The ShelfToni Morrison: Where to Begin
Arthur Dandridge on how to find your way into Toni Morrison's work: which book to start with, what Beloved actually is, and why the difficulty is the point.
Ideas
The Shelf
IdeasThe Backup Route
Oil crossed $100 a barrel on Friday. For the first time in the modern era, both of the world's critical shipping corridors are under simultaneous military threat.
IdeasThe Old Question
The Senate voted 50-48 to limit the president's war powers. One day later, two senators changed their votes. That pattern has a longer history than the current war.
IdeasThe Verdict Stands
Two courts found genocide was committed at Srebrenica. The men convicted of ordering it are serving life sentences. On the 31st anniversary, the president of Republika Srpska held a news conference to say it never happened.
At LargeAt Large: The Return
I bought a kitchen gadget online. Getting my money back required a plan.
The ShelfColson Whitehead Books: What He Inherited and What He Made His Own
Arthur Dandridge on nine books by Colson Whitehead: the tradition he carries forward, the experiments nobody else would try, and where to begin.
At LargeAt Large: The Group Text
My sons started the family group text in January. Nobody asked my permission.
The ShelfZora Neale Hurston Books: Lost for Decades, Essential Forever
Arthur Dandridge on how one of America's essential writers got pushed out of the canon and why she came back.
At LargeAt Large: The Update
The phone improved itself overnight. The improvements are somewhere on the phone.
The ShelfThe Best Southern Gothic Novels: Beauty and Horror in the Same Sentence
Arthur Dandridge traces what southern gothic actually is, who truly defined it, and the best southern gothic novels you need to read.
At LargeAt Large: The Appointment
The patient portal sent me a confirmation message at two-fifteen in the morning. Nobody asked it to.
The ShelfJames Baldwin's Best Books: Where to Start and Where They Take You
Arthur Dandridge on the books that matter most, and the order in which to read them.
At LargeAt Large: The Wisdom
My son Brian forwarded me an article about hydration. I have been drinking water since 1953.
At LargeThe Notification
I said yes to forty-one apps before I understood the nature of what I was agreeing to.
The ShelfReading Richard Wright
The books Arthur Dandridge keeps going back to, and why Richard Wright still asks the questions that matter.
At LargeThe Password
I have forty-seven passwords and the memory of a woman who found her reading glasses in the refrigerator.
IdeasHow to Find Your Photos on an iPhone: Someone Designed It This Way on Purpose
Your phone has 14,000 photos in it. Finding the one you want shouldn't require a degree in library science.
From the EditorFrom the Editor: The First Letter That Came Back
Two weeks in, and the thing that surprised me most was not the writing. It was the reading.
At LargeThe Job I Did Not Apply For
I have been scanning my own groceries for six years now, and nobody has offered me a performance review.
Reading ListThree Novels About the Second Half of Life That Refuse to Lie to You
A bookseller's case for three novels that tell the truth about what it means to have lived long enough to know things.