Author: true mag admin

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Memoir in the Margins

The dance between journalism and memoir is like two old friends reconnecting at a party—there’s an awkwardness, a curiosity, and an undeniable chemistry. When I..
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Historical Memoir for Our Times: Lessons in Testimony and Resistance

Writers might consider how integrating historical or philosophical frameworks can elevate personal suffering into universal moral inquiry.
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The Writing is the Permanence

I stopped writing in my journal recently. Stopped cold. I convinced myself that I could dictate instead, to try and be 2x more productive, maybe..
a heavy fog overlaid on an image of a street with shops and people walking past, seemingly not paying attentionD
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Daily Photographs

On a slower pace, writing, and realizing what time brings.
a loaf of challah with old swedish handwritten text written overlaidT
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The Conversations We Weren’t Meant to Hear

"As both a nonfiction writer and novelist, I've discovered that these overheard conversations contain the most authentic speech, revealing their generational differences and cultural identities."
A photograph of orange California poppies (Genthe photograph collection, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division) overlaid with a fuzzy photograph of a fire burning high.G
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Gathering Speed and Complexity

A Primer for Craft in Literary Journalism: "In this understanding, craft has a bigger job to do than to enthrall or entertain, to make a true story read like fiction or feel like fantasy. In this understanding, creativity is part of the journalism, working in service to ideas, not in service of earning a label. We can’t separate the literary from the journalism at all."
two photos of a canal in amsterdam--one during the day, one during the night--overlayed on each other so that day or night evokes the memory of the other.W
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Writing on Memory, Considering When To Do So

"All genres have a central expectation, and that of memoir is wisdom," writes Kutlay in this meditation on history, memory, and writing about ourselves.
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The Secret to Everything

[First Runner-Up 2018 Proximity Essay Prize] Here in the last slip of rural country near Raleigh, I drive slowly down a gravel road, unsure if I’m going in the right direction. The road gradually becomes dirt: two tire ruts divided by a hump of grass. Sparse rows of pine trees line both sides of the narrow road. I’m a social worker, and I’m making an early morning visit, a new referral to start the day. This one a possible suicide case—I hate suicide cases.
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Already We Are Less Than Ever Before

[Winner of the 2018 Proximity Essay Prize] Fereidoun M. Esfandiary hypothesized the sun was the heart of utopia. He changed his name to FM-2030 to mark the year he’d turn 100. Interviewed by Larry King, FM-2030 wears a heavy white robe and says his new name is “neat.
This is a blue and green image depicting an obscure image underwater.S
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Swim Lessons

[Runner-Up for the 2024 Proximity Prize] They checked our military IDs as they stood in camouflage outside our high school and slung M-16 machine guns around their shoulders. And their eyes lingered a little too long on shy, sophomore girls standing in line.