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How the personal narrative can make the difference between prison and release
When Dashka Slater looked at California’s parole system, she saw more than a sprawling bureaucracy; she saw a place where people struggled toward redemption. When she followed those seeking parole, the...
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What journalistic process can teach both kids and scientists
Janica Johnson flipped her reporter’s notebook open to an empty page as she and her team prepared for an interview with Donna Shows, a cell biologist from the Benaroya Research Institute. They had...
View ArticleCoronavirus is a reminder of this universal lesson: No experience is ours...
This column was originally published as an issue of Nieman Storyboard’s weekly newsletter. You can read back issues of the newsletter and subscribe here. We read most stories from a distance — whether...
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Why storytelling can be more important — and sexier — than fishing and hunting
Once upon a time, the sun and the moon — the man and the woman — had a quarrel over who was the strongest of the two, and whether one or the other should carry out the important task of lighting up the...
View ArticleStories are read twice in readers’ minds: Once for information, then for meaning
EDITOR’S NOTE: This piece is published in partnership with the Poynter Institute. I have come to believe that all readers read all stories twice — all the time. The first reading comes through the eyes...
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When a profile is also about art is also about climate change is also about...
Julia Rosen has probed the myths of America’s deepest lake, looked down on Prince William Sound from a floatplane and joined a quest to scour the Bronx for jumping worms. But when it came time for a...
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A war correspondent and mom faces new fears in the early days of coronavirus
Coronavirus is no longer something happening somewhere else — no matter where you are — or something that will soon become yesterday’s news. As of this week, cases have been confirmed on every...
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Calling out Olympic officials’ past failures as coronavirus threatens the...
Sally Jenkins has been writing for the sports section of the Washington Post going on 20 years. The Associated Press and the Society for Professional Journalists have named her the nation’s best sports...
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Writing the character, contradictions and soul of a place
America’s quadrennial obsession with Iowa has passed like the season’s last snow storm, there for a turbulent moment but forgotten three days later. The nail-biting over bad election apps and...
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What we can learn about writing and life in a graduation speech sent from a...
Do you remember your college commencement speaker, or anything s/he said? I had it in my head that a state legislator spoke at my high school graduation in 1970, but had to reach out to former...
View Article“… America was postoned.”
The story begins with a short sentence: “Routine left us suddenly” — a succinct summarization of what Floridians were feeling after those first two weeks of March. It ran on March 13, 2o20, under a...
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A writer channels her own life of fear to report about science and psychology
Canadian freelancer Eva Holland didn’t just report her debut nonfiction book, “Nerve: Adventures in Science and Fear.” She lived it. For the book, she plummets out of an airplane, stands on the brink...
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Six core questions to spark fresh ideas
Journalism is, at core, a reactive profession. Something happens; journalists react. Then they cover the counter-reaction to the reaction, and track any consequences as they dribble out. I used to...
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How to wed personal experience and journalistic discipline
Some journalistic tenets are almost sacred, among them: The story is not about us. But sometimes, the story is. Or at least the journalist is living the same story as his or her sources and readers....
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How knowing the full story process informs a writer’s work
The anecdote is packed. Daniel Riley was writing a profile for GQ of Brooks Koepka, one of the world’s elite golfers, and he knew immediately that this would be a good scene to anchor his story, which...
View ArticleJohn Prine would want us to feel real life today, and write it with feeling...
It’s 4:08 a.m. EST on Wednesday, April 8, as I type this, and John Prine has been dead for too long. Like many of you, I went to bed a few hours ago with the news. Like some of you, I woke up too...
View ArticleWhen the narrative becomes the disease
EDITOR’S NOTE: This piece is published in partnership with our friends at the Poynter Institute. It’s happening again, as it always happens with disease. Our fear of contagion has turned some among...
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A religion reporter profiles a charismatic community drawn to a “miracle Bible”
Surprising stories spring from any number of places. Investigative or narrative or explanatory stories often start with curiosity sparked by a local news story or feature. That’s what happened when an...
View ArticleTeaching narrative in the time of coronavirus
Every year as I put together my syllabus, Hank Stuever’s list makes me smile. A decade ago, I came upon the 13 questions that my former Washington Post colleague would ask himself to judge whether he...
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Can deep reporting answer the ultimate coronavirus question: How will it end?
One of the things that distinguishes the coronavirus outbreak from disasters that have come before is the disorienting flood of research and information. Credit — or blame — that on the growing...
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