CATEGORIES

Hanya Yanagihara's Haunted America
The Atlantic

Hanya Yanagihara's Haunted America

Her new novel experiments with alternative versions of history, upending personal and national destinies.

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10 mins  |
January - February 2022
He Walked the Line
The Atlantic

He Walked the Line

Johnny Cash was beloved by Americans who could agree on little else. Was he too eager to please?

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10+ mins  |
January - February 2022
The Freshman
The Atlantic

The Freshman

After January 6, Peter Meijer thought he could help lead the GOP away from an abyss. Now he laughs at his own naïveté.

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10+ mins  |
January - February 2022
Imagine the Worst
The Atlantic

Imagine the Worst

How to head off the next insurrection

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10 mins  |
January - February 2022
January 6 Was Practice
The Atlantic

January 6 Was Practice

Donald Trump is better positioned to subvert an election now than he was in 2020.

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10+ mins  |
January - February 2022
The Atlantic

Dangerous Prophecies

The assumption that civil war is inevitable in America is inflammatory and corrosive.

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10 mins  |
January - February 2022
Unwrappers' Delight
The Atlantic

Unwrappers' Delight

Americans can’t resist the lure of elaborate packaging.

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10 mins  |
December 2021
The Autocrats Are Winning
The Atlantic

The Autocrats Are Winning

If the 20th century was the story of liberal democracy’s progress toward victory over other ideologies— communism, fascism, virulent nationalism— the 21st century is, so far, a story of the reverse.

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10+ mins  |
December 2021
The End Of Trust
The Atlantic

The End Of Trust

Suspicion is undermining the American economy.

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7 mins  |
December 2021
The Miraculous Sound of Forgiveness
The Atlantic

The Miraculous Sound of Forgiveness

In his thrillingly transgressive opera The Marriage of Figaro, Mozart pulled off his most amazing musical feat.

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10+ mins  |
December 2021
How Self-Reliant Was Emerson?
The Atlantic

How Self-Reliant Was Emerson?

Transcendentalism, the American philosophy that championed the individual, emerged from an exceptionally tight-knit community.

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10+ mins  |
December 2021
The Singularity is Here
The Atlantic

The Singularity is Here

Artificially intelligent advertising technology is poisoning our societies.

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10+ mins  |
December 2021
The Martial Art I Can't Live Without
The Atlantic

The Martial Art I Can't Live Without

Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu has been compared to chess, philosophy, even psychoanalysis. But its real appeal is on the mat.

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8 mins  |
December 2021
Several People Are Typing
The Atlantic

Several People Are Typing

Slack made it easier to crack jokes and easier to stir up trouble. Employees love it. Bosses don’t.

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10+ mins  |
November 2021
Unhappy Returns
The Atlantic

Unhappy Returns

What really happens to all the pants that don’t fit

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10+ mins  |
November 2021
Snowbirds
The Atlantic

Snowbirds

Photographs by Naomi Harris

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2 mins  |
December 2021
The Antiquities Cop
The Atlantic

The Antiquities Cop

Matthew Bogdanos is on a mission to prosecute the wealthy dealers and collectors who traffic in the looted relics of ancient civilizations.

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10+ mins  |
December 2021
Shape-Shifting Animals on an Inhospitable Planet
The Atlantic

Shape-Shifting Animals on an Inhospitable Planet

Lizards’ feet are morphing, squid are shrinking, butterflies’ wings are growing stronger.

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10 mins  |
December 2021
In Defense of the Insufferable Music Fan
The Atlantic

In Defense of the Insufferable Music Fan

What we lose when we “like everything”

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10+ mins  |
November 2021
It Didn't Have to Be This Way
The Atlantic

It Didn't Have to Be This Way

A brilliant account of 30,000 years of change upends the bedrock assumptions about human history.

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10+ mins  |
November 2021
The Men Who Are Killing American's Newspapers
The Atlantic

The Men Who Are Killing American's Newspapers

Inside Alden Global Capital, the secretive hedge fund gutting newsrooms and damaging democracy

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10+ mins  |
November 2021
The Engineers' Daughter
The Atlantic

The Engineers' Daughter

James and Lindsay Sulzer have spent their careers developing technologies to help people recover from disease or injury. A freak accident changed their work—and lives—forever.

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10+ mins  |
November 2021
Facebookland
The Atlantic

Facebookland

The social giant isn’t just acting like an authoritarian power. It is one.

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10 mins  |
November 2021
W. G. Sebald, Usurper of Lives.
The Atlantic

W. G. Sebald, Usurper of Lives.

Germany’s renowned and morally scrupulous novelist ransacked the stories of Jewish lives for his fictions. Does it matter?

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10+ mins  |
November 2021
How I Fell for Formula 1
The Atlantic

How I Fell for Formula 1

Netflix got Americans like me to finally care about auto racing. The NFL might want to take notes.

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10+ mins  |
October 2021
The Unwritten Rules of Black TV
The Atlantic

The Unwritten Rules of Black TV

For decades, Black writers and producers have had to tell stories that fit what white executives deemed “authentic.” Can a new generation finally change that?

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10+ mins  |
October 2021
Jonathan Franzen Finally Stopped Trying Too Hard
The Atlantic

Jonathan Franzen Finally Stopped Trying Too Hard

At last he put aside the pyrotechnics and went all in on his great theme: the American family.

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10 mins  |
November 2021
Where Is Our Paradise of Guilt-Free Sex?
The Atlantic

Where Is Our Paradise of Guilt-Free Sex?

Half a century after the sexual revolution, we still haven’t reconciled what we should want with what we do want.

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10+ mins  |
October 2021
Everybody Wants to Rule the World
The Atlantic

Everybody Wants to Rule the World

A new game builds on the addictive appeal of Sid Meier’s Civilization.

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8 mins  |
October 2021
Colson Whitehead Subverts the Crime Novel
The Atlantic

Colson Whitehead Subverts the Crime Novel

In a country born of theft, everyone is an accomplice.

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10 mins  |
October 2021