Search Results for: new york times

The Transformation of David Brooks

Longreads Pick

Funt goes deep on the evolution of a New York Times columnist.

Author: Danny Funt
Published: Oct 27, 2015
Length: 19 minutes (4,859 words)

How the ACLU Came to Publish a Powerful Piece of Investigative Journalism

“Out of the Darkness” is not an easy story to read. It chronicles how two psychologists who had previously devoted their careers to training US troops to resist abusive interrogation tactics teamed up with the CIA to devise a torture program and experiment on human beings. The story is a torrent of information artfully webbed into a fluid narrative, fleshed out with specific, vivid details. It has all the elements we’ve come to expect from strong investigative longform journalism, albeit from an unlikely outlet: The American Civil Liberties Union.

One doesn’t typically think of the ACLU as a journalism outlet, so I reached out to the story’s author, Noa Yachot, to hear more about how the piece came about, and the ACLU’s role as publisher (the story was also syndicated on Medium). Yachot is a communications strategist at the ACLU, and she spoke to Longreads via email. Read more…

The Most Haunted Road in America

Greetings from Clinton Road, N.J.
Illustrations by Matt Lubchansky

Taffy Brodesser-Akner | Atlas Obscura | October 2015 | 20 minutes (4,944 words)

Atlas ObscuraOur latest Exclusive is a new story by Taffy Brodesser-Akner, co-funded by Longreads Members and published by Atlas Obscura.

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In a part of New Jersey where snakes slither slowly across a road, still coiled and yet somehow still moving; in a part of New Jersey where an insect that looks like a miniaturized bat sits on your windshield, menacing you while you make a sound that doesn’t sound quite like you from inside your car; in a part of New Jersey with a disproportionate amount of road kill in an already highly populated-by-road kill state; in a part of New Jersey where your phone cannot, will not pick up any kind of signal; here, in West Milford, in the county of Passaic, lies Clinton Road, a 10-mile stretch of haunted highway. Read more…

Who Is Justin Trudeau? Four Stories About Canada’s Next Prime Minister

While we Americans were busy debating the latest in Joe Biden’s will-he-or-won’t-he status and trying to keep track of just how many Republicans are still in the race, Canada went ahead and elected* their next Prime Minister. So who is the soon-to-be resident of 24 Sussex?

Justin Trudeau, the leader of Canada’s Liberal Party, is a boxer, a self-described feminist, and a former high school teacher. He’s also “young, handsome, [and] charismatic,” according to The New York Times. He’ll be the second-youngest Prime Minister in Canadian history and the very first to follow a parent into office (his father was former Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, making him the scion of Canada’s only political dynasty). But those are just the headlines; together, these four stories help paint a richer picture of the man who will soon lead our northern neighbors. Read more…

The Top 5 Longreads of the Week

Image via The Intercept.

Below, our favorite stories of the week. Kindle users, you can also get them as a Readlist.

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From Jamaica to Minnesota to Myself

Longreads Pick

A personal essay by Marlon James, published by The New York Times earlier this year. James has just won the 2015 Man Booker Prize for his novel, A Brief History of Seven Killings.

Published: Mar 10, 2015
Length: 8 minutes (2,181 words)

In Search of a Separate Peace: Five Stories About Communes

What is the purpose, the lure, of communal living? Why have the residents of different communes in United States chosen isolation over convenience? In these five stories, you’ll meet men and women—many, members in the LGBTQIA+ community—who have chosen, with mixed results, to dedicate themselves to their chosen families.

1. “They Built It. No One Came.” (Penelope Green, New York Times, May 2015)

They changed their names and called themselves the Harmonists, rescuing and repurposing Colonial-era dwellings in Pennsylvania. Their numbers never swelled more than two. Can Zephram and Johannes make peace with their failed enterprise? Read more…

How Veganism Went Mainstream

It’s as if vegans collectively realized that you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar, or at least that you spread the message more easily when you don’t start preaching about how eating honey represents an exploitation of bees. Vegans like Mr. Ronnen, Ms. Piatt and Mr. Roll remain highly fluent in the political arguments for plant-based eating, but they’re less likely to be sanctimonious about it, Mr. Ronnen said.

And nonvegans, in turn, seem less likely to be dismissive. Chad Sarno, a 39-year-old chef and culinary educator in Austin, Tex., remembers a time when you’d step into a restaurant and “you would say the vegan word and the chef would look at you like you had three heads and just got off the commune.” Now, with influential nonvegan chefs like David Kinch and Alain Passard rhapsodizing about the glory of vegetables, the dialogue has shifted. “Plants are so sexy,” Mr. Sarno said.

Jeff Gordinier, writing in The New York Times about how veganism has crossed from the subversive, co-op fringe into mainstream America, with delicious new strains of cooking and marketing attracting people concerned with nutrition, physical appearances and activism.

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The Politics of Poetry

Longreads Pick

The New York Times’s poetry columnist on the intersection between poetry and politics.

Author: David Orr
Source: Longreads
Published: Oct 7, 2015
Length: 18 minutes (4,527 words)

Jerry Falwell, Judith Krug, and the Origins of ‘Banned Books Week’

America, 1981: Ronald Reagan was sworn in as president, MTV aired its first video, and the culture wars were on. That January, the Rev. Jerry Falwell—a televangelist-turned-political-kingmaker who essentially invented the religious right as we know it today—had sent a massive direct mailing to his Moral Majority constituency, urging readers to examine their school libraries and textbooks for “immoral, anti-family and anti-American content,” and to bring indiscretions to the attention of the Moral Majority. The American Library Association, which had long tracked complaints about attempts at book censorship, was reporting soaring numbers. Enter our heroine, Judith Krug, and the origins of Banned Books Week. Read more…