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Four hundred years of harsh history delivered in 8,000 unflinching words
“Our founding ideals of liberty and equality were false when they were written. Black Americans fought to make them true. Without this struggle, America would have no democracy at all.” So begins...
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Free writing: Releasing your inner artist
Somewhere in the early pages of “Draft No. 4: On the Writing Process,” John McPhee gives a nod to daily news reporters. The author and New Yorker writer was explaining his own, wildly successful...
View ArticleDancing your way into the art of writing
I’ve studied an Indian classical dance form known as Bharatanatyam on and off since I was five. Bharatanatyam, like writing, has its own syntax: a combination of hand gestures, specific sequences of...
View ArticleElegance on the court — and on deadline
Kobe Bryant had enough championship rings for a fist, a mural bearing his image on Melrose Avenue and a history that echoes loudly in the #MeToo era. The former Lakers star’s shocking death with eight...
View ArticleIn good writing, clarity is job one
After 40-some years of practicing journalism, I decided there was much I still had to learn about the craft. So I became a teacher. Any of you who have gone from reporting and writing to talking about...
View Article“If you think of all these words just staggering around, grammar is their...
Who can say what causes a reader to pause, in one moment, a line or passage she might zoom through at other times? Some sudden notice of the melody of language? Some echo of a forgotten conversation?...
View ArticleUsing narrative digression to weave backstory, context and suspense into stories
I’m bleary-eyed as I write this. Late last night, I finished several weeks of binge-watching “The West Wing,” all 156 episodes of the nostalgic political series which ran on television for seven...
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A blocked writer rediscovers her voice as she discovers America’s national parks
I started the year on the road. I left a job of more than seven years — a happy, busy job that taught me so much until it didn’t and it was time to seek new adventures. It was the kind of job that...
View ArticleHow writers show you the love
It’s a predictable moment: A reporter needs some relevant emotion for story, so — recorder running and notebook poised — asks: “How does it feel?” You can insert the situation of your choice: Trial...
View Article“Iowa is a fairy tale.”
Editor’s note: The sentence in our headline is not the One Great Sentence flagged by Storyboard contributor Jill U. Adams. It’s the opening sentence of a profile of Iowa that sets up the sentence Adams...
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