“The author spent days in a room with no light. Who would he be when he emerged?”
silence
Posted inEditor's Pick
Soundscapes of the Silenced
“In late Renaissance Florence one in five women lived behind institutional walls whose rule was sensory mortification. Historians are struggling to recover their inexpressible secrets.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
Shhhh. The Silver Lake Reading Club Has Started
“Begun on the premise that book clubs were too restrictive and too chardonnay-focused, they wanted to provide a space where there was no assigned reading and everyone was welcome.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
Variations on the Theme of Silence
“Without stretches of silence, you cannot hear yourself or anyone else.”
Posted inNonfiction
When We Are Afraid
On teaching in a red state, the silences in our history lessons, and all I never learned about my hometown.
Posted inNonfiction
Learning from Perimenopause and a Kpop Idol
Struggling with fluctuating hormones, Wendy Gan is inspired by the musician Mino to stop muting herself and return to writing.
Posted inNonfiction
On Silence (or, Speak Again)
Elissa Bassist breaks her silence about everything she’s not supposed to talk about and comes out alive.
Posted inBooks, Nonfiction, Story, Unapologetic Women
The Silence of Women
Women who spoke too angrily or too publicly were punished in cruel and unusual ways.
Posted inEditor's Pick
A Woman Becomes a Nightingale
An illustrated essay in which Carolita Johnson reviews the ugly history of rape being weaponized — and politicized — as a means of silencing women.
Posted inEssays & Criticism, Nonfiction, Unapologetic Women
What My Mother and I Don’t Talk About
Michele Filgate reflects on her teen years with an abusive stepfather and a mother whose silence protected him.