VENICE — For a change, it was the Venetians who crowded the square. Days before Italy lifted coronavirus travel restrictions on Wednesday that had prevented the usual crush of international visitors from entering the city, hundreds of locals gathered on chalk asterisks drawn several feet apart. They had come to protest a new dock that…
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For all of its attention-sucking, data-mining downsides, the internet has held true to at least one of its original promises: connecting disparate groups of people. There’s hardly a better reminder of this than a global health crisis and a national wave of protests. Online, informal support networks have flourished; people are coordinating services for their…
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WASHINGTON — Long considered the world’s premier public health agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has fallen short in its response to the most urgent public health emergency in its 74-year history — a pathogen that has penetrated much of the nation, killing more than 100,000 people. The agency made early missteps in…
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Nikil Saval is a socialist candidate running for State Senate in Pennsylvania’s 1st district, which encompasses a huge swath of Philadelphia. He used to edit the literary and political magazine N+1, which is to say that he is more bookish than your standard elected-office-seeker. This occasionally gets in his way. During a recent forum about…
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Good morning. Concentration is hard to come by these days, amid the nation’s strife. We are living through a tough and chaotic and wrenching time, filled with fury and an abiding sadness. We’re unsettled. We’re tense. We’re divided. The emotions arrange themselves in combinations that make it hard to work, to read, to watch, to…
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For decades, drug companies have depended on a component in the blood of the horseshoe crab to test injectable medicines, including vaccines, for dangerous bacterial contaminants called endotoxins. Conservationists and some businesses have pushed for wide acceptance of an alternative test, to protect the horseshoe crabs and birds that feed on their eggs. Earlier this…
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It’s graduation season — and, understandably, parents, friends, classmates and the graduates themselves are at a loss for how to celebrate. For the 3.7 million expected to graduate high school this year, streaming a commencement address by a prominent politician or celebrity isn’t a substitute for the feeling you get walking across a stage and…
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In Unhitched, couples tell the stories of their relationships, from romance to vows to divorce to life afterward. Quarantining during the coronavirus pandemic has given Debi and Marc Ford time to reflect on the mistakes they each made during a nearly 13-year marriage. Both say that chasing external success strained their relationship and kept happiness…
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The fashion industry is in a state of emergency. This has been made clear not only by the mounting bankruptcies of big-name retailers, but also by the closure of beloved small businesses. These are brands that won’t bounce back. Before the Modist, Noor Tagouri would spend as much as an hour a day browsing fashion…
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How many days in a row can you wear sweatpants? As warmer weather arrives, it may be time to show a little leg and opt for shorts. Jim Moore, the creative director at large of GQ, sees two options: “Long and slim, or short and a little bit baggy,” he said. And nearly everything will…
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