Readings

How Do I Accept My Girlfriend’s Cheating Past?

On struggling after graduating, trying to get your parents off your back, and tolerating your partner's unsavory past.

Out of the Woods and Into the Particle Accelerator

Figuring out the force behind Taylor Swift's new song, one component part at a time.

The Knick's Historical Manipulations

Steven Soderbergh's turn-of-the-last-century medical drama is obsessed with modernity—what it means to step out of history's shadow, and how we shape the past to fit our current needs.

28 'Til I Die

On reaching life’s sweet spot.

The Right to Die in Prison

Belgium's decision to grant euthanasia to a prisoner who claims he's beyond rehabilitation may seem like a win-win, but making choices in prison isn't like making choices anywhere else.

How to Feel About the End of the World

Catastrophe, capitalism, and unlikely optimism in Ben Lerner’s 10:04 and Naomi Klein’s This Changes Everything.

Buy My Cat

Few people would just give their beloved pet away. But for the right price? Keep talking.

Revolutionary Cells of the World, Unite!

Inoculations have always been met with fear. But rewrite the metaphors associated with vaccination, Eula Biss’s On Immunity says, and people may realize they’re not about corruption, but community.

Don't Want To Know Your Name

Does anonymity lead to incivility—or the opposite? Consider examples from Alfred Hermida's Tell Everyone: Why We Share and Why It Matters.

The Truth Behind Kill the Messenger

In the 1990s investigative reporter Gary Webb broke the story linking the CIA with drug traffickers. Then his own fellow journalists effectively ruined him. Enter Hollywood.