Essays

Essays

Lessons of the Line

Charles Simic and me
Dana Levin
Essays

Ucky Art

Judith Scott, Eva Hesse, and the visceral power of "texxture"
Lauren Elkin
Essays

Unfathomable Life

As a philosopher, I thought I understood risk. Then I tried to get pregnant.
Anna Hartford
Essays

Spiritualism’s Shadows

On COVID-19 and false consolation
Alicia Puglionesi
Essays

Heat Maps

Desire in the dark
Alex Marzano-Lesnevich
Objects of Desire

Jars with Well-Fitting Lids

Seeing loss more clearly
Catherine Lacey

Browse

Essays

Essays

Discovering Hélène Bessette

The innovative fiction of a forgotten French writer
Kate Briggs
December 1, 2021
An excerpt from Vivian Gornick’s Fierce Attachments on the cover of Village Voice.
Essays

The Power of Testimony

Why personal narrative has displaced fiction
Vivian Gornick
December 1, 2021
Graphic with ring light and hand wearing teal nail polish by Tung Chau
Essays

The Screen is a Mirror

On gender transition in the Zoom era
S. Brook Corfman
November 22, 2021
Graphic with lips and motioning hands by Tung Chau
Essays

My Queer Voice

It has outed me my whole life. Why?
Zachary Pace
November 15, 2021
The cast of A Strange Loop singing and dancing.
Essays

Becoming a Playwright

The sources of my storytelling
Michael R. Jackson
November 10, 2021
Graphic with hands holding ballet slippers, weighing scales, and cigarettes.
Essays

Battle Scene

Ballet, trauma, and rebirth
Ian Spencer Bell
October 18, 2021
Graphic with a hamster atop one house and a gravestone atop another.
Essays

A Small Death in the Family

What losing our pet taught me about a much greater, deeper love
Craig Morgan Teicher
October 12, 2021
Installation of found hand mirrors arranged in an oval on a wall.
Essays

Race Off

The fantasy of race transformation
Namwali Serpell
September 27, 2021
Todd Gitlin speaks with with I.F. Stone at a demonstration against nuclear weapons, Washington D.C., 1962.
Essays

In Pursuit of Clancy Sigal

A writer’s radical life
Todd Gitlin
September 20, 2021
Collage with images from social media
Essays

Now Is Pretty Creepy

On Miranda July
Min Li Chan
September 20, 2021