2020 2020
We’ve had a year, you must admit, Whose misery would just not quit. At last, we offer this obit: We’re glad to see the back of it.
Dec 29, 2020 / Column / Calvin Trillin
What Can We Learn From the 1918 Pandemic? What Can We Learn From the 1918 Pandemic?
A recent history of the pandemic illuminates not just parallels with our moment but how a public health crisis can become a political one as well.
Dec 29, 2020 / Books & the Arts / Richard J. Evans
Random Assignment Random Assignment
It seems to want to rain but can’t. It fades to pink, an argument. Relinquish the dream. You can’t ever get what you want, You can’t please any of the people Any of the time. Time…
Dec 29, 2020 / Books & the Arts / Elisa Gabbert
Apples Apples
The townspeople paste wax apples on the trees, glow shyly out their windows as the Dictator struts past the monument of his father strutting past nothing at all. Yesterday, the Dic…
Dec 29, 2020 / Books & the Arts / Claire Schwartz
How the Fight Over Spain’s Anti-Fascist Legacy Involves a Former ‘Nation’ Editor How the Fight Over Spain’s Anti-Fascist Legacy Involves a Former ‘Nation’ Editor
Spain’s progressive government is protecting the tomb of Julio Álvarez del Vayo, foreign minister for the Republic during the Civil War and later a Nation editor. Spain’s right win...
Dec 28, 2020 / Sebastiaan Faber and Bécquer Seguín
The US Covid Death Toll Increases Exponentially The US Covid Death Toll Increases Exponentially
The impact of the pandemic on American lives continues to be devastating.
Dec 28, 2020 / OppArt / Andrea Arroyo
Somewhere Real Somewhere Real
Get in, George Eliot. I packed PB&Js. I’m bringing that rainbow parachute we held hands under as eight year olds. Get in, right beside Autumn, beside every manic pixie dream gi…
Dec 28, 2020 / Poems / Shira Erlichman
The Groundbreaking Honesty of Joe Sacco’s Comics Journalism The Groundbreaking Honesty of Joe Sacco’s Comics Journalism
His decades-long project of reportage in graphic form works like oral history—bearing witness to the historical traumas of his subjects.
Dec 28, 2020 / Books & the Arts / Jillian Steinhauer
Holding Our Breath for Four Years Holding Our Breath for Four Years
Exhaling after Trump’s environmental attacks.
Dec 26, 2020 / OppArt / Tjeerd Royaards
‘Christmas in My Soul’ ‘Christmas in My Soul’
Fifty years ago this season, Laura Nyro delivered a timeless rebuke to racism, militarism, and “the sins of politics.”
Dec 25, 2020 / John Nichols