Commentary

In Lieu of Explanation

By Sisonke Msimang March 10, 2022

No “hot take” can ever make sense of the trauma of children.

Conflict

Commentary

Suffering Is for Other People

By Jina Moore Ngarambe March 8, 2022

We’re not surprised by white refugees. We’re terrified by what they represent.

Conflict

Commentary Photography

“It was as if the Taliban were still there”

Photographs by Jassem Ghazbanpour, text translated from the Persian by Salar Abdoh September 6, 2021

Photographer Jassem Ghazbanpour was in Kabul when the Taliban fled. What he saw twenty years ago feels, today, like an eerie premonition.

Asia & Oceania

Commentary

Hamilton’s Familiar Sound

By Catherine Provenzano March 3, 2021

The songs performed by women in Lin-Manuel Miranda's musical don't sound very revolutionary.

Arts & Culture

Commentary

Future Fashions: The Imagination

By K-Ming Chang December 14, 2020

I spent every night lying on the lower bunk of our bunk bed, looking up at the yellowed bottom of my brother’s mattress, crafting a future self in his shadow.

Clothes, Interrupted

Commentary

Future Fashions: The Pår

By Xiaowei Wang December 14, 2020

You could walk around in your comfortable gray flannel everyday, yet others would see an outfit tailored to their imaginings.

Clothes, Interrupted

Commentary

Another Atrocious Man Named Clive

By Matthew Gavin Frank February 3, 2021

Or, the Ass of a Sociopath

History Politics

Commentary

Future Fashions: The Skin

By Lauren Beukes December 14, 2020

What if we were our own victimless leathers, blood-and-sweatshops?

Clothes, Interrupted

Commentary

Future Fashions: The Sari

By Shruti Swamy December 14, 2020

The length of it stretches back and back, deep into the past where my mothers worked and lived.

Clothes, Interrupted

Commentary

Stanford’s White Supremacists

By Adam Morris January 28, 2021

Removing the symbols of the university's history with eugenics won't be enough.

Class Education Race

Commentary

Stitching and Writing on the Margin

By Roslyn Bernstein January 25, 2021

Former journalist Sabine Heinlein is charting the history of zoonotic diseases not on magazine covers, but quilts.

Arts & Culture Bodies & Nature

Commentary

Cold Inside: Sexual Climate Change

By Helena Feder November 19, 2020

Even before the pandemic, no one wanted to have sex. Now desexualization is a global crisis.

Bodies & Nature Sex Technology & the Future

Commentary

Nairobi Rising

By Nanjala Nyabola October 27, 2020

Is Kenyan fiction experiencing a renaissance after decades of authoritarianism?

Africa Lit World

Commentary

The Sacrifice Zone

By Chloe Hooper October 8, 2020

Historic wildfires reflect not only a failure to care for the environment, but for each other.

Climate & Environment

Commentary

Sleeping with Jerry

By Elizabeth Logan Harris October 6, 2020

We played together. Messed around. Our fingers got wet.

Family & Relationships Humor

Commentary

Good Food

By Boyce Upholt July 23, 2020

For a more equitable restaurant industry, someone's got to give.

Arts & Culture Race

Commentary

Scott Pilgrim’s Hat

By Jeff Ihaza July 1, 2020

In quarantine, as men bereft of the services of barbers took to wearing hats indoors, they were adopting a long practice of mine.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Hand-Knit Sweater

By Ken Liu June 22, 2020

The sweaters my grandmother made hung loose, so I could grow into them.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Protest Wear

By Amanda Adé June 22, 2020

Soft fabric shoes plus a large crowd equaled a big mistake. They were ruined by the end of the day.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Fishnets

By Maisy Card June 22, 2020

She wore an electric blue wig and what I can only describe as a blue thong over fishnets.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Striped Shirt

By Elisa Gabbert June 22, 2020

I guess I wore that shirt a lot, though I never really thought of it as my favorite shirt.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Unitard

By Jenn Shapland June 22, 2020

The unitard is a portal to existing only and fully inside myself.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

T-Shirt

By Zaina Arafat June 22, 2020

Where stakes are the highest, the shirts are called on to perform their very best.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Shiny Black Boots

By John Paul Brammer June 22, 2020

I miss standing in them, stomping in them, and walking with that delectable intent.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Cotton Skirt

By Jessi Jezewska Stevens June 22, 2020

It sits high on my waist and pairs well with low heels.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Aligogoro

By Innanoshe R.A. June 22, 2020

It’s the intricately hand-woven type, in purple, with generous gold accents to match her lace.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Green Pants

By Lucy Ives June 22, 2020

The pants were so extraordinarily bad that they transcended to a new category, becoming, in the process, a wardrobe staple.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Vintage Drop-Waist Dress

By Binnie Kirshenbaum June 22, 2020

It was appliqued in black linen, with a pattern to rival the Chrysler Building.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

All-Black Everything

By Nehal El-Hadi June 22, 2020

The leisurewear was an attempt to subvert the nothingness by disappearing into it before it arrived.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Wedding Hat

By Amy Fusselman June 22, 2020

It was beautiful, to be sure, it just wasn’t what I imagined. I felt like my hat was crying.

Fashion in Isolation

Commentary

Fashion in Isolation

By Mary Wang June 22, 2020

Considering the sentimental, contradictory, and inescapable relationships we have with what we wear.

Fashion in Isolation Arts & Culture

Commentary

How We Drink Now

By Mickie Meinhardt, Helen Schulman, Michael Adno, Amy Jo Burns, Sarah Madges, Rion Amilcar Scott, A.E. Osworth, and Tracy O'Neill May 29, 2020

Eight writers discuss drinking during lockdown.

Arts & Culture

Commentary

On Travel Writing

By Jason Wilson May 26, 2020

In the absence of travel, what is a travel writer to do?

Travel & Adventure

Commentary

The Future in Catastrophic Times

By Joseph Osmundson May 20, 2020

As we navigate life during COVID-19, science doesn't have all the answers. But queer theory might.

Health Politics

Commentary

Will COVID-19 Strengthen our Bonds?

By Jennifer Stitt May 12, 2020

Living with chronic illness in the midst of a pandemic requires a new map.

Bodies & Nature Health

Commentary

The Worlds We Find Ourselves In: Mark Doty and Jane Hirshfield in Conversation

By Mark Doty and Jane Hirshfield April 30, 2020

"At times when the outside world’s facts—or the heart’s facts—seem immovable, words still can move."

Lit World

Commentary

Apparition

By Mark Doty March 26, 2020

Walt Whitman's boundless self persists, even 128 years after his death.

Lit World

Commentary

Ruff Reckoning

By Sharona Lin March 11, 2020

A look back at Kirsten Bakis’s 1997 novel Lives of the Monster Dogs

Lit World

Commentary

The Cover of My Face

By Meredith Talusan March 10, 2020

A trans author reflects on the fraught history of trans women’s memoir covers, and why she didn’t want her likeness on her own.

Bodies & Nature Gender Lit World

Commentary

Recognizing Blackness in Chile

By Maya Doig-Acuña March 2, 2020

How the rise of the #Chiledespertó movement has created space to discuss the country’s whitewashed constitution.

Americas Politics

Commentary

What About Your Grandmother, Jeanine?

By Aya de Leon February 12, 2020

The author of American Dirt has begun to claim her Puerto Rican heritage. But when the island needed her, she was busy writing an exploitative tale about Mexico.

Lit World Race

Commentary

Hanif Abdurraqib and the Performance of Grief

By Jay Deshpande February 10, 2020

On the particular braiding of grief and nostalgia that animates the poet-slash-critic's work.

Arts & Culture Lit World

Commentary

A Cold, White Sport in a Warming World

By Beth Boyle Machlan February 3, 2020

In the battle for hockey’s future, it's a question of #grit vs. Gritty.

Sports

Commentary

We Need to Talk

By Scott Korb December 24, 2019

The phrase needn't always conjure fear.

Education

Commentary

Anatomy of a Successful Campus Talk

By Aaron R. Hanlon December 10, 2019

The real threat to free speech on campus isn't what you think.

Education Politics

Commentary

The Trouble with Trauma

By Nimmi Gowrinathan October 25, 2019

The discourse around the #MeToo movement doesn't always reflect the realities of living with trauma.

Gender Justice

Commentary

Arundhati Roy: “Literature provides shelter”

By Neel Dhanesha May 20, 2019

In this year’s PEN America Arthur Miller Freedom to Write Lecture, Arundhati Roy spoke about the power of literature to challenge governments.

PEN World Voices Arts & Culture

Commentary

Six Writers on the Power of Telling the Truth

By Fran Bigman May 16, 2019

At a panel at this year’s PEN America World Voices Festival, six writers discuss the empowering effects of sharing difficult experiences.

PEN World Voices Arts & Culture

Commentary

Two “Artists of the Air” on the Limits of Time and Space

By Alan Scherstuhl May 16, 2019

At a panel at this year’s PEN America World Voices Festival, high-wire walker Phillippe Petit and extreme-action pioneer Elizabeth Streb discuss their death-defying art.

PEN World Voices Arts & Culture

Commentary

Five Poets Reflect on the Life and Work of Yusef Komunyakaa

By Spencer Green May 16, 2019

At a panel at this year’s PEN America World Voices Festival, five poets discuss the pain and self-actualization in the poems of Komunyakaa.

PEN World Voices Arts & Culture

Commentary

A Nation’s Conscience

By Dan Xin Huang January 31, 2019

Peking University and the legacy of Chinese intellectual independence.

Asia & Oceania Education

Commentary

A Goodbye Memo to Mackenzie Bezos from Husband Jeff as He Transitions to New Love, Alexa

By Phineas Lambert January 16, 2019

A natural next step in the CEO’s Amazonian evolution.

Humor Technology & the Future

Commentary

The Surprising Story of Hubert Julian

By José García Escobar January 15, 2019

The man who challenged the CIA and sold weapons to the president of Guatemala

Americas History

Commentary

The Heavy Load

By Adam Dalva December 31, 2018

A New Year's kiss brings an unexpected surprise.

The Kiss Family & Relationships

Commentary

(How to) Suffer Well: Depression Sitting Still

By Sihan Tan October 24, 2018

Is the act of enduring hardship a virtue, or just an exercise in malaise?

Arts & Culture Asia & Oceania

Commentary

Project for a Trip to the Golden Venture Crash Site

By Lisa Chen September 19, 2018

Once I learned the club was in proximity to the crash site, my obsession with calculating the distance between the two quickly overtook any other interest. The sedimentary layers of history, and how close they are to the surface, give me vertigo. I wanted to feel time spin.

Government Race USA

Commentary

Dessert in the Land of Plenty

By Ed Winstead May 7, 2018

A history of carrot cake in America.

Deserts Americas Humor

Commentary

The Women of the White House

By Rafia Zakaria January 10, 2018

A feminist reading of Fire and Fury.

Politics

Commentary

The Family Dolls, Featuring Charlie, Leslie, & More

By John Reed December 20, 2017

Why it's okay to play with Manson family paper dolls: The first six installments of John Reed's Manson Family Paper Doll book. Print & Color Yourself!

Arts & Culture History USA

Commentary

Armistice Day in the Virtual Trenches

By Ed Winstead November 11, 2017

The First World War ended a century ago, but its violence persists.

Arts & Culture Conflict History Lit World

Commentary

It Ends With September

By David Graver October 6, 2017

Reflections on the tail end of the year.

Humor

Commentary

Raising the Dead

By Ben Purkert September 27, 2017

An author’s visitation seems, in my students' eyes, a resurrection.

Commentary

 Universities’ Reliance on Contingent Faculty Endangers Free Speech on Campus

By Vanessa Guida, Kat Savino, and Shannon Azzato Stephens September 22, 2017

When universities rely heavily on contingent labor, they do more than reduce their own bottom lines.

Education Politics

Commentary

The Many Ivans

By Rowan Hisayo Buchanan September 14, 2017

Weiqing Yuan on being a Chinese street artist in Times Square

Arts & Culture Work & Money

Commentary

The Greater (Grater) Divide

By Roslyn Bernstein June 19, 2017

Considering recent contemporary art in Israel.

Arts & Culture MENA

Commentary

August Sander: The Intimacy of Time

By Alex Zafiris June 15, 2017

The singular power of portraiture's 20th century master.

Arts & Culture

Commentary

The Afterlife of the Party

By Chloe Lizotte June 5, 2017

What the late Glenn O'Brien can teach us about grieving online.

Arts & Culture

Commentary

A Tremendous Opportunity

By Joshua D. Graber June 2, 2017

On CEO activism in the Trump era.

Politics USA

Commentary

Rebranding the Civic, From Private Prisons to Border Patrol

By Liza St. James May 16, 2017

Dispatches from the PEN World Voices Festival.

Lit World USA

Commentary

The Lamentable Tragedy of Stephen K. Bannon

By Ida Lodemel Tvedt May 15, 2017

On Steve Bannon's adaptation of Shakespeare's bloodiest play.

Politics USA

Commentary

Atonement and Sacrifice

By Alejandro Merlín, translated from the Spanish by Charlotte Whittle April 18, 2017

On the discovery of mass graves, and the importance of naming the dead, from Greek mythology to the so-called War on Drugs.

Conflict History MENA

Commentary

A Motion of Pleasure

By J. Mae Barizo March 29, 2017

"A mother’s milk, the first inherent ardor."

The Kiss

Commentary

Donald, in Passing

By Stewart Lawrence Sinclair March 27, 2017

On talking to “the opposition” then and now

Politics USA

Commentary

Balam Ajpu: Mayan Hip-Hop’s Political Agenda

By José García Escobar March 20, 2017

"When people feel our passion, they offer theirs.”

Americas Arts & Culture

Commentary

Mexico’s Drive-Out Cinemas

By Kurt Hollander March 17, 2017

In Mexico, watching cinema on wheels.

Americas Arts & Culture Technology & the Future

Commentary

The Children’s Hour, Theatre Rhinoceros, 1986

By Kim Todd March 13, 2017

Finding parallel AIDS educations in a theatre.

Health

Commentary

The Night and Nightingale

By Nathalie Handal March 1, 2017

I ran my hands through his hair as if counting the seconds of my life.

The Kiss Conflict Family & Relationships MENA

Commentary

In The Salesman, the Dark Drama of Everyday Life

By Sholeh Wolpé February 27, 2017

The Iranian Oscar winner for best foreign film is a suspenseful meditation on the nature of truth.

Oscars 2017 Arts & Culture

Commentary

Disappeared

By John Washington February 16, 2017

On using a loaded term for an overlooked tragedy.

Justice Politics

Commentary

The Transcendental Face of Art

By Joshua Sperling February 15, 2017

On John Berger, a writer of our time.

Arts & Culture

Commentary

Female Fighters Series Re-Examines Women’s Rage Around the World

By Eve Ensler February 15, 2017

The knee-jerk response to militarized women is dismissal and condemnation. Instead, the founder of V-Day argues, it is time to reexamine their stories and understand their wrath.

Female Fighters Conflict Gender