A political orator wittily compared our party promises to western roads, which opened stately enough, with planted trees on either side, to tempt the traveller, but soon became narrow and…
Only once have we elected a really ignorant man to the Presidency. Andrew Jackson was almost completely innocent of book-learning when he came to the White House. Furthermore, he was…
For years, whenever I was in New Orleans, I used to run past an equestrian statue just outside the voluptuously green City Park. Though it is situated at a major…
Percentage by which the number of international borders with barriers has increased since 2014: 48 Year in which the U.S. Census Bureau may add a category for people from the…
By Daphne Merkin, from This Close to Happy: A Reckoning with Depression, a memoir that will be published next month by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Merkin is the author of…
From a list of phrases used in various languages to describe a sun-shower, the phenomenon of the sun shining while it rains. The phrases were compiled by Bert Vaux, a…
From a complaint filed in an Illinois circuit court last year by Robert Rialmo, a Chicago police officer, against the family of Quintonio LeGrier, a nineteen-year-old black man who was…
From affidavits written by people across the United States that were included in a lawsuit brought against the Department of Homeland Security by the Immigration Reform Law Institute. The lawsuit,…
By Dubravka Ugrešic, from an essay that was published in the September/October issue of World Literature Today. Ugrešic is the author of more than a dozen books. She was the…
From an interview with the philosopher George Steiner that was conducted in 2014 by Laure Adler, a journalist. The interview appears in A Long Saturday, which will be published in…
From a list of reasons cited by the Drug Enforcement Administration for suspecting travelers of transporting drugs. Originally compiled by a judge, the list appears in Unwarranted: Policing Without Permission,…
From scenarios presented in Fighter Not Killer, an app that is used by militant groups, including the Islamic State, to test combatants’ knowledge of international humanitarian law. The app was…
By Rachel Cusk, from Transit, a novel that was published this month by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Cusk is the author of eight previous novels, most recently Outline (2014).
From letters mailed last year to Gettysburg National Military Park by visitors who had taken rocks from the site as souvenirs.