writing

Every award-winning journalist started off somewhere. For New Yorker staff writer Margaret Talbot, that place was The Daily Californian, which she affectionately calls the “training ground” for her successful journalism career.

I was sitting in Portuguese 103 one dreary winter day last semester when it occurred to me — and this thought was not in English, but in the Portuguese-Spanish cocktail pseudo-dialect known as “Portunhol” — that I was, in that moment, a visitor to the Portuguese language.

On my computer, I wrote troves of poetry and metaphorical stories, burdening Microsoft Word documents with lamentations about the depression I had been dealing with since fourth grade, and about my parents divorcing. Alone in my room, symbolic pen in my hand, I began, in earnest, to cement my career as a writer.

I wrote in excruciating detail about everything that happened in my life. I’ve never had a very good memory, and I knew that what I didn’t record would be lost entirely.

From the connection between politics and spirituality to dating in the #MeToo age, Alicia Dattner doesn’t hold back in her comedy writing.

When I opened my inbox to a thank-you email from a reader two years ago, I paused. It was significant for two reasons. First, it told me the thoughts I had expressed were valid. Second, it convinced me I needed to write.

You want to write, but you're not sure where to start. If you haven't started writing yet, start planting those seeds. We can worry about the weeds later.

Although writing notes by hand seems onerous to many current college students, research shows that students who handwrite their notes retain information better than students who type notes.

My problem with science stems (pun intended) from beefs I have with the systems and institutions designed for learning it.