Spring 2021

Spring 2021 cover image

Volume 109, No. 1
Spring 2021
The Yale Review

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Table of Contents

Nonfiction

Jean Valentine at her desk
Essays

And Finally I'll Say Goodbye

Remembering my mother, Jean Valentine
Rebecca Chace
May 19, 2021
A group of people stand in various postures before a wall
Portfolio

Exile and Memory

Reimagining Iran through 200-year-old portraits
Amak Mahmoodian
May 19, 2021
New York Times Cover reading "US Deaths near 100,000, an incalculable loss
Books

Incalculable Loss

How writing can help make sense of grief
Christopher Spaide
May 19, 2021
Corgi jumping from floating dock into water after a tennis ball with great abandon
Criticism

It Me

The trouble with memes
Marta Figlerowicz
May 19, 2021
James Merrill in a kitchen
Letters

Merrill's Last Letters

Writing to the end
James Merrill
May 19, 2021
A stack of books
The Moment

On Rereading

Remaking the world
Victor Brombert
May 19, 2021
An image from Ingmar Bergman's Persona
Essays

My Year of Stalking Rachel

The quest to see without being seen
Becca Rothfeld
May 19, 2021
The Smiths vinyl among records on a shelf
Essays

The Wrong Daddy

Morrissey and the cult of the wounded white male
Jeremy Atherton Lin
May 19, 2021
The author with her sister in childhood.
Essays

There I Almost Am

On envy and twinship
Jean Garnett
May 19, 2021

Fiction

Les Comètes title card
Fiction

Les Comètes

The inner lives of stars
Leanne Shapton
and
Sheila Heti
May 19, 2021
A chalkboard in a classroom
Fiction

Massachusetts

Caleb Crain
May 19, 2021
Dishes in a sink full of suds
Fiction

Some Agonies Over and Over

Olivia Clare
May 19, 2021

Poetry

Adapted from Mónica Leitão Mota / Creative Commons
Poetry

"Mulatto" :: "Quadroon"

Charif Shanahan
May 19, 2021
Populox / Creative Commons
Poetry

Desire

Elizabeth Metzger
May 19, 2021
Detail from Leo Gestel, Sketch with hand and flowers, 1891–1941, Rijksmuseum
Poetry

Everyone's Poem

Sara Nicholson
May 19, 2021
Adapted from Mónica Leitão Mota / Creative Commons
Poetry

Failed Essay on Loving a Man Who Loves Money, Or: Autobiography as Class Traitor, Or: Capitalism (A Love Story?)

Elisa Gonzalez
May 19, 2021
Detail from Furuya Korin, Seika, 1905, Rijksmuseum
Poetry

Hinge

Jessica Fisher
May 19, 2021
Bernal Saborio / Creative Commons
Poetry

Landing

Aleksandar Hemon
May 19, 2021
Courtesy Terrance Hayes
Poetry

Maps of States

Terrance Hayes
May 19, 2021
Shadowy white figure on a black ground. Detail from Jose Chavvary / Creative Commons.
Poetry

Patronage

Solmaz Sharif
May 19, 2021
Deborah Santiago / Creative Commons
Poetry

Pay Ourselves What to Ourselves Is Debt

Elisa Gonzalez
May 19, 2021
Julie de Graag, Cuckoo flower rosettes, 1887–1924, Rijksmuseum.
Poetry

Ten Lyric Pieces

Sara Nicholson
May 19, 2021
Gail Williams / Creative Commons
Poetry

The Last Prom Queen in Antarctica

Ocean Vuong
May 19, 2021
Neil Hester / Creative Commons
Poetry

Thirty-Six Silos

David Baker
May 19, 2021
Adapted from Mónica Leitão Mota / Creative Commons
Poetry

Thirty-Third Year

Charif Shanahan
May 19, 2021
Adapted from Jose Chavvary / Creative Commons
Poetry

Wood Working at the End of the World

Ocean Vuong
May 19, 2021

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