Nonfiction

Essays

When Does a Divorce Begin?

Most people think of it as failure. For me it was an achievement.
Anahid Nersessian
Books

Vanity Fair’s Heyday

I was once paid six figures to write an article—now what?
Bryan Burrough
A Closer Read

Taking Offense

Reading through bad feeling
Garth Greenwell
Dan Fox as a child with his nain, or grandmother, in the chicken-filled yard of Siambr Wen, near Llanrwst, North Wales, UK
Essays

What Happened When I Began to Speak Welsh

By learning my family's language, I hoped to join their conversation.
Dan Fox
Sepia toned photograph showing painter Joan Mitchell behind a canvas in her studio
Essays

The Unfolding of Time in Paint

My encounters with Joan Mitchell's panels
Rachel Cohen

Browse

Nonfiction

An image of an old coin.
Essays

The Virtues and Vices of Speech

On truthfulness, deception, flattery, and more
Giovanni Gioviano Pontano
and
G. W. Pigman III
July 1, 2019
A still image from film of a creature running through the woods who appears to look like Bigfoot.
essays

The Wild Man Within

Peter Matthiessen’s Bigfoot
Jeff Wheelwright
July 1, 2019
A stack of old issues of The Yale Review. Courtesy Pentagram
Essays

I Harbor a Stillborn Scribe of the German Tongue in Me

On Germans and Jewishness
Peter Wortsman
May 13, 2019
A stack of old issues of The Yale Review. Courtesy Pentagram
Essays

What We Leave

Stealing pants from a rockstar
Sara Schaff
April 15, 2019
A stack of old issues of The Yale Review. Courtesy Pentagram
Essays

Cremation Society of Kentucky

A life in burned flesh
Raymond Abbott
April 8, 2019
A portrait by Picasso of Gertrude Stein.
Essays

“Sitting at the Table” with Stein and Ashbery

“An Occasion” for Thin[g]king
Karin Roffman
April 1, 2019
Louie Bellson lighting Pearl Bailey's cigarette
Essays

Cultural Differences

How fictional portrayals of intermarriage haven't quite caught up
Jennifer Acker
April 1, 2019
A stack of old issues of The Yale Review. Courtesy Pentagram
Essays

Music in the Second Person

Listening to Opus 110
Mark Mazullo
April 1, 2019
A stack of old issues of The Yale Review. Courtesy Pentagram
Essays

Myth and Anarchy

Matthew Spellberg
April 1, 2019
A photograph of Ann Petry.
Essays

Nothing New Under the Sun

Ann Petry’s The Street and The Narrows
Emily Bernard
April 1, 2019