“When we were offered jobs as deckhands, we jumped at the chance, naïve to the risks of the open sea.”
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Posted inEditor's Pick
Letter to My Teenage Self: An Incarcerated Man Interrogates the Person He Once Was
“From his prison cell, Hector Ortiz reexamines the traumas, hardships, and bad choices that led to his lengthy sentence—and ultimately taught him about the man he needed to be.”
Posted inReading List
Eyes on the Prize: A Treasure Hunting Reading List
Every quest holds at its heart a puzzle to solve—and that puzzle can become an obsession.
Posted inEditor's Pick
The First Family of Human Cannonballing
“David and Jeannie Smith gave up their day jobs for a life of daredevil stunts —with six children in tow.”
Posted inEditor's Pick
They Were Labeled Witches. They Just Had Dementia.
“In tribal communities across Namibia, older, eccentric people are often accused of witchcraft and violently attacked.”
Posted inTop 5
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
This week’s edition highlights stories by Peter Flax, Abigail Edge, Jesús A. Rodríguez, Henry Wismayer, and Elif Batuman.
Posted inEditor's Pick
“Monorail!” How Conan O’Brien Came Up With an Iconic ‘Simpsons’ Episode
“Thirty years later, Conan O’Brien reflects on the making and legacy of ‘Marge vs. the Monorail,’ one of the best ‘Simpsons’—and sitcom—episodes of all time.”
Posted inReading List
More Than Just an Object: A Collector’s Reading List
The bowerbird, which lives on the east coast of Australia, has an abiding eye for anything blue. Solitary males travel great distances to bring back all manner of blue objects to decorate their nests. Shells, flowers, plastic bottles, and feathers are all fair game, and bowerbirds have even been known to grind up blue pigments […]
Posted inNewsletter
Both Sides of The Mirror
Introducing The Longreads Questionnaire, featuring Vauhini Vara.
Posted inTop 5
The Top 5 Longreads of the Week
This week’s list features stories from Shara Johnson. Paul Fischer, John Woodrow Cox, Marc Hogan, and Angelica Jade Bastién.
