This week’s top 5 long reads

This week we feature articles about restorative justice, a donated body allegedly sold at Harvard, an ER doctor who recognized his own devastating condition, a fascinating career pivot, and a beleaguered chimpanzee. To do.

Mari Cohen | Jewish Currents | September 28, 2023 | 7,745 words

In 2015, I was on an Amtrak train that derailed, killing eight people, including the young man sitting next to me. I was lucky to escape with relatively minor injuries. In the years since then, I have often thought about the train engineer who was acquitted in a jury trial of a series of charges related to the accident. He had no intent to cause harm, and he certainly was not responsible for systemic problems that could have lessened the scale of the tragedy if Amtrak had proactively addressed them. I don’t think he should suffer. There is no doubt that living with the knowledge of what happened while he was driving the train is a bad enough burden. But this doesn’t mean I’m not angry about the accident, and the compensation Amtrak offered the victims didn’t do much to soothe those feelings. Sometimes I wonder what it’s like to talk to an engineer. This is because through the exchange of words, some kind of healing may be achieved for both parties. A similar idea is at the heart of Mari Cohen’s beautiful essay about hit-and-run victims. In the aftermath, Cohen began reporting on restorative justice approaches to traffic accidents. Advocates say this approach “better meets the needs of all involved, creates a private space where drivers can express remorse without legal repercussions, and where victims can receive an apology.” I believe. looking for. ” Through reading, interviews, and her own experiences, Cohen considers whether restorative justice is a viable alternative to criminal justice. She believes we can change our perceptions about closure. Hopefully, she suggests, that might be the case: “I’m trying to let go of the idea that a solution has to solve everything in order to do something,” she writes. —SD

Brenna Erlich Rolling Stone | December 4, 2023 | 4,937 words

This horrifying story describes a strange crossover between a morgue and a strange world. It was donated to Harvard University (through the Anatomy Gift Program) because Harvard University Mortuary Director Cedric Lodge was said to have allowed people to enter the morgue to purchase and take home bodies. The remains may have inadvertently become collectibles. Yes, those who gave their bodies to science may now have body parts on collectors’ shelves.Brenna Ehrlich covers this disturbing story rolling stone and discovers that other morgue owners have been charged with the same crime. It is difficult to understand that people in such a position of trust would sell fees, or that anyone would actually want to buy fees. This is a scary part of the world. However, through conversations with his family, Mr. Ehrlich shows us the true horror of this incident. Grieving families are unsure whether their remains are authentic or whether their relatives have been turned into strange trinkets. A touching detail was the number of people eager to discuss their loved ones’ secret recipes (William R. Buchanan ate his famous carrot cake, Doreen Gordon ate her amazing macarons, Adele Mazzone was good at pork fried rice). I appreciated the care Ehrlich took to humanize the people who donated the bodies in the first place. —C.W.

Grace Glassman | Slate | November 26, 2023 | 5,038 words

In ongoing medical emergencies, ordinary patients and their families may not understand exactly how dangerous the situation has become, as experts and experts speak a rapid succession of numbers and acronyms that only they can understand. It happens often. (Strangely enough, if you don’t know exactly how dire a situation is, you can’t understand how bad it could be. And this lack of understanding can sometimes turn into kindness.) First Aid As a treatment room physician, Grace Glassman didn’t have that luxury. When he went into hemorrhagic shock after giving birth to his third child by Caesarean section, he knew he would die without heroic medical intervention, so he did everything he could on his way to the operating room for life-saving surgery. I asked for many things. “The doctor was running next to my stretcher,” she wrote. “I found her hand and said, ‘Dr. P., please do it all for my children.’ I was shocked to see her wiping her tears. ” This work is a master class in personal essays. It unfolds at a perfect pace, placing you in the hospital room where the trauma unfolds, and providing the essential context needed to understand Glassman’s danger without overwhelming you with medical details. While all origin stories can be said to be both individual and universal, “Glassman” created a work that transcends its genre. —K.S.

Tad Friend | The New Yorker | December 4, 2023 | 8,925 words

Being an older rap fan means you’re faced with weird “what happened to X” moments on a regular basis. So Jesse James, the man behind the bizarre 1991 film “Shake It Like a White Girl,” is now a billionaire (by marriage), a triathlete (for fun), and , we learn that Jesse Eitzler is also passionate about becoming an athlete. A top motivational coach. I still don’t know how to react to this development, but I can at least say that this event has given Tad Friend his A+ profile up to date. This is a window into a world that feels like the end state of every “optimization” podcast you’ve ever heard. And they are determined to flock to the next city. They want trade secrets, and even better, they want the mindset to deploy them. ” Self-help, as it is now known, is a massive industry, with a man (most often) awarded his six-figure prize money for his one speech at a popular conference. That’s what Itzler is aiming for, albeit in the name of helping people find gratitude and overcome self-doubt. But while there’s no shortage of great scene work, from the waiting room before addressing the people selling dialysis machines to the spontaneous swim race with Olympic athletes, the real attraction here is the It’s a sharp deconstruction of a myth. Last year, a Friend feature on the world of door-to-door salespeople fascinated me in the same way. He is able to document a kind of masculinity like few others can, unraveling its tensions and deceptions until what begins as a profile of a single person becomes an archetypal X-ray. . You may not have heard this song before, but it’s sure to rock. —PR

Imogen Westnight | Guardian | 5 December 2023 | 7,400 words

I know from the beginning that this is going to break your heart. But from the first sentence, you know Imogen West-Knights is going to give you some fascinating reporting, so brace yourself and keep going. Last December, beloved chimpanzees at Sweden’s Hrvik Zoo escaped from their cage. It took him 72 hours before zoo staff and keepers placed them in the monkey house. West Knights recreates that ordeal with deft pacing and detail. Over time, the situation becomes even more dire as zoos must weigh the safety of the chimpanzees against the safety of zookeepers and the public. The photos in the piece, the snowy landscape on the zoo’s grounds that looks more sinister than serene, as one can’t help but imagine these great apes being left out in the cold, some of them in their final moments. It adds to the disturbing nature of the story. (You might also be wondering, why are we exposing these animals to places that are too cold for them for half the year?) This is a sad read, but it’s important to note that zoo safety protocols, climate Whether zoos should exist in the first place. —CLR

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Can you hear the timpani? Here are our readers’ favorite articles this week: