Craft

The Longest War
In a new book, Jonathan Waldman tracks the history of rust

Propeller Q&A

Evan P. Schneider chats with Jonathan Waldman about Rust, mapping out a book project, and getting your ass in the chair. more

Publishing

Dear Nick
An open letter from the publisher of Nick Jaina's memoir, Get It While You Can

By Michael Heald

"You may be graceful on stage, Nick, but you were not graceful on the wet concrete of the Travelers Inn. You were folded in on yourself like a man who had dropped his glasses on the ground." more

Portfolio

Fantastic Worlds
Martin Venezky's dynamic book design is part translation, part theater

Propeller Q&A

Just as a filmmaker must create a complete physicality that the words in the text rarely provide, so a designer can sometimes build a complete, fantastic world that moves the book well beyond the manuscript and image choice... more

Speculative Cinema

She Selected Herself
Laura Poitras goes where Godard and Truffaut could not

By Dan DeWeese

If a speculative film is one that causes us to see our reality in a different way, Citizenfour is a speculative film. Some may prefer to define a speculative film as one that takes place in an alternate reality that we see as our possible future. If you prefer this second definition, Citizenfour is still a speculative film... more

Auteur

Transported
In Richard Linklater's films, conversation delivers the power of time travel

By Jonah Hall

In Richard Linklater's award-gathering Boyhood, as in most of his films, the audience is invited not only to watch, but to listen... more

Personal History

Birds Over Water
After Simone Weil's Gravity and Grace

By Sarah Kruse

I'm leaving my family on the West Coast, returning from a funeral. Nothing that surrounds me seems real. I have slipped between the cracks of something, or something has fallen away... more

Poetry

Four Poems by E.G. Cunningham

"Ladies in Wait"
"Flesh / Flash"
"Tenebroso for Greco"
"Gentle" more

Fiction

The Only One

By Margaret Malone

"My friend Robin, her parents got a divorce and her dad lived in a motel next to a Mexican restaurant for a while and then her parents got undivorced and her dad moved back in. So it's possible. It happens." more

Sport

Hanging On
Hassan Whiteside defies the narrative of "unmet potential"

by Jonah Hall

Hassan Whiteside entered the NBA at twenty-one, likely without a great deal of guidance, and critics quickly labeled him a case of unmet potential. He has spent this year rewriting those critics' narratives of him, in impressive fashion... more