Family
Sabine Heinlein grew up in a family where everyone was treated as equals. It didn’t work out like they hoped.
Posted inTop 5
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
Below, our favorite stories of the week. Kindle users, you can also get them as a Readlist. Sign up to receive this list free every Friday in your inbox. * * * 1. A Bitter End Emily Guendelsberger | Philadelphia City Paper | June 26, 2014 | 50 minutes (12,732 words) A daughter gets caught […]
Posted inMember Pick, Nonfiction
The Craft of Poetry: A Semester with Allen Ginsberg
An intimate recollection of a Beat legend.
Posted inBooks, Nonfiction
The Rise of Joan of Arc: How a Visionary Peasant Girl Defied a Dress Code and Challenged the Patriarchy
Following the guidance of the voices only she could hear, Joan, a peasant girl living in a world dominated by aristocrats and men, left her home to convince the dauphin—and many men along the way—that only she could save France and make him king.
Posted inReading List
Critical Reading on the Conservative Movement
Below is a guest reading list from Maisie Allison, digital editorial director of The American Conservative. *** Here is a (mostly critical) reading list for conservatives and others interested in a deeper consideration of conservatism, and how the post-movement right might draw creatively from older sources to chart a way forward. My former boss Andrew Sullivan’s […]
Posted inBooks, Nonfiction, Story
Interview with a Torturer
Documentary filmmaker and Khmer Rouge survivor Rithy Panh spent hundreds of hours interviewing Duch, the commandant of the Cambodia “killing fields” and one of the most notorious torturers of the 20th century. This is his haunting memoir of those interviews.
