#411: “The World Belongs to the Young”

An interview with Daniel Duane, author of “A Tale of Paradise, Parking Lots, and My Mother‘s Berkeley Backyard”

Welcome, new subscribers, and welcome back, loyal readers! I’m happy you’re here.

Today’s issue is dedicated to an interview with Daniel Duane, the author of “A Tale of Paradise, Parking Lots, and My Mother's Berkeley Backyard,” September’s article of the month.

Originally published in The New York Times Magazine in May, the piece explores the housing crisis in the Bay Area and the fears that emerge alongside the inevitability of change. If you haven’t read it yet, I urge you to do so — and join our discussion on September 24, if you’re moved.

Join our discussion

I got a chance to interview Mr. Duane a few weeks back, and it was an honor. I won’t give everything away, because it’s better to listen, but we discussed a number of topics, including:

• his fond memories of growing up in Berkeley

• his relationship with his mom, who was a radical activist in the 1960s, but who now feels scared about the changes coming to her neighborhood

• how the NIMBY / YIMBY debate could benefit from some compassion and nuance

Most of all, it became abundantly clear in our conversation that Mr. Duane is nostalgic but also does not find nostalgia useful. After all, we need more housing, he argues, even if that means having to make sacrifices for the common good. Sometimes, that sacrifice means realizing our time has come, that the world belongs to the young, that it’s time to let go.

At one point, when I was asking myself, Well, what is this story really about for me? I had sort of a moment of thinking about it as like, It‘s about the fact that the world belongs to the young, and it hurts when you find out that you’re no longer one of them. And that moment comes for everyone.

Thank you for reading this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀

To our 10 new subscribers — including Sonia, Abigail, and Charles — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. To our long-time subscribers (Kristen! Kristin! Krystyn!), you’re pretty great, too. Loyal reader Paul, thank you for sharing the newsletter and getting the word out.

If you like Article Club, please help it grow. I really appreciate your support. Here are two ways you can help out:

❤️ Become a paid subscriber, like Opal (thank you). If you’ve subscribed for free for a long time, and you appreciate the articles and author interviews, and if you’ve joined one or more discussions, I encourage you to take the leap. You’ll join an esteemed group of readers who value the mission of Article Club. Plus you’ll receive surprise perks and prizes. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year.

📬 Invite your friends to subscribe. Know someone who’s kind, thoughtful, and loves to read? I’d love it if you encouraged them to subscribe. Word of mouth is by far the best way to strengthen our reading community. Thank you for spreading the word.

Share Article Club

On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT.

#410: The Fat Girl Allegory

Four great articles about the body + an invitation to join our discussion this month

Welcome, new subscribers, and welcome back, loyal readers! I’m happy you’re here.

This week’s issue includes four great pieces exploring issues that involve the body. I’m excited for you to read the lead article, “The Fat Girl Allegory,” in which writer Andriana Mendoza recounts her coming-of-age as a fat queer Latinx woman. The prose is fresh and electrifying. Also thought provoking (albeit in an entirely different way) is the second article, which explains why nearsightedness has skyrocketed over the past half century, why it’s scary, and what can be done about the problem.

If those topics don’t interest you, scroll down past the pet photo, and you’ll find a pair of well-written (and intense) articles featuring the experiences of girls raising their children after the Dobbs decision made abortion illegal where they live.

This issue may hit hard. As always, I’d love to hear what you think. Leave a comment below, or if that’s too public for you, hit reply or email me. Thank you very much for trusting me to bring articles to you.

Leave a comment

⭐️ This month’s discussion: Are you concerned about the price of housing in your community? If so, I warmly invite you to this month’s discussion on Sept. 24, 2:00 - 3:30 pm PT on Zoom. We’re going to be reading, annotating, and exploring “A Tale of Paradise, Parking Lots, and My Mother’s Berkeley Backyard,” by Daniel Duane. It’s a great article about the state of housing in the Bay Area, the fear of change, the power of nostalgia, and the writer’s relationship with his mother.

I’d be delighted if you joined our discussion. All you need to do is sign up below. If it’s your first time, don’t be shy. I’m certain you’ll find other Article Clubbers kind, thoughtful, and inviting. Plus feel free to ask me questions so you feel comfortable.

Sign up for the discussion

1️⃣ The Fat Girl Allegory

Andriana Mendoza — who grew up in Hayward, California — is a writer to watch. Let me get out of the way and get right to some of her words:

I’m ten and sad and fat and conditioned straight out the womb to base my entire value on what fourth grade kids thought of me. And I would’ve bought the kind words if soccer boys were nicer to me in school, if I had a recess boyfriend who sucked on my lips behind the pine tree. I looked too much like Mike Wazowski then; I had that body type: little titties, fat belly, my ass the ghost of almost something. In my fat origin story, I say I was born destined for frog bod, but really it all began with an equal mix of poor people problems and golden arches.

And you really shouldn’t be mean to fat kids because sometimes fat kid moms have two jobs and no mans and think $5 Family Combos sound a lot better than lugging exhausted limbs into tan kitchens to whip up something “balanced.” We ate well, went to sleep with our tummies full, money left over for gas the next day. It was fine really, you live and you learn, look at life like old bread (just pick off the fuzzy bits and keep eating). So I became big and I stayed big, my consistently dainty mother glowing like a woodland goddess next to me, silver-toothed classmates snickering on about Candy’s hot mom.

By Andriana Mendoza • The Audacity • 21 mins

Read the article

2️⃣ The World Is Going Blind. Taiwan Has The Cure.

Growing up, I prided myself on my impeccable eyesight, as if I had anything to do with my 20/20 vision. Then in college, my eyes changed. Like billions of people across the globe, I developed nearsightedness (myopia, if you’re feeling fancy). Turns out, it wasn’t just me who found their vision got fuzzy. Over the last 50 years, myopia has become a worldwide epidemic. Up to 90 precent of Chinese teenagers and 96 percent of Korean teenagers have nearsightedness. By 2050, more than half of the world population will need glasses or contacts. Many people will go blind. The culprit? It’s not what you might think. It’s not watching TV too close. It’s not looking at your phone too much. The cause is surprising; the cure makes sense. Taiwan is already doing it. Will the United States follow its lead?

By Amit Kawala • Wired • 17 mins

Read the article

Arlo, who belongs to Peter and me, is not only the newsletter’s mascot. He is a real dog with real feelings. The feeling depicted in this photo: a deep longing for chicken treats. Want your pet to appear here? hltr.co/pets

3️⃣ She Wasn’t Able to Get an Abortion

This one is hard to read. It’s even hard to type this introduction. Ashley (not her real name) lives in Clarksdale, Mississippi. She was raped by a stranger in the yard outside her home. She wasn’t able to get an abortion because the closest provider is located in Chicago, a nine-hour drive away. Besides, her mother would have to take off work, pay for gas, and find a place to stay for a couple nights. “I don’t have the funds for all this,” she said. Now Ashley is a mother. She’s 13 years old and just started seventh grade. Yes, this is a disturbing article. But writer Charlotte Alter is careful to tell Ashley’s story with empathy. Ms. Alter also offers context of the Mississippi Delta, explains the impact of Dobbs, excoriates the local police department, and profiles the doctors who provide care. Ashley mom says, “This situation hurts the most because it was an innocent child doing what children do, playing outside, and it was my child. It still hurts, and is going to always hurt.”

By Charlotte Alter • Time Magazine • 14 mins

Read the article

4️⃣ Teen Parents, Two Years Later

Don’t worry: This story is more hopeful than the last. Brooke met Billy at a skate park two years ago in Corpus Christi, Texas. They were both 17 years old. A few months later, Brooke discovered she was pregnant. No way did Brooke feel ready to have a kid, but Texas banned abortions, and the closest clinic was a 13-hour drive away. She gave birth to twin daughters. This article tells the story of how the High family is making things work, day by day. First the positive: They got a place in Tampa, Florida. Billy is a mechanic for the Air Force. The twins take swim lessons and love their bedtime stories. Now the challenges: They fight a lot. Billy likes to play video games and go skating. Sometimes he sits in his car, thinking of leaving Brooke. But they’re in couple’s counseling, still in it, at 19 years old. They’re trying to make things work, for Kendall and Olivia, for their kids.

By Caroline Kitchener • Washington Post • 23 mins

Read the article

Thank you for reading this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀

To our 12 new subscribers – including Melanie, Ruby, Siobhan, Shirley, Alessandra, Eli, Sam, Mary, and Amnic — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. To our long-time subscribers (Jay! Jane! Janie!), you’re pretty great, too. Loyal reader Orion, thank you for sharing the newsletter and getting the word out.

If you like Article Club, please help it grow. I really appreciate your support. Here are two ways you can help out:

❤️ Become a paid subscriber, like Nancy (thank you). If you’ve subscribed for free for a long time, and you appreciate the articles and author interviews, and if you’ve joined one or more discussions, I encourage you to take the leap. You’ll join an esteemed group of readers who value the mission of Article Club. Plus you’ll receive surprise perks and prizes. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year.

📬 Invite your friends to subscribe. Know someone who’s kind, thoughtful, and loves to read? I’d love it if you encouraged them to subscribe. Word of mouth is by far the best way to strengthen our reading community. Thank you for spreading the word.

Share Article Club

On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT.

#409: Yes to Housing! (But not in my backyard.)

Let’s discuss “A Tale of Paradise, Parking Lots, and My Mother’s Berkeley Backyard, by Daniel Duane”

Happy almost-September, loyal readers. I’m happy to announce that this month, we’ll be reading and discussing “A Tale of Paradise, Parking Lots, and My Mother’s Berkeley Backyard” by Daniel Duane. Originally published in The New York Times Magazine back in May, the article is a poignant, nuanced look at the housing crisis in the Bay Area. I hope you’ll join us.

I grew up in the Bay Area, and went to college in Berkeley, so I know firsthand (as do many of you) that white progressives here really want social justice — as long as it doesn’t inconvenience us and everything remains the same.

In this piece, Mr. Duane recounts his idyllic childhood growing up in Berkeley in the 1970s, when fighting for a better world meant preserving People’s Park and protecting natural resources against capitalist intruders. But times have changed, Mr. Duane argues, and his mother, who still lives in his childhood home, has not. “Where are all the birds supposed to go?” she asks, when her younger neighbors call for new housing. “Are we just going to turn everything into Manhattan?”

Mr. Duane writes:

It was hard not to wonder if we all reach a point in our lives at which personal convenience and a fear of change become imperceptibly commingled with our sense of the common good.

What I like most about this piece is how Mr. Duane is able to criticize his mother and other Berkeley NIMBYs, but at the same time explain their perspective and practice empathy for their lived experiences. But there’s a difference between having empathy and allowing privileged people to maintain their comfort at the expense of others.

Do you need to be from the Bay Area to appreciate this article? No, not at all. The housing crisis is everywhere. Also, there’s so much more to this piece — nostalgia, fear of change, and the acknowledgment that we’re all getting older.

Read the article

I’d love it if you read the article and joined our discussion on September 24. If you’re interested, this is how things will go:

• This week, we’ll read the article

• Next week, we’ll annotate the article as a group and share our first impressions

• The following week, we’ll hear from Mr. Duane in a podcast interview

• On Sunday, September 24, 2:00 - 3:30 pm PT, we’ll discuss the article on Zoom

Sign up for the discussion on Sept. 24

If this will be your first time participating in Article Club, I’m 100% sure you’ll find that you’ll feel welcome. We’re a kind, thoughtful reading community. Feel free to reach out with all of your questions.

Also exciting, as with all Article Club monthly selections, the author will be participating in the festivities, recording a podcast episode for your listening pleasure. The author of two novels and four books of non-fiction, Mr. Duane has written journalism about everything from politics and food to rock climbing and social justice, and for publications ranging from The New York Times Magazine to Wired, GQ, Esquire, and Outside. Mr. Duane won a 2012 National Magazine Award for an article about cooking with Chef Thomas Keller and has twice been a finalist for a James Beard Award. Duane has taught writing for the Bread Loaf Environmental Writers’ Conference and the MFA program at San Francisco State University. He lives in San Francisco with his wife, the writer Elizabeth Weil, and their two daughters.

So what do you think? Interested in reading the article and joining our discussion this month? If you’re still a maybe, here are a few questions for you. If you’re a yes to one or more of them, you‘re a great candidate.

• Are you paying too much for your housing, in a way that’s not sustainable?

• Are you concerned about the state of housing in your community?

• Do you feel nostalgic about your childhood home and neighborhood?

• Do you want there to be more justice but are sometimes fearful of change?

• Do you like reading and hanging out with other kind, thoughtful people?

Sign up for the discussion on Sept. 24

Longtime newsletter enthusiast Charli, who belongs to loyal reader Eva, doesn’t like change and will always refer to Article Club as The Highlighter. Nominate your pet to appear here! hltr.co/pets

Thank you for reading this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀

To our 7 new subscribers – including Mike, Prakash, Caitlin, Alison, Peggy, and Kimberly — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. To our long-time subscribers (Irene! Isodore! Ilene!), you’re pretty great, too. Loyal reader Nancy, thank you for sharing the newsletter and getting the word out.

If you like The Highlighter Article Club, please help it grow. I really appreciate your support. Here are two ways you can help out:

📬 Invite your friends to subscribe. Know someone who’s kind, thoughtful, and loves to read? I’d love it if you encouraged them to subscribe. Word of mouth is by far the best way to strengthen our reading community. Thank you for spreading the word.

Share The Highlighter Article Club

❤️ Become a paid subscriber, like Matt (thank you!). You’ll join an esteemed group of readers who value the mission of The Highlighter Article Club. Plus you’ll receive surprise perks and prizes. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year.

On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT.

#408: Back to School

Racial (de)tracking, looping, boys, and chronic absenteeism

Welcome, new subscribers, and welcome back, loyal readers! I’m happy you’re here.

Just like that, we’re back to school. Where did the summer go? Oh, we’re still in it, you say? Right — that’s because school begins early now, at least out here in California, where students in Oakland returned on Aug. 7.

I’m going to tell you a secret: This is my 26th year in education. Now here’s another secret: This is the most excited and hopeful I’ve been in a long time. I’m still trying to figure out why I feel this way, but in the meantime, I’m not going to fight this feeling.

This week’s issue is dedicated to the start of the new school year. As usual, I’ve selected thought-provoking articles that explore a variety of issues. Here’s what’s down below:

• a school district’s effort to achieve racial equity by detracking its classes

• an “easy” reform that could improve academic achievement

• a call to action for us to focus on the struggles of boys

• the stubborn problems of student absenteeism and teacher shortages

Hope you enjoy this week’s articles, and have a great weekend.

✏️ If you’re an educator, student, or parent: How was your first day of school?

Leave a comment

1️⃣ Tracking Racial Equity

When David Glasner became the superintendent of Shaker Heights Schools in the suburbs of Cleveland in 2019, he thought he had arrived in a progressive place. After all, this was Shaker Heights — the community that had famously integrated its neighborhoods back in the 1950s, when the rest of America wanted the opposite.

But after visiting the district’s schools, Dr. Glasner soon realized that behind that noble facade stood a strong system of academic tracking. Enrichment classes available only to elite students in elementary school led to honors classes in middle school, then Advanced Placement classes in high school. It didn’t take Dr. Glasner’s doctorate to deduce that white students dominated those spaces.

What he did next was both bold and controversial. During the pandemic, without consulting families or engaging teachers, Dr. Glasner integrated courses at the early grades to dismantle the racist tracking system and to ensure that Black students would receive equitable educational opportunities.

Then all hell broke loose.

By Laura Meckler • The Washington Post • 13 mins

Read the article

2️⃣ An Old, Easy Way to Improve Public Education

As the last article demonstrated, detracking is not the easiest, smoothest way to improve public education. Why not try something simpler? asks Emmy-winning education journalist John Merrow in this concise essay. His answer: looping, or lengthening the time teachers have with their students.

Dr. Merrow writes:

The notion of finding a new dentist or physician each year for every child seems absurd. We want children to know their doctors and to feel comfortable with them. It’s important for physicians to know their patients as they grow. Yet for many of these same children, their schools assign them to a new teacher and require they learn a new set of classroom routines and adult expectations every year.

The logic makes sense. So does my lived experience; I taught three cohorts of students from ninth grade until they graduated. My memory says it was wonderful (overall, of course — maybe not every day). Furthermore, Dr. Merrow cites a recent study in Tennessee that found that looping improved academic achievement, especially among boys of color, and decreased chronic absences and suspension rates. What’s not to love?

By John Merrow • The Merrow Report • 5 mins

Read the article

Judy, who belongs to VIP Joel and loyal reader Christsna, is kind and has a lot of energy. Want your pet to appear here? Nominate them here: hltr.co/pets

3️⃣ What To Do With Boys

We already know the statistics: boys are struggling. For example, they perform worse (especially in English) than girls. They go to college less often. They get in trouble more. If boys underperform girls, shouldn’t we do something about it? Of course we should, argues Richard Reeves in this succinct essay. He even has concrete ideas that make sense. So what’s the problem? Unfortunately, in this piece, Dr. Reeves does not address why policy makers and educators bristle at instituting reforms that would benefit boys. I have my hunches. If you have a hunch, I’d love to hear.

By Richard Reeves • No Mercy/No Malice • 7 mins

Read the article

4️⃣ Where are the teachers? Where are the students?

I’m blessed to work at a school that is fully staffed. And I’m blessed that when my colleagues get sick, we have a pool of substitutes eager to teach our students. But I acknowledge that my experience is not the norm. The teacher shortage is significant and is not going away anytime soon. It’s deeply sad and disturbing to me. We have families sending their children to school to follow their dreams, and instead they’re being shuttled to multipurpose rooms to waste their days rotting their brains on their phones. If no teachers are there to teach them, why should students go to school in the first place? The answer? They’re not. Chronic absenteeism persists unabated.

“Millions of Kids Are Missing” • By Bianca Vázquez Toness • AP • 6 mins
”Schools Scramble to Find Teachers” • By Shannon Pettypiece • NBC • 7 mins

Thank you for reading this week’s episode. Hope you liked it. 😀

To our 9 new subscribers — including Dee, Danielle, Molly, Ella, Dashka, and Lance — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. To our long-time subscribers (Steve! Steven! Stephen!), you’re pretty great, too. Loyal reader Jenn, thank you for sharing the newsletter and getting the word out.

If you like Article Club, please help it grow. I really appreciate your support. Here are two ways you can help out:

📬 Invite your friends to subscribe. Know someone who’s kind, thoughtful, and loves to read? I’d love it if you encouraged them to subscribe. Word of mouth is by far the best way to strengthen our reading community. Thank you for spreading the word.

Share Article Club

❤️ Become a paid subscriber, like Dee (thank you!). You’ll join an esteemed group of readers who value Article Club. Plus you’ll gain access to our monthly discussions, our monthly quiet reading hours, and my personal audio letters from me to you. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year.

On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT.

#407: “I Don‘t Find Despair Useful”

An interview with Matthew Desmond, author of “Why Poverty Persists in America”

Welcome, new subscribers, and welcome back, loyal readers! I’m happy you’re here.

Today’s issue is dedicated to an interview with Matthew Desmond, the author of “Why Poverty Persists in America,” August’s article of the month.

Originally published in The New York Times Magazine in April, the piece is an excerpt from Prof. Desmond’s bestselling book, Poverty, by America. If you haven’t read it yet, I urge you to do so — and join our discussion on August 27, if you’re moved.

Join our discussion

Fellow Article Clubber Melinda and I got a chance to interview Prof. Desmond a few weeks back, and it was an honor. I won’t give everything away, because it’s better to listen, but we discussed a number of topics, including:

• how poverty is about having a lack of choice, not just money

• how exploitation is at the center of poverty

• what it means to be a poverty abolitionist

Most of all, it became abundantly clear in our conversation that Prof. Desmond doesn’t find despair useful. Even though poverty is a result of harmful policies, shame won’t solve the problem. Rather, Prof. Desmond wants us to do something about the issue — not just talk about it. There’s too much “informed sophisticated passivity,” he said.

For the past half-century, we’ve approached the poverty question by pointing to poor people themselves — posing questions about their work ethic, say, or their welfare benefits — when we should have been focusing on the fire. The question that should serve as a looping incantation, the one we should ask every time we drive past a tent encampment, those tarped American slums smelling of asphalt and bodies, or every time we see someone asleep on the bus, slumped over in work clothes, is simply: Who benefits? Not: Why don’t you find a better job? Or: Why don’t you move? Or: Why don’t you stop taking out payday loans? But: Who is feeding off this?

As someone who sometimes likes to read and think and discuss, yet remain on the sidelines, I appreciated Prof. Desmond’s call to action. In the interview, he offers five ways we can be poverty abolitionists. Let’s stop debating people and sighing about how bad things are, he says. Let’s stop trying to change other people’s beliefs. Calling himself a “pragmatic writer,” he said, “I want my work to do things.”

endpovertyusa.org

Thank you for listening to this week’s episode. Hope you liked it. 😀

To our 16 new subscribers — including Joe, Kent, Emily, Rachael, Dhaka, Jordan, McKenzie, and Robert — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. To our long-time subscribers (Rose! Rosie! Rosaline!), you’re pretty great, too. Loyal reader Ivy, thank you for sharing the newsletter and getting the word out.

If you like Article Club, please help it grow. I really appreciate your support. Here are two ways you can help out:

📬 Invite your friends to subscribe. Know someone who’s kind, thoughtful, and loves to read? I’d love it if you encouraged them to subscribe. Word of mouth is by far the best way to strengthen our reading community. Thank you for spreading the word.

Share Article Club

❤️ Become a paid subscriber, like Nellie and Tanya (thank you!). You’ll join an esteemed group of readers who value Article Club. Plus you’ll gain access to our monthly discussions, our monthly quiet reading hours, and my personal audio letters from me to you. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year.

On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT.

#406: The Journalism Issue

Racism, scandal, and two feel-good stories about the news

Welcome, new subscribers (there are many of you), and welcome back, loyal readers! Thank you for being here.

This week’s issue is about journalism. Ever since I started reading the Sporting Green when I was 10, I’ve loved leafing through a print newspaper every morning. My beloved high school journalism teacher Nick Ferentinos championed the rights and responsibilities of a free press — and made sure we practiced them. I’m even part of a “Journalism Club,” where we discuss issues that the news industry is facing. Maybe I’m not a news junkie, but I’m certainly an enthusiast.

We know journalism is struggling (for example: newspapers are dying, trust in the news is plummeting). But like last week, I didn’t want to choose articles with familiar headlines. The point of Article Club, after all, is to offer a variety of viewpoints from a variety of publications. That’s why I’m pleased with this week’s pieces, which include:

• A history of racism in American newsrooms, focusing on The Philadelphia Inquirer

• A profile of perhaps the worst plagiarist-fabulist journalist of all time

• Two feel-good stories: how young people and small-town reporters are getting scoops and making journalism proud

I hope you read and listen to one (or more) of this week’s selections. If you do, and if they resonate, please share your thoughts with the Article Club community. All you need to do is click the button below. I’d love to hear from you.

Leave a comment

1️⃣ Black City. White Paper.

Philadelphia is considered by many as the birthpace of American democracy. But if this is true, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Wesley Lowery writes, then “to be the birthplace of American democracy is also to be the birthplace of American inequality.”

In this outstanding article, an in-depth report on The Philadelphia Inquirer, Mr. Lowery explains how the esteemed newspaper got its roots nearly 200 years ago and how the murder of George Floyd made clear that the publication had long failed at serving its community, in particular its Black readership.

While the report focuses on one newspaper, Mr. Lowery raises universal questions about the role of the press in American society and whether white-dominated institutions, once interrogated, can become more equitable without a total overhaul.

By Wesley Lowery • The Philadelphia Inquirer • 25 mins • with my annotations

Read the article

2️⃣ Hello, My Name Is Stephen Glass, and I’m Sorry

Back in the last millennium, when the truth mattered, a man named Stephen Glass wanted to make it big in journalism. He landed a job at The New Republic, endeared himself to his colleagues with self-deprecatory charm, and got to work — reporting and writing and churning out some solid pieces. But then he asked himself: Is there a better way? Yes, there was, he decided. That’s when Mr. Glass started making up exciting, bombastic, sensationalistic stories out of whole cloth.

This profile by his former friend Hanna Rosin not only summarizes the scandal but also explores issues of trust, redemption, and forgiveness. Can a reporter who breaks the most important rule in journalism (and then lies about it) truly change his ways? At what point can we believe a liar again?

By Hanna Rosin • The New Republic • 26 mins • with my annotations

Read the article

The skies are majestic outside Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado. Thank you to loyal reader Jenny for this wonderful photo. Article Clubbers, if you traveled somewhere beautiful this summer (pet or no pet), please share.

3️⃣ Missing Voices: A Tale of Two School Newspapers

This four-part series by young journalists in New York City is a must-listen if you care about education, equity, and the future of news. Reporters from The Bell follow two school newspapers and their staffs as they build their journalism programs in a segregated system in which resources go disproportionately to established schools with predominantly white populations. The podcast does an outstanding job making the case that all schools should have a robust journalism program.

By Wesley Almanzar, Jadelyn Camey, Fredlove Deshommes, Edward Mui and Jayden Williams • The Bell • 2 hours (4 parts) • Apple Podcasts

Listen to the podcast

4️⃣ A Local Paper First Sounded the Alarm on George Santos. Nobody Listened.

Don’t worry, this isn’t a podcast episode about George Santos. But it is an episode about how George Santos got exposed. And it wasn’t The New York Times that did the exposing — even though the Gray Lady got the credit. (That’s often the case in journalism.) In reality, it was the North Shore Leader, a local small-town newspaper out of Long Island, that got the scoop. In this interview, New Yorker reporter Clare Malone explains how the Leader realized Mr. Santos was a total phony, how the paper reported the story, and how its editor and staff members felt when their more-famous competitors got the glory.

By Clare Malone and David Remnick • The New Yorker Radio Hour • 54 minutes • Apple Podcasts

Listen to the podcast

Thank you for reading this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀

To our 40 new subscribers — including Breanne, Dianna, Paige, Sam, Maria, Samantha, Liz, Sadie, Eduardo, CJ, Jessica, Marcus, Claire, Michele, Jeff, Lily, Leonardo, Sara, Allison, Malui, Max, Raj, Emma, Luis, Zara, George, Tim, Carla, and Cristi, I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. To our long-time subscribers (Quentin! Quinn! Quincy!), you’re pretty great, too. Loyal reader Henry, thank you for sharing the newsletter and getting the word out.

If you like Article Club, please help it grow. I really appreciate your support. Here are two ways you can help out:

📬 Invite your friends to subscribe. Know someone who’s kind, thoughtful, and loves to read? I’d love it if you encouraged them to subscribe. Word of mouth is by far the best way to strengthen our reading community. Thank you for spreading the word.

Share Article Club

❤️ Become a paid subscriber, like Tim and Tom (thank you!). You’ll join an esteemed group of readers who value Article Club. Plus you’ll gain access to our monthly discussions, our monthly quiet reading hours, and my personal audio letters from me to you. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year.

On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT.

#405: The Man Issue

Four stories that explore the question, “What does it mean to be a man?”

Just like that, it’s August. It was my birthday yesterday, work started up in earnest this week, and Article Club is back after its summer hiatus. Thank you for being here.

This week’s issue is about the state of men today. We know they’re struggling (for example: decreasing college graduation rate, increasing suicide rate, decreasing life expectancy). But I didn’t want to choose articles with familiar headlines. And I didn’t want all doom and gloom. The point of Article Club, after all, is to promote thoughtfulness, nunace, and empathy. I’m particularly pleased with the lead article, which I highly recommend, especially to educators as they return to school. The other three pieces — including a “best-of” from the archives — are solid selections, too. Hope you enjoy one or more of them, and then let me know if they resonate. 📚

Leave a comment

⭐️ We’re back: Join us for this month’s discussion of “Why Poverty Persists in America” on Sunday, August 27. The online conversation is 2:00 - 3:30 pm on Zoom, and the in-person discussion is 11:00 am - 1:00 pm in Oakland. It’d be great to have you. Pulitzer Prize-winning author Matthew Desmond knows how to write, and in this excerpt from his book, Poverty, by America, he explains why economic equity has not improved over the last 50 years. The answer is not a decrease in government spending. Rather, the answer is capitalism’s unchecked expansion of exploitation. Then, Prof. Desmond challenges us to do something about it.

On the fence? Listen to fellow Article Clubber Melinda and I chat about the piece in this podcast episode. Don’t worry, there aren’t major spoilers, plus Melinda is great. Besides, listening might spur you to sign up for the discussion.

Listen here

All right, have I convinced you? If so, it’s time to sign up! I’m looking forward to seeing you there. (Also, feel free to ask me questions about how it works.)

Sign up for the discussion

1️⃣ The Unbecoming: A former L.A. gang member finds his resurrection tale at UC Berkeley

Despite my tendency to gravitate toward serious articles and heavy topics, I always love a feel-good story — especially around this time, when I’m gathering inspiration to start up another school year. This is one outstanding feel-good story.

At first glance: Jessi Fernandez joins a gang, loses loved ones, and spends time in jail, but nothing extinguishes his dream to make something of himself and give back to his family. So he joins Homeboy Industries, gets the support he needs, and eventually earns his college degree from UC Berkeley. It’s a pretty amazing personal story of resilience, determination, and as Mr. Fernandez says, ganas.

On a second glance: It was palpable how Mr. Fernandez’s success was a community undertaking. Many people and organizations banded together to provide guidance and a strong safety net — from Homeboy Industries, to Community Overcoming Recidivism through Education, to the University of Oxford, to the People of Color House, to Berkeley Underground Scholars, to Father Greg Boyle, to Brittany Morton, to Kevin McCarthy. It was heartwarming and staggering to take in. It also reminded me that much of my work as an educator is connecting young people to a network of possibilities in their community, to support them on their life path.

And one last thing: It didn’t hurt that Mr. Fernandez found solace at school, sought out mentors along the way, and always came to class prepared. It also didn’t hurt that Mr. Fernandez is a deep, curious thinker. At his graduation, in addition to announcing that his next step is to pursue a doctorate in sociology, he quoted Paulo Freire:

Maybe the journey isn’t so much about becoming anything. It’s about un-becoming everything that isn’t really you, so you can be who you were meant to be in the first place.

By James Rainey • The Los Angeles Times • 14 mins • my annotations

Read the article

2️⃣ They Lost Their Kids to Fortnite

A generation ago, we were supposed to be scared of video games because they made our boys violent. Not so, said the research. But now, games have become so addictive that boys rarely go outside, spend way less time in unstructured play, and experience fits of rage when parents try to regulate their screen use. This story of Canadian mom Alana and her Fortnite-loving son Cody is an extreme but sadly familiar one. Cody loses interest in soccer and school; he steals his family’s money to make in-app purchases; he breaks a window in a fit of rage. His parents seek professional help for Cody. But they also realize that this problem is not a personal or family failure. Instead of blaming themselves, they take Epic Games to court, joining a class action lawsuit claiming that the company knows exactly what it’s doing and is purposely exploiting children and promoting addictive behaviors to pad their profits.

By Luc Rinaldi • Maclean’s • 24 mins • no paywall • my annotations

Read the article

Mouse, who belongs to loyal reader Corinne, likes fast car rides in the convertible, especially when the destination is Crescent City, California. Want your pet to appear here? hltr.co/pets

3️⃣ Men Are Lost. Here’s a Map Out of the Wilderness.

“I started noticing it a few years ago,” columnist Christine Emba begins this essay. “Men, especially young men, were getting weird.” She quotes a friend: “Men are in their flop era.” In this comprehensive opinion piece about the state of men and masculinity, Ms. Emba covers her subject from every angle. She considers the incel, the hoodie-wearer, the alt-righter, the manosphere, the Proud Boys, the gamer. Ms. Emba takes a look at history, reminding us that it’s not only our generation that has stressed out about the “true meaning” of masculinity. She explains how Jordan Peterson and Sen. Josh Hawley and Andrew Tate and other manfluencers have reclaimed a traditional masculinity of protectiveness, leadership, and emotional security that is attractive to young men. But it’s also violent and misogynistic, Ms. Emba argues. The problem, she writes, is that a new definition of “good masculinity” has not yet emerged. And because progressives are not comfortable focusing on the struggles of men (for fear of being labeled as sexist), it’s going to take a long time to develop a sense of masculinity that is healthier and more robust.

By Christine Emba • The Washington Post • 26 mins • my annotations

Read the article

A FAVORITE FROM THE ARCHIVES

4️⃣ S-Town

Chosen for the newsletter back in 2017, this podcast series caught my attention again this summer, for some reason, and I binged-listened to it again, just like last time. Six years ago, the story of John McLemore and the plight of men in his Alabama town helped urban elites understand Southern deplorables and the Trump victory. What begins as a Serial-style whodunit quickly morphs into something much more sinister. Some people found the whole project exploitative, especially because Mr. McLemore never gave his consent to several episodes. Despite the controversy, I found the storytelling even more gripping and the main character even more heartbreaking this time around. If you haven’t had a chance to listen, I say try it, if you can stomach the subject matter. (There are many content warnings.) You certainly won’t forget Mr. McLemore anytime soon.

By Brian Reed • Serial and This American Life • 7 hrs • Apple Podcasts

Listen to the podcast

Thank you for reading this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀

To our 5 new subscribers — including Samantha and Cristi, I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. To our long-time subscribers (Penelope! Penny! Phoebe!), you’re pretty great, too. Loyal reader Gene, thank you for sharing the newsletter and getting the word out.

If you like Article Club, please help it grow. I really appreciate your support. Here are two ways you can help out:

📬 Invite your friends to subscribe. Know someone who’s kind, thoughtful, and loves to read? I’d love it if you encouraged them to subscribe. Word of mouth is by far the best way to strengthen our reading community. Thank you for spreading the word.

Share Article Club

❤️ Become a paid subscriber, like Nancy (thank you!). You’ll join an esteemed group of readers who value Article Club. Plus you’ll gain access to our monthly discussions, our monthly quiet reading hours, and my personal audio letters from me to you. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year.

On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT.

#404: The Article Club Enneagram

What’s your reading personality type?

Happy Thursday, loyal readers. Thank you for being here.

This week, I have something a bit different for you. Instead of the regular fare of outstanding, thought-provoking articles, let’s delve deeply into our psyches, shall we?

Our reading psyches, that is.

For the first time ever, I’m happy to announce The Article Club Enneagram. Like the traditional Enneagram, which encourages self-knowledge and personal growth, the Article Club Enneagram aims to uncover our authentic reading personalities, especially as they pertain to this publication.

Which type of reader are you? What’s your reading personality type?

Before we dive in, here are a few important caveats:

1. This is not meant to be serious.

2. You don’t need to know anything about the traditional Enneagram.

3. Your Article Club “reading personality type” by no means defines how you are as a reader overall (or in a different context).

All right, I think we’re ready! Let’s take a look at the Article Club reading personality types.

Big thanks to loyal reader Peter for the illustration, using his new original (and beautiful) typeface, Peasy.

You’ll notice that like the traditional Enneagram, there are nine reading personality types — ranging from “The Blurber” (#1) all the way to “The Supporter” (#9). My sense is that even without reading the descriptions of each personality type, you might already lean toward two or three of the categories.

Important: One type is not “better” than another. (My Enneagram friends say that every single number is stressful!)

Which way you lean, of course, likely depends on many factors, including:

• how long you’ve been a subscriber

• whether you know me personally

• if you’re an introvert or an extrovert

• if you like the articles and topics I choose

• how much time you can cobble together to read

• and more

Do you have an initial idea as to which type of reader you are, just from the titles? If so, that’s great. But most of us will need to go a little deeper to determine our true Article Club reading personality type.

To help with that process, I wrote up descriptions of each type, with the help of loyal reader Ben, an eight-year subscriber. Please take a look.

Big thanks to loyal reader Ben for his help with the words. Big thanks to loyal reader Peter for the illustration. Isn’t Peasy beautiful?

Is everything becoming clearer now? Have you landed on one reader type that you’re certain of? Or are you choosing between two types? Maybe you’re a 2 during the school year and a 5 in the summers? Or you aspire to be a 1, but right now, because of Life, you’re an 8? Please take your time — there’s no right answer. Only you know.

(Now, I’m pretty sure the traditional Enneagram people would say it’s not possible to be more than one number, or to “change” personalities. My response to this is, here at Article Club, let’s do whatever we want!)

Most importantly: Whichever reading personality type you are, I am very happy that you’re here. At Article Club, there’s room for everyone. 📚

All right, it’s time: Which type of reader are you?

You are 100% not obligated to share your Article Club reading personality type with anyone, but I warmly invite you to do so! All you need to do is click the button below. Feel free to share your number and say a little bit about why you chose it. It’d be great to hear from many of you. I’m very eager to see where we all stand.

Leave a comment

Thank you for reading this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀

To our 5 new subscribers — including Nithya, Patrick, Alicia, and Devron — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. To our long-time subscribers (Opal! Omar! Olga!), you’re pretty great, too. Loyal reader Fern, thank you for sharing the newsletter and getting the word out.

If you like Article Club, please help it grow. I really appreciate your support. Here are two ways you can help out:

📬 Invite your friends to subscribe. Know someone who’s kind, thoughtful, and loves to read? I’d love it if you encouraged them to subscribe. Word of mouth is by far the best way to strengthen our reading community. Thank you for spreading the word.

Share Article Club

❤️ Become a paid subscriber, like Monique (thank you!). You’ll join an esteemed group of readers who value Article Club. Plus you’ll gain access to our monthly discussions, our monthly quiet reading hours, and my personal audio letters from me to you. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year.

On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT.

#403: Mariachi and Spelling Bees

Guest editor Tony Johnston shares great articles on Mariachi music healing, undercover cops scheming, “wokeness” criticizing, and Spelling Bee championing

I’m very excited to announce that this is the first-ever special guest issue. In just a moment, I’ll turn it over to my close friend (for 20+ years!), educator extraordinaire, literacy expert, big reader, and ardent Article Clubber Tony Johnston.

But first, one quick thing: Last week was The AI Issue, where I challenged you to figure out which article blurbs I wrote vs. which ones ChatGPT wrote. Let’s take a look at how you voted.

I’m happy to reveal that the answer is 1 & 3 and that nearly half of you got it correct. Great work! But is this a good or a bad thing? Does this mean that AI is fairly good at writing like me, or does this mean that I write sorta like an AI? 😀 Anyway, much food for thought, and most importantly, thank you very much for playing.

Now on to this week’s issue! You’re in very good hands with my good friend Tony. Way back when, we taught ninth grade Humanities together, and since then, he’s gone off to do amazing things as a professor of education in West Hartford. His work focuses on adolescent literacy and supporting youth of color in schools. Plus he’s a smart and funny guy, and I’m confident you’ll enjoy his article selections. Let’s get to it.

Hi, my name is Tony and I am not an AI — or am I? I am the guest editor for this week’s issue of Article Club. I am glad you are here and I hope you enjoy the 403rd edition!

It was exciting and humbling that Mark invited me to assemble this offering of articles. In working to compile these pieces I was struck by just how much time and reading Mark must do in order to get us three or four great pieces, and I encourage others to guest edit if only to go down the rabbit holes Mark navigates so well.

Like many of you, I look forward to the timely offering of Article Club each Thursday. If you are like me, you don’t always get a chance to read all (any?) of the articles, but just seeing Mark’s thoughtful blurbs about each piece, his welcoming tone, and gentle invitation to participate in a reading community brings feelings of comfort. It’s similar to the packages of Top Ramen and hot cocoa mix in my cupboard which, like Mark’s articles, often remain unopened — it’s just good to know they are there.

The articles selected for this week reflect my effort to emulate Mark’s deft ability to provide us with pieces that are timely, without being heavy handed or redundant. With this in mind, I avoided articles that discuss AI or ChatGPT, billionaire feuds, or the SAG-AFTRA strike.

This week’s lead article introduces you to meet an undercover Chicago cop investing crooked coppers; next we meet a Mariachi music teacher in Uvalde; after that we have a scathing critique of liberal perspectives; and the last piece celebrates an unlikely winner of the nation’s first Spelling Bee!

As a guest editor I have the privilege of asking a question of my fellow readers, a chance to learn a bit more about the other 1,000+ subscribers who welcome this weekly pearl to their inbox. Because I do research on how people engage in literacy activities, I’d love to learn which description best reflects your reading habits. Plus, polls are fun.

Thanks for playing! I count myself as mostly a reader of fiction, but also — who has time to read? Luckily for us, Mark does! Now let’s get to this week’s articles.

1️⃣ The Gutsy Undercover Cop Who Took Down Chicago P.D.’s Most Crooked Crew

I recently finished Small Mercies by Dennis Lehane, a work of fiction about Boston during the 1974 school desegregation chaos, the Boston mafia, and one pissed off mama. I recommend it. Reading begets reading — and this week’s lead article is without question informed by my reading of Lehane and my love of thrillers. It is a suspenseful and well-written long read (40 minutes) by David Harris about Black Chicago cops going undercover to uncover corruption, only to be undermined when the cops they busted stopped looking like them.

His real identity was even more unfathomable — and the corrupt cops who had just shaken him down had no idea what was coming for them.

Read the article

2️⃣ How a High School Mariachi Team Triumphed in Uvalde

The tragedy and inaction to stop the shooter who killed 19 children and two teachers at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde occurred just over a year ago. Feelings of anger, grief, and numbness readily returned as I reviewed articles and news footage commemorating the anniversary. Then, I found our second article, by Julyssa Lopez, which is less about the tragedy and more one that celebrates the teachers, art in the schools, the resiliency and leadership of teenagers, and the Mariachi music helping to heal this small town of 15,000. This is the sort of read that allows us to heal, and to celebrate the heroes and small victories in spaces where the unfathomable overwhelms.

When Martinez started at Uvalde High, a lot of his students didn’t take the music seriously. Within two years, they’d become the pride of Uvalde, during a wrenching time.

Read the article

When you are the guest editor, you can add your own pets. Here our dogs Tucker and Primo, who are giving me that “do you mind?” look!

3️⃣ Doing the Work

From time to time, we can count on Article Club to provide readings that cause a sense of dissonance, and in that spirit our third article is a scathing critique of liberal views and makes the case that “woke” is the new Protestantism. As a Bay Area product now living in the Nutmeg state — where the influence of those early Puritan values echo still — I was struck by the following analogy by the author, Ian Buruma:

It was the “spirit of hard work” that characterized those striving to meet the Protestant goal of ethical perfection. This could be interpreted literally, as the work of accumulating wealth through honest labor. But this labor, and its material fruit, go together with the spiritual work of moral improvement. There are clear contemporary parallels in what theorists of antiracism call “doing the work,” which functions as both a sign of one’s current enlightenment and of his or her commitment to continuous and endless self-improvement.

If you can stomach the white tears by the author about his own experience being “canceled” and the conservative talking points of the familiar reductionist claims about the increasingly tenuous term of “woke,” give it a shot! The commentary about the shifting agenda of the Left from the 1960s to today certainly merits consideration.

Read the article

4️⃣ When She Won the First National Spelling Bee, Marie C. Bolden Dealt a Blow to Racism

The first Spelling Bee in the US was 115 years ago, and our final article discusses the surprising winner, Marie C. Bolden, and her untold story. Bolden not only wins with a perfect score and a gold medal she kept hidden from her own family, but does so in the face of racism and prejudice (one of the words that was actually included as part of that initial competition).

Read the article

Big gratitude to Tony for guest editing this issue. Thank you for bringing us four outstanding, thought-provoking articles. And for being the first-ever guest editor. It’s a big deal! (Plus, Tony’s an astute reader: not everyone knows I’m a huge fan of mariachi and spelling bees.) Article Clubbers, please feel free to leave a comment to share your appreciation for Tony’s contribution. (And let me know if you’d like to guest edit someday!)

Leave a comment

To our 3 new subscribers — including Paris and Devron — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. To our long-time subscribers (Opal! Oakley! Oliver!), you’re pretty great, too. Loyal reader Fern, thank you for sharing the newsletter and getting the word out.

If you like Article Club, please help it grow. I really appreciate your support. Here are two ways you can help out:

📬 Invite your friends to subscribe. Know someone who’s kind, thoughtful, and loves to read? I’d love it if you encouraged them to subscribe. Word of mouth is by far the best way to strengthen our reading community. Thank you for spreading the word.

Share Article Club

❤️ Become a paid subscriber, like Veronica (thank you!). You’ll join an esteemed group of readers who value Article Club. Plus you’ll gain access to our monthly discussions, our monthly quiet reading hours, and my personal audio letters from me to you. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year.

On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT.

#402: The AI Issue (sort of)

Great pieces on learning loss, the efficacy of books, Ocean Vuong, and dogs

Happy July, loyal readers, and thank you for being here.

Everyone’s talking about AI and how it’s either going to take over the world or help us save the world. It got me thinking, in a much smaller kind of way: Could AI replace me as the editor of Article Club? Could ChatGPT assemble the articles, write the blurbs, and feature the cute pet photos? In fact, is that what’s happening right now with this introduction? 😀

Don’t worry, I’m not transferring ownership of this newsletter to a bot. But this week, let’s try something a bit different, just for experimentation’s sake. Here goes:

• There are four selections below: three articles and one podcast episode.

• I have written two of the blurbs. ChatGPT 3.5 has written the other two.

• Can you tell the difference?

Want to try it out? If so, there’s a one-question “quiz” at the bottom. You can see how other readers responded, and then I’ll reveal the answer next week.

And if you’re not interested, that’s not a problem. I hope you check out the selections regardless. They’re great this week — covering a wide range of issues, including how a school district tries to support its students academically after the pandemic; whether traditional books need to be modified to meet the modern reader’s brain; how award-winning poet Ocean Vuong thinks about the purpose and impact of his art; and how a dog’s companionship can heal the mind and the heart. Hope you enjoy.

⭐️ Also new this week: At the bottom of each selection, you’ll find four new features (that you’ve suggested!) to encourage better and deeper reading. They are:

1. A dedicated “read the article” button — you can’t miss it!

2. The ability to save the article to read later on Pocket (when you have more time)

3. An annotated version of the article (learn what’s going on in my head as you read)

4. A clear citation of the author and publication (giving credit where credit is due)

Let me know what you think. As always, I’d love to hear from you.

Leave a comment

1️⃣ The Pandemic Generation

The pandemic was horrible for our young people. There’s no doubt about it. Especially if you focus on mental health, everyone will agree with you. But if you start talking about academics, you might get pushback. Want to trigger a Bay Area educator, for instance? Say “learning loss” and see what happens. The rejoinders will come fast: “Learning takes many forms” and “Don’t have a deficit mindset” and “Our kids learned life skills during the pandemic.”

I don’t personally like the term either. And I don’t think it’s helpful to litigate whether schools should have remained closed for the 2020-21 school year. But I appreciated this article exploring how the community of Richmond, Virginia engaged with the question of whether shifting to a year-round calendar (and adding 40 days of instruction for some students) would address their widening achievement gap. Reading the piece reminded me of two things in education: (1) Change takes a very long time, (2) When Black people want something, they usually don’t get it.

By Alec MacGillis • The New Yorker • 24 mins • with my annotations • save for later

Read the article

2️⃣ Why Books Don’t Work

Move over, books. You’re no longer the best medium for conveying knowledge. In this article, applied researcher Andy Matushack argues that readers absorb only a fraction of the information presented in books. The problem is that books have no explicit theory of how people actually learn, and the implied model that they are built upon, “transmissionism,” is problematic. Readers must engage in complex metacognition, which can be mentally taxing, to effectively absorb the knowledge presented in books. The article explores how books could be improved by understanding more about human cognition. For example, books should consider readers’ interests, skills, and background knowledge, modifying their content based on the reader.

By Andy Matuschak • 18 mins • with my annotations • save for later

Read the article

Ryan, who belongs to loyal reader Ashley, likes digging and looking for squirrels. Want your pet to appear here? hltr.co/pets

3️⃣ Ocean Vuong: On Telling Lies and Building Family

Even if you haven’t spent one minute reading his poetry or his brilliant novel, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, you’ll love listening to Ocean Vuong’s thoughtful, soothing voice in this outstanding interview. Mr. Vuong talks about how he became a poet, how he met his partner, what his family means to him, and thanks to his hero Annie Dillard, when he’ll know it’s time to stop writing. Here’s one of many memorable quotations from the conversation:

I can be satisfied with a sentence, but I don’t know if that gives me true joy. I’m truly happy when I know that my creative work, language — which weighs absolutely nothing, is immaterial, ethereal — has created a home that can sustain and bolster the people I love. It feels like a magic trick or a dream.

Seriously, I could listen to Mr. Vuong talk about any topic, including his favorite basketball team, the New York Knicks, a team he loves because he enjoys rooting for “pantaloons.”

By Anna Sale • Death, Sex & Money • 39 mins • Apple Podcasts • save for later

Listen to the podcast

4️⃣ The Way Home

After a freak accident, writer and teacher Jane Ratcliffe suffers from a brain injury that impairs her mobility and cognitive abilities. She is lonely and frustrated until a neighbor’s dog, Ortiz, becomes her daily companion and motivates her to recover. Ms. Ratcliffe spends four years caring for him and going on long walks, forming a strong bond. She writes:

Ortiz licks my face. We touch foreheads. What would I do without him? Later, when I take him home to my neighbors’ house, he tries to leave with me, as he often does. Sometimes it’s a struggle to get him to stay there. Part of me believes Ortiz loves me more than he does his family.

One day, Ms. Ratcliffe’s neighbors announce they’re moving away, which prompts Ms. Ratcliffe to ask if she could keep Ortiz. They decline. Even though she’s grateful for the time they’ve spent together, what remains is a deep loss.

By Jane Ratcliffe • The Sun • 14 mins • with my annotations • save for later

Read the article

All right. Are you ready for the challenge?

OK, let’s review: Two of the blurbs above I wrote, and two of them an AI wrote (along with some light editing on my part). Can you tell which are which?

Thank you for playing! I’ll reveal the answers next Thursday.

Thank you for reading this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀

To our 8 new subscribers — including Jules, Martha, Sara, Ashley, Lakay and Kristin — I hope you find the newsletter a solid addition to your email inbox. To our long-time subscribers (Nora! Norah! Noreen!), you’re pretty great, too. Loyal reader Enrick, thank you for sharing the newsletter and getting the word out.

If you like Article Club, please help it grow. I really appreciate your support. Here are two ways you can help out:

📬 Invite your friends to subscribe. Know someone who’s kind, thoughtful, and loves to read? I’d love it if you encouraged them to subscribe. Word of mouth is by far the best way to strengthen our reading community. Thank you for spreading the word.

Share Article Club

❤️ Become a paid subscriber, like Nancy (thank you!). You’ll join an esteemed group of readers who value Article Club. Plus you’ll gain access to our monthly discussions, our monthly quiet reading hours, and my personal audio letters from me to you. It’s $5 a month or $36 a year.

If you like to read great articles and connect with other kind people, consider supporting Article Club by becoming a subscriber.

On the other hand, if you no longer want to receive this newsletter, please feel free to unsubscribe. See you next Thursday at 9:10 am PT.