Save this storySave this storySave this storySave this story In 1886, Leo Tolstoy published a short story called “How Much Land Does a Man Need?” Its protagonist, a poor farmer named Pahóm, dreams of becoming a landowner. He thinks, “If…
Save this storySave this storySave this storySave this story Alex BaraschCulture editor You’re reading the Goings On newsletter, a guide to what we’re watching, listening to, and doing this week. Sign up to receive it in your in-box. If your…
Save this storySave this storySave this storySave this storyYou’re reading the Food Scene newsletter, Helen Rosner’s guide to what, where, and how to eat. Sign up to receive it in your in-box. As with pizza, barbecue, and other archetypal American…
Save this storySave this storySave this storySave this story In his cover for the January 22, 2024 issue, the artist Pascal Campion set out to capture a distinctive aspect of winter in New York: the way the low sun hits…
Save this storySave this storySave this storySave this story It’s hard for a neurosurgeon to navigate a brain. A key challenge is gooeyness. The brain is immersed in cerebrospinal fluid; when a surgeon opens the skull, pressure is released, and…
Save this storySave this storySave this storySave this story In 2000, Dickson D. Despommier, then a professor of public health and microbiology at Columbia University, was teaching a class on medical ecology in which he asked his students, “What will…
Save this storySave this storySave this storySave this story Like so many millennials, I entered the online world through AOL Instant Messenger. I created an account one unremarkable day in the late nineteen-nineties, sitting in the basement of my childhood…
Save this storySave this storySave this storySave this story Not long ago, I became a kind of undertaker. I was a fact checker at this magazine until recently and, in the final months of my tenure, it felt as if…
Save this storySave this storySave this storySave this story The finale of “The Curse,” the oddest and most original show on television right now, opens with Asher and Whitney Siegel, the grin-and-bear-it married couple played by Nathan Fielder and Emma…
Save this storySave this storySave this storySave this story Toward the end of “The Light Room,” Kate Zambreno’s memoir of the early pandemic, she describes corresponding with a friend, the author and professor Sofia Samatar, about the difference between hoarding…